Justice to the Loyalists

Year
1900
Month
6
Day
4
Article Title
Justice to the Loyalists
Author
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Page Number
4
Article Type
Language
Article Contents
JUSTICE TO THE LOYALISTS. The people of St. John are indebted to the Rev. John deSoyres, LL. D-, for some interesting information which he has communicated to an evening contemporary in regard to Dr. Moses Ciol-Tyler, “the distinguished American historian, who did us the honor last week of accepting an honorary degree at our university." The condescension of this act was increased by the fact, so pointedly stated by Dr. deSoyres, that Dr. Bridges, who performed the office of introducer of the recipients of honorary degrees with dignity and efficiency, was prevented from doing justice to the merits of Dr. Tyler, “on account of the absolute impossibility of finding anything to say about many of those others, whom the extensive sympathies of the Senate had added to the list.” We join with Dr. deSoyres in regretting that no special recognition was offered in the province of the Loyalists to Dr. Tyler who has done justice to the merits and difficulties of the Loyalists in his “Literary History of the Revolution," but this cause of regret might have been avoided if Dr. deSoyres had written his letter in advance of the arrival of Dr. Tyler instead of after his departure. We fear, however, that Dr. deSoyres is hardly doing justice to another American writer when he speaks of Dr. Tyler as “the first of Americans to do justice to the merits and difficulties of the Loyalists." Lorenzo Sabine, whose book on the Loyalists was published in 1S17, dealt with, the founders of this province in quite as kindly a fashion as anything that Dr. deSoyres quotes from Dr. Tyler's book. Indeed we cannot help thinking that the latter must have read Sabine while preparing his own work. Dr. Tyler says: "On whose cheek should have been the blush of shame, when the habitations of the aged and feeble were sacked, and no refuge was left but the woods! When the innocent were outraged, and foul words spoken to women?" Half a century before Dr. Tyler's book was published, Sabine wrote as follows: "On whose cheek should have been the blush of shame, when the habitation of the aged and feeble Foster was backed, and he had no shelter but the woods? When Williams, as infirm as he, was seized at night, dragged away for miles and smoked in a room with fastened doors and a closed chimney top? What father who doubled, wavered and doubled still, whether to join or fly, determined to abide the issue in the land of his birth because foul words were spoken to his daughters, or because they were pelted when riding or moving in the innocent dance?"