PREFACE Some time before his death, Sir Wilfrid Laurier placed in my hands all his papers, covering the period to the close of his term of office. After his death, Lady Laurier gave access to the later papers. These papers included all the documents of public interest which he had accumulated, with the exception of a few boxes of letters lost in the burning of the Parliament Buildings during the war. It will be noted that few letters have been reprinted in the early as compared with the late years of Sir Wilfrid's life. There is a striking difference in the character of the correspondence of the middle and of the last years. During his years of office, when business pressed and when men came across a continent at a prime minister's nod, the letters, though abundant, are nearly always brief and rarely of general interest. In the years of comparative leisure, when a leader in opposition had to go to men, or write them, and particularly when emotions were stirred, the letters are longer and freer. Sir Wilfrid's caution and his remarkable memory lessened the extent to which he committed himself on paper. He never wrote a letter when he could hold a conversation, and he never filed a document when he could store the fact in his memory: fortunately, his secretaries saw to the filing. So far as is known, he never wrote a line in a diary in his life. He was not given to introspection; he lived in his day's work. The writer is deeply indebted to friends of Sir Wilfrid and of his own who have read these pages in proof. They are given to the public with the hope that they may provide his countrymen with the material for a fuller understanding of one who was not only a moving orator, a skilled parliamentarian, a courageous party leader, and a faithful servant of his country, but who was the finest and simplest gentleman, the noblest and most unselfish man, it has ever been my good fortune to know. O. D. SKELTON. Kingston, Canada, |