Excerpt from The Library of Oratory, Ancient and Modern, Vol. 15 of 15: With Critical Studies of the World's Great Orators by Eminent Essayists IR john sparrow thompson, a distinguished Canadian statesman and jurist, the fourth Premier of the Dominion, was born at Halifax, Nova Scotia, Nov. 10, 1844, and died at Windsor Castle, Dec. 12, 1894. Early in his legal career he was the recognized leader of the Bar of that Province. He became a member of the Provincial government and for a short time was Premier. In 1882, he was appointed a judge, but in 1885 resigned to enter the Federal government, at Ottawa, in which he was appointed Minister of Justice. Upon the retirement of Sir John Abbott, in 1892, he became Premier of Canada and held the position until his sudden and lamented death at Windsor, England, at the early age of fifty. The circumstances of his death were exceedingly dramatic. During the autumn of 1894 he visited England to settle some details of the Bering Sea question, and to be sworn a member of the Imperial Privy Council. For this latter function he was sum moued to Windsor Castle to take the oath of office before the Queen on the 12th of December and while there he was stricken with syncope of the heart and died instantly. His remains were conveyed by a warship to Halifax. Sir John Thompson was one of the best parliamentary debaters of his time. His speeches are remarkable for beauty and finish, for the clearness and vigor of his utterances, and for the cogency of the arguments advanced. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.