On the 10th of December, Parliament again met. The House of Assembly re-elected Mr. Panet to the Speakership, and the Governor approved of his election. In his speech from the throne, Governor Craig had never doubted the loyalty and zeal of the parliaments which had met since he had assumed the administration of affairs. He was confident that they were animated by the best intentions to promote the interests of the King's government and the welfare of the people. He looked for such a disposition in the tenor of their deliberations. He called their attention to the temporary Act for the better preservation of His Majesty's government, and for establishing regulations respecting aliens or certain subjects of His Majesty, who had resided in France. No change had taken place in the state of public affairs, that would warrant a departure from those precautions which made the Act necessary. He did not mean that it should be supposed that he meant to divide the interests of His Majesty's government from the interests of the public, for they were inseparable. But the preservation of His Majesty's government was the safety of the province, and its security was the only safeguard to the public tranquillity. He therefore recommended those considerations together with the Act making temporary provision for the regulation of trade between Canada and the United States to their first and immediate consideration. He entreated them to believe that he should have great satisfaction in cultivating that harmony and good understanding which must be so conducive to the prosperity and happiness of the colony, and that he should most readily and cheerfully concur, in every measure, which they might propose, tending to promote those important objects. And he further intimated that the rule of his conduct was to discharge his duty to his sovereign, by a constant attention to the welfare of his subjects, who were committed to his charge, and these objects he felt to be promoted by a strict adherence to the laws and principles of the constitution, and by maintaining in their just balance the rights and privileges of every branch of the legislature. Sir James Craig's attempts at maintaining a balance of power were the chief causes of all his blundering. He did not himself know the proper balance of power between himself and the governed. He could not possibly perceive when his balance-beam was out of its centre, and if he had seen a slight leaning to one side, and that side not his own, he could not have conceived that the scales of justice would have been very much affected. It never occurred to him that the displacement of it, only to the extent of one-sixteenth half of an inch, on the side of Government and Council, would weigh a quarter of a century against the Assembly, the people and progress. But so it was. The beam with which Sir James Craig would have and did weigh out justice, was one-sided, and, to make matters still worse, the Governor threw into the adverse scale a host of his own prejudices, and of the prejudices of his secret councillors. He would have been glad, had the House expelled Mr. Bedard, one of its members, on the plea that it was prejudicial to its dignity that a representative of the people should be kept in durance, while the House was in session, and still more discreditable that that member should be charged with treason. Hardly had he delivered his speech, and the Assembly returned to their chamber, when the Governor sent a message to the House intimating that Mr. Bedard, who had been returned to Parliament, as the representative of Surrey, was detained in the common gaol of Quebec, under the "Preservation Act," charged with treasonable practices. The House most politely thanked the Governor-in-Chief for the information. The House resolved that Mr. Bedard was in the common gaol of Quebec. The House resolved that Pierre Bedard was, on the 27th day of March, returned to Parliament, as one of the Knights Representative of Surrey. The House resolved that Pierre Bedard, was then one of the members of the Assembly, for the existing Parliament. The House resolved that the simple arrest of any one of His Majesty's subjects did not render him incapable of election to the Assembly. The House resolved that the Government Preserves Act, guaranteed to the said Pierre Bedard, Esquire, the right of sitting in the Assembly. And the House resolved to present a humble address to His Excellency, informing him that his message had been seriously considered, that several resolutions had been passed, which they conceived it to be their duty to submit to His Excellency, and that it was the wish of the House that Pierre Bedard, Esquire, Knight Representative for the County of Surrey, might take his seat in the House.