the staunch and impulsive Reformer, was born in Springfield, Dundee, Scotland, on the 12th of March, 1795, and came to Canada in 1820. He was descended from a peasant parentage, and when a mere infant was thrown for support on his brother. He obtained a meagre business education in Dundee, and at seventeen started for England, where he obtained employment as a clerk with Lord Lonsdale. On the 18th of May, 1824, appeared in Niagra the first number of his paper, The Colonial Advocate. It was roughly written, and dry, and declamatory, but it was on the right side, and made the oligarchists twist uneasily in their chairs. "Every effort", says Mr. Morgan, "except such as reason and the law might have sanctioned, was made to suppress the paper. A bitter personal quarrel, carried on by means of the press, between Mr. Mackenzie and some prominent members of the official party, led, in 1826, to the violent destruction of the printing office by a mob of irritated friends of the ruling party. The office was forcibly entered and the types cast into the bay of Toronto. At this time, the paper was printed at that city. A most inopportune time was chosen for the work of destruction. It was probably not known to the rioters that the last number of the paper which it was intended to destroy had already been published; for if it had the act would have been stupid and illegal. As the act was done in the face of day, the perpetrators of it were known, and damages were recovered against them, on the case being brought into a court of justice. We must suppose that the object of scattering the types into the bay was to put an end to the existence of an obnoxious newspaper; but the effect was precisely the contrary of what had been intended. The paper, of which the last number had already been issued, received from the violence used to put it down a new lease of existence. The Colonial Advocate, instead of expiring in 1826, as it would, if left to itself, continued to be published till 1833, when the press and types were sold to Dr. O'Grady. In 1828, Mr. Mackenzie was elected to the Canadian Parliament, for the County of York. The violence of the official party was not confined to the destruction of a printing office. Mr. Mackenzie had, in his newspaper, used language towards the majority in the Assembly, which that majority chose to regard as libellous, and they resolved to punish the representative for the act of the journalist. The alleged libel consisted of describing the majority as sycophants fit only to register the decrees of arbitrary power. Language quite as strong as this has frequently been used in the House of Commons. For instance, Henry, now Lord Brougham, when in the House of Commons, said of the Minister Peel, 'I do not arraign him as much as I do you, his flatterers, his vile parasites,' for which language, so far from being expelled, he was not even called to order. But admitting the language used by Mr. Mackenzie to be libellous, the proper remedy would have been to bring the case before a jury. But that remedy was hopeless; it was notorious that no verdict could have been obtained against the publisher of the alleged libel. It was treated as a breach of privilege; on that ground the expulsion proceeded, and an attempt was made to render Mr. Mackenzie incapable of sitting in the Assembly. His re-election could not, however, be prevented, for  no member of the official party would have had the least chance against him; and as often as he was expelled - five times - he was re-elected; once when he was absent in England". He was chosen first Mayor of Toronto in 1836, and with all his faults, seemed to have been the darling of those who were doing battle for popular rights. His visit to Downing Street when the dominion of the Family Compact was most galling, was productive of several minor results; but it seemed to be our fortune to have gentlemen governing us then, who were conspicuous only for their utter unfitness for the position. Sir Francis Bond Head, with several trunks full of blank poems, plays and unfinished essays, made a great sensation on first appearing here, but he had a soft head, and the Tories promptly brought him into line. He was in Canada in 1837-38, the season of William Lyon Mackenzie's wild uprising near Toronto. Mackenzie did not succeed with his motley band of well-meaning followers, but with a price upon his head, fled the country through the wintry woods. He eventually obtained a pardon through the influence of his friend, Mr. Hume, and returned to Canada. The Reformers gave him the cold shoulder, and the Tories raised their eyes in horror when they looked upon him. In 1850, he opposed George Brown for Haldimand, and defeated him. He held his seat in the Assembly till 1858, when he resigned. He died in comparative poverty, at Toronto, in August 1861. In 1822, he married Isabel Baxter, a sister of Mr. George Baxter, teacher of the Royal Grammar School at Kingston, and the same from whom so many of our prominent Canadians received their early tuition. He left seven children.