Elections, electors and elected; stories of elections past and present

N.>C^oS-

a-'> /

Elections, Electors and
Elected

':'^9^^

THE LIBRARY

OF

THE UNIVERSITY

OF CALIFORNIA

PRESENTED BY

PROF. CHARLES A. KOFOID AND

MRS. PRUDENCE W. KOFOID

Elections, Electors and
Elected

Stories of Elections Tast and Tresent

By

R. G. Webster

LL.B., J.P., Barrister-at-Iaw

Author of " Japan : From the Old to the New,"
" The Trade of the World," etc.

London

8. W. Partridge & Co.

8 and g Paternoster. Ri;^''^irn^^vri;?;;>..

1906 ( ^.. 2> *\

OLD ACQUAINTANCES

IN THE

HOUSE OF COMMONS

THE AUTHOR INSCRIBES

THESE PAGES

Preface

Those who wish for a complete guide to
the conduct of a parliamentary election will
have to consult the many text-books on that
subject, though in these pages will be found
many hints — useful hints, it is my hope —
conducive to success, and not to be found
elsewhere. From my experience as a can-
didate in five contested parliamentary elec-
tions, and as one who has assisted in scores
of other contests, who has been returned to
Parliament in the majority of the former, and
has had the satisfaction of aiding the victorious
candidates in the vastly greater number of
the latter elections, I have often found that
local enthusiasm and the lack of knowledge
as to the right way to fight an election have
led many candidates, their agents and sup-
porters, into all sorts of political pitfalls,
purposely placed in their way by astute

7

8 Preface

opponents. Endless time and energy have
been wasted on all sorts of false issues,
whilst the real question before the electors
has been neglected, the result being defeat.

I do not want anyone to cast this little
book aside and say, '' Oh, elections ! that
must be a dull book, as it does not deal with
the subjects which I usually read about in
novels — namely, love and marriage, intrigue
and scandal, murder and sudden death, and
other pleasant subjects." All I ask is, who-
ever takes this little book up, read it and
judge for yourself

And whilst deeply impressed with the
importance of the subject, and that the
election of a member of Parliament for any
constituency is a gravely important matter,
both to the man who is elected that he
does his duty faithfully and well, and to his
constituents that he is a useful and fitting
representative, although not, as some con-
stituencies seem to imagine, the fountain of
doles, or a sort of voluntary relieving officer,
still, thank goodness ! life is not all gloom ;
there is the bright side to everything as well
as the dark, there is light and shade to every
truly depicted picture. A man need not be

Preface 9

invariably considered clever because he is
supernaturally heavy and dull and wearisome.
And whatever my critics may say, I shall,
in these pages, go from grave to gay, even
on this deeply important subject. The public
has decided in its latter-day reading, mainly
consisting of fiction, not to peruse the Lydia
Languish-cum- Falkland kind of twaddle; no
more can they endure a few hundred pages
of the sighs and the woes of a love-sick
maiden, the agonies and despair of her more
or less devoted lover, ending in the over-
throw of the villain, a marriage, and a live-
happy-ever-after numerous- progeny chapter
at the end. No ; apparently, from the few
novels I have recently read, they now
demand a high - spirited heroine, who, to-
gether with her numerous admirers, must
move in the highest* circles, who passes her
time in incessant love affairs and in constant
travelling at home or abroad, and in visits
to the houses of the aristocracy. The
majority of these worthy characters must be
endowed with high - sounding titles, with
wealth beyond the dreams of avarice, and be,
as a rule, abnormally selfish and absolutely
devoid of brains.

lo Preface

The public, who is the king in such matters,
has decided that the humorous element shall
not be lacking in these works. Let it be
so. But can any, even the best of them,
compare in real wit and humour to the
description of the Eatanswill Election in
Ptcktvick} Would that any writer of the
present day could compare with Dickens,
that great master of the pen, who was
witty without being — without leaving a nasty
taste in the mouth. So was Lever, and so
was Marryat. If I have before me such
"examples who dealt with elections, our army,
and our navy, both in the serious and also
in the lighter vein — and how many thousands
of boys have joined our navy partly through
reading Midshipman Easy, and turned out to
be gallant sailors ? — if I have such examples
before me, I know I shall be pardoned by
the less exacting if I, too, attempt, however
imperfectly, to emulate their example. I
purpose in these pages not only to give
many of my own personal experiences at
elections, as well as those of others, both in
the past and at the present day, but to avoid
as far as practicable — though to do so
entirely would be difficult — allusions to any

Preface 1 1

burning political question of the day. The
country will ere long be engaged in the
throes of a General Election. The name
I believe I was generally known by in the
" House " was *' R. G.," and " R. G.," there-
fore, wishes that the best men may win. But
who ** the best men " are he leaves for others
to decideo

R. G. W.

8 King's Bench Walk,
Temple, E.G.

Contents

CHAPTER I

ELECTIONS IN THE DAYS OF OPEN VOTING

PAGE

Nominations on the Hustings — Gladstone's Contest

in 1868 in South-West Lancashire . . .17

CHAPTER H

THE GIANTS OF THE PAST

Edmund Burke's Oratory — He declines the Poll at
Bristol— The Great Pitt— Wilberforce's Address
to the Electors of Hull— The Great West-
minster Election of 1796 — Charles James Fox
heads the Poll — The Duchess and the Butcher
— The Middlemen and their Profits — Speech
by Fox to his Constituents — An old West-
minster Custom — The first Sir Robert Peel as
a Reformer — Cobden on Free Trade — Our
Fiscal System — Palmerston on Civis Roinanus
sum — Beaconsfield's Prophecy regarding Home
Rule fulfilled— The Funeral of a Great States-
man— Underground Electioneering — "Bottling"
the Electors — Pocket Boroughs . . / 23

14 Contents

CHAPTER III

A CONTESTED ELECTION IN CUMBERLAND, 1880

PAGE

Canvassers and Canvassing — The Blues and the
"Yallars" — How the Money was then Spent —
"Register! Register! Register!" — Organisation 47

CHAPTER IV

BYE-ELECTIONS IN THE EARLY EIGHTIES

The Power of Oratory — Greater Britain — " Beyond
the County and the Shire " — A Bye-Election in
the West Countree — Speaking at Tiverton —
The Candidate's Reply 58

CHAPTER V

CONTESTING A SEAT IN LONDON

What "Flags and Banners" may include — The
" Pups " versus the " Lambs " — Are Open
Meetings always the Best? — Old-time Politi-
cal Stage Property — Should the Candidates
Canvass? — Bill-posting, etc. — The Use of a
Spare Set of Envelopes 71

CHAPTER VI

TACTICS AT ELECTIONS

False Statements and how to Check Them — About
Meetings — A Committee ? — The Candidate and
his Election Agent — Speakers from Outside —
A Marked Register — The Country before Party
Politics 86

Contents 1 5

CHAPTER VII

THE FIRST "unionist" FIGHT AT THE POLLS

FACE

The Public Dinner— The Chairman's Danger— The
Ghostly Electors — Personation, Penalties for —
A Life Assurance Yarn— "The Copper Kettle"
— Returned to Parliament — Taking One's Seat 99

CHAPTER VIII

"the house"

All-Night Sittings — On Speaking in the House-
Parliamentary Gossip — "The Elector of Middle-
sex "—The Retort Courteous ?— " Obstruction "
—"Those Fearful Creatures "—Lord Rath-
more's Mistake — "The Devoted Gorillas" —
Sir Havelock Allen — The Flattened Member —
Carry Motion to Abolish the Illiterate Vote . no

CHAPTER IX

IN OPPOSITION

Re-elected — Nothing like Caution — When does a
Candidature Commence ? — The Election Agent
—The Sub- Agent— No Flies about Him— The
Day of the Election — Independent Organisa-
tions— Desirability of Written Orders with
Counterfoils — Interview with Lord Salisbury,
then Prime Minister — Electioneering in Mont-
gomeryshire— Dinners at the House and the
Jubilee Club — A Contested Election in Lincoln-
shire— With Lord Randolph Churchill in Perth-
shire— Mass Meeting at Todmorden . .126

1 6 Contents

CHAPTER X

ANOTHER GENERAL ELECTION

PAGE

" The Cordite Vote "—Another Contested Election
— Mr Chamberlain's likeness to Pitt — " Always
Fight for a Win " — Helping at a Bye-election —
The Wrong Meeting— On Public Speaking —
Racial Characteristics — A Political Fight in
Holborn — Scotland and Heckling — The Chair-
man— Undue Length of a General Election —
Conclusion 143

Elections, Electors and
Elected

CHAPTER I

ELECTIONS IN THE DAYS OF OPEN VOTING

In jotting down some of the electioneering
incidents which have fallen to my lot during
five contests at the polls, in three of which I
had the honour of being returned to Parlia-
ment, although no attempt will be made to
show how to win an election, it will be my
wish to interest the readers by giving them
some of my own experiences at the parlia-
mentary elections in which I have either
been a candidate or have assisted, and to
add here and there a few hints to candi-
dates and others as to what are the
best things to do and those to avoid at
elections.

My first experience of electioneering was

17 2

1 8 Elections, Electors and Elected

as a boy going with my stepfather to the
nominations of the rival candidates at a
North-country town.

It was in the days of open nominations,
and the hustings were erected in the market-
place, each candidate and his friends being
divided by a wooden partition from the oppo-
site party. The proceedings were practically
in dumb show, and the proposing and second-
ing of the Conservative and the Liberal, and
their speeches, were perfectly inaudible for
the noise and din, the blare of rival brass
bands, tin trumpets, whistles, and the mingled
cheers, howls, and yells of the free and inde-
pendent electors and their belongings. Even
the mayor, who acted as returning officer, on
his declaring the show of hands in favour of
one of the rival candidates, hardly got a
hearing, a poll being at once demanded on
behalf of his opponent. The only one person
to whom the crowd would listen was a local
wag, a toffee merchant, who had a stall in
the market-place, and rejoiced in the name of
** Toffee Joe." His views were supposed to
be strongly democratic, and he heckled the
Conservative candidate with a number of
more or less smartly -put questions of a

Elections in the Days of Open Voting 1 9

somewhat bantering nature. This delighted
the crowd immensely, and they laughed and
cheered to their hearts' content, punctuating
their enthusiasm by a few cabbages and other
missiles indiscriminately hurled at those on
the hustings. The gentleman whom my rela-
tive was supporting treated the matter as a
good joke, and retorted smartly, winding up
by saying: "Joe, you stick to toffee!" and
turning to the crowd, he continued, " You try
his toffee, you'll find it much better than
his jokes." In fact, though the proceedings
were rather noisy and rough - and - tumble,
they were on that occasion quite good-
natured and free from bitterness.

The next occasion that it fell to my lot to
be present at an election was at a memorable
contest in 1868. For at this election, in
South- West Lancashire, Gladstone and Gren-
fell were the candidates on one side, and
Turner and Cross on the other. It was par-
ticularly keenly fought, and it occurred during
the old days of open voting, and prior to the
Ballot Act. There was then only one polling-
place for the whole of this large constituency,
and that was at Newton-le- Willows, and to
this, at that time, small township I drove

20 Elections, Electors and Elected

over with the late Col. Wilson Patten, then
M.P. for North Lancashire (afterwards Lord
Winmarleigh), and my stepfather. The
excitement all day long was intense as the
returns of the state of the poll were issued
from time to time from the rival committee
rooms. On their being posted up one
noticed that each of them differed slightly ;
they always gave a couleur de rose return for
their own candidates. The official returns
came out every one or two hours, and, of
course, were the only really accurate and
reliable ones. It was, during the greater
part of the day, a very close contest indeed,
and for a lonor time Gladstone and Grenfell

o

were slightly ahead, and it was not until an
hour or so before the close of the poll (which
then ended as early as four o'clock) that
Turner and Cross had the majority of the
votes, and they were ultimately returned.

One rather amusing incident which occurred
during this contest was the following : — An
elderly gentleman, arrayed in a blue coat
and brass buttons, a determined supporter
of one of the two great parties in the State
(and there were only two great political
parties in those days, and not, as now,

Elections in the Days of Open Voting 2 1

several) was asked by the presiding officer
when he went into the polling-booth for
whom he tendered his vote, and replied,
** For the righteous cause," and it was not
until several renewed queries had been
addressed to him, and it was pointed out to
him that he must name the candidates he
voted for or his vote would not be registered,
that he at length consented to give the
names of those for whom he wished to vote.
Another elector arrived by a train about ten
minutes to four o'clock, proposing to go to
the polling-booth. A gentleman who was a
supporter of the opposite party to the in-
tending voter engaged him in earnest con-
versation, till at length the latter said, ** Well !
good-bye, I must be off to vote." '* Next
election, I think," said the wily one, who had
been conversing with him. " Why, what
do you mean?" ''Mean!" he replied, ''it's
past four o'clock, and you're too late this
journey." This was then considered a smart
electioneering trick.

Shortly before the close of the poll, when
it was obvious that Turner and Cross were
in, I got a good horse, which, at my request,
an ostler had retained for me, and went a

2 2 Elections, Electors ana Electea

hand gallop over the stony road (then made
of cobble sets) to the town of Warrington
with the news, and it need hardly be said
that my reception at the committee rooms
of the victorious candidates was an enthusi-
astic one, as it was generally anticipated that,
at the utmost, not more than one of those
candidates would have been elected.

CHAPTER II

THE GIANTS OF THE PAST

Before I take up the thread of my own elec-
toral experiences, I propose briefly to refer
to some interesting matters respecting a few
notable elections in bygone days, and give
short extracts from the speeches of great
statesmen on grave issues before the country
in the past, issues still, many of them, of to-day.

Prior to the Reform Acts passed during the
last century, the polling at contested elections
was not, as now, concluded in a day, but lasted
for fifteen days, and, in consequence, the wear
and tear of these contests and their consequent
expense to the candidates were appalling.

The bravest and the wisest electioneering
address that I have ever come across, ad-
dressed to an assembly of Englishmen, was
one delivered to the electors of Bristol by

Edmund Burke in 1780. ** Would," as

23

24 Elections, Electors and Elected

Maurice wrote, "our younger statesmen
might read it again and again, till they
have, in the true sense of the phrase, learnt
it by heart." Burke, who had represented
that city during a Parliament for six years
prior to that date, was presenting himself
to his old constituents for re-election, and
explaining his conduct to them to ask for
a renewal of their confidence. There was,
however, a feeling at that time amongst the
merchants of that city that he had injured
their trade by his votes on the American
War ; he had, moreover, offended their pre-
judices in other ways, and he had been too
busy in his parliamentary work to pay them
as many visits as they had supposed were
due from a representative ; and a journey
from Westminster to Bristol was not then,
as now, a matter of hours, but of days.
He made the most complete defence in a
speech delivered just before the election, from
which great oration I would here fain make
a few extracts. *' I should wish," Burke
said, ''undoubtedly (if idle wishes were not
the most idle of all things) to make every
part of my conduct agreeable to every one of
my constituents. But in so great a city, and

The Giants of the Past 25

so greatly divided as this, it is weak to
expect it. In such a discordancy of senti-
ments it is better to look to the nature of
things than to the humours of men. The
very attempt toward pleasing everybody
discovers a temper always flashy, and often
false and insincere. Therefore, as I have
proceeded straight onward in my conduct,
so I will proceed in my account of these
parts of it which have been most excepted
to " ; and later in the speech he added :
•* Gentlemen, we must not be peevish with
those who serve the people. We shall
either drive such men from the public stage
or shall send them to the court for protec-
tion, where, if they must sacrifice their
reputation, they will at least secure their
interest. Depend upon it, that the lovers
of freedom will be free. . . . If we degrade
and deprave the minds of our representatives
by servility, it will be absurd to expect that
they who are creeping and abject before us
will ever be bold and incorruptible asserters
of our freedom against the most seducing
and the most formidable of all powers."
Speaking of his political opponent, who had
evidently been "■ nursing," as it is called, the

26 Elections^ Electors and Elected

constituency in Burke's absence at his
parliamentary duties at Westminster, he said,
'' While I watched and fasted and sweated
in the House of Commons, by the most easy
and ordinary acts of election, by dinners and
visits, by 'How do you do's?' and * My
worthy friends,' I was quietly moved out
of my seat ; and promises were made and
engagements entered into, without any
exception or reserve, as if my laborious
zeal in my duty had been a regular abdica-
tion of my trust. ... I knew that you
chose me, in my place along with others,
to be a pillar of the State, and not a weather-
cock on the top of the edifice, exalted for
my levity and versatility, and of no use but
to indicate the shiftings of every fashionable
gale. . . . To have been the man chosen
out to redeem our fellow-citizens from
slavery, to purify our laws from absurdity
and injustice, and to cleanse our religion from
the blot and stain of persecution, would be
an honour and happiness to which my wishes
would undoubtedly aspire, but to which
nothing but my wishes would have entitled
me. ... I must fairly tell you that, as far
as my principles are concerned (principles

The Giants of the Past 27

that I hope will only depart with my last
breath) I have no idea of liberty uncon-
nected with honesty and justice. . . . No!
The charges against me are all of one kind,
that I have pushed the principles of general
justice and benevolence too far, further than
a cautious policy would warrant, and further
than the opinions of many would go along
with me. In every accident which may
happen through life — in pain, in sorrow, in
depression and distress — I will call to mind
this accusation and be comforted."

At the close of his speech Mr Burke was
encouraged to go on with his canvass ; but the
opposition being too decided on the second
day of the election, he declined the poll in a
noble address, which concluded as follows : —

" I tremble when I consider the trust I have
presumed to ask. I confided too much, per-
haps, to my intentions. They were really fair
and upright, and I am bold to say, that I ask
no ill thing for you when, on parting from
this place, I pray that whoever you choose
to succeed me, he may resemble me exactly
in all things, except in my abilities to serve
and my fortune to please you."

I have not by me the name of the gentle-

28 Elections^ Electors and Elected

man who succeeded Burke as one of the
representatives of Bristol, but that is im-
material ; he no doubt got what he desired —
honours or decorations, if they were given in
those days, or, more probably, a statue to
delight the eyes of future generations.

About that period, or shortly afterwards, in
1789, one of the great questions on which
elections were fought was the abolition of
the Slave Trade, which was urged by William
Wilberforce in many forcible and earnest
speeches. In 1792 he introduced a motion
in the House of Commons for its immediate
suppression, and supported it by an able
speech. The speakers who followed were
still inclined for delay, and for gradual rather
than immediate abolition. Pitt supported
Wilberforce in an eloquent address. Regard-
ing this oratorical effort, the latter inserted
in his diary as follows: — *' Windham, who
has no love for Pitt, tells me that Fox
and Gray, with whom he walked home
from this debate, agreed on thinking Pitt's
speech one of the most extraordinary dis-
plays of eloquence they had ever heard.
For the last twenty minutes he really
seemed to be inspired.'* All authorities

The Giants of the Past 29

agree that this was one of the greatest
efforts of Pitt's genius, because it com-
bined, with the most impassioned declama-
tion, the deepest pathos, the most Hvely
imagination, and the closest reasoning.
Pitt opposed slavery in every form and
shape, and declined to allow the matter
to wait for its abolition ''for the general
concurrence of Europe," and in one of
the concluding sentences of this speech he
said : *' Then may we hope that even Africa,
though last of all the quarters of the globe,
shall enjoy at length, on the evening of her
days, those blessings which have descended
so plentifully upon us in a much earlier period
of the world. Then also will Europe, partici-
pating in her improvement and prosperity,
receive an ample recompense for the tardy
kindness (if kindness it can be called) of no
longer hindering that continent from extri-
cating herself out of the darkness which in
other more fortunate regions has been so
much more speedily dispelled. It is on this
view, sir — it is an atonement for a long and
cruel injustice to Africa — that the measure
proposed by my honourable friend most
forcibly recommends itself to my mind."

30 Elections, Electors and Elected

Wilberforce, though a strong reformer and
philanthropist, and an earnest worker for the
abolition of slavery, undoubtedly held strongly
patriotic sentiments^ in fact, at that date the
enemies of Great Britain were the enemies
of practically all its inhabitants, and we
viewed such matters then in the same way
they now present themselves to the peoples
of the United States and Japan. In 1807,
addressing his constituents at Hull, the follow-
ing occurs in a speech which Wilberforce
made whilst we were engaged in war during
the Napoleonic era : — *' I am glad, gentle-
men, to know I am addressing those who,
like myself, revere this excellent constitu-
tion, and assign its just nature to each of
its respective parts ; who know that all
three branches of it are equally necessary,
and who understand that liberty and loyalty
can co-exist in happy and harmonious com-
bination. Gentlemen, as long as you thus
understand the constitution under which you
live, and know its nature, so long will you
be safe and happy, and notwithstanding
the varieties of political opinions which will
exist in a free country, you will present a firm
and united front against every foreign enemy.

The Giants of the Past 3 1

Great countries are perhaps never conquered
solely from without, and while this spirit of
patriotism and its effects continue to flourish,
you may, with the favour of Providence, bid
defiance to the greatest of our adversaries."

A few years prior to this electioneering
speech of Wilberforce's at Hull occurred one
of the most notable and hardly-fought elec-
tions in the history of the City of West-
minster. The polling lasted for fifteen days,
and it is thus referred to in a record of that
election published shortly after that date : —

"In consequence of the dissolution, the
gentlemen undermentioned offered them-
selves as candidates to represent the ancient
and respectable City of Westminster in the
new Parliament to be holden at Westminster,
July 12, 1796.

** The Rt. Hon. Charles James Fox.

"John Home Tooke.

" Sir Alan Gardner, Bart., Vice- Admiral of
the White and Major-General of Marines."

Each candidate apparently fought in
different interests. Sir Alan Gardner was a
supporter of the then Tory administration of
which Pitt was Premier, Fox stood in the
Whig interest, and Tooke was an ultra-

32 Elections^ Electors and Elected

Radical. For these fifteen days each candi-
date addressed the electors at the poll.
Fox's speeches were, as all his addresses
always were, of a most eloquent character.
The admiral's were, as may be imagined,
extremely dignified ones, and Tooke's were
of the vituperative and burning with indigna-
tion, down with everything and with every-
body, except Tooke description. I will not
attempt to give them, nor would space
permit me to do so. It is interesting to
note that at the conclusion of the poll on the
first day the poll was as follows : —

Y ox Mr Fox, 232 ; for Admiral Gardner,

132 ; and for Mr Tooke, 129.
At the end of the eighth day the poll stood —
Admiral Gardner, 2624; Mr Fox, 2529;

Mr Tooke, 1634.

At the end of the poll on the fifteenth day —

Mr Fox, 5160; Admiral Gardner, 4818 ;

Mr Tooke 2819 ;

and the two former were returned. This

election is also notable for the fact that

during its continuance the beautiful Duchess

of Devonshire of the day gave a butcher a

kiss in exchange for his vote for Fox. It

has been rumoured that in more recent days,

The Giants of the Past 33

during a contested election, one of the can-
vassers, who was a young and attractive lady
of title, was informed by a Westminster
butcher that there was a custom in that
borough which he should appreciate if she
complied with before he promised to give his
vote for her candidate. The lady gathered
up her skirts and hastily departed, saying,
** ril mention it to the committee ! "

The butchers in Westminster appear, about
the date of Fox's election in 1796, or shortly
afterwards, to have moved actively to en-
deavour to get rid of what was to them a
great grievance, and which a committee of
the House was appointed to inquire into —
namely, the disadvantage they laboured under
owing to the excessive prices charged them
for meat by the middlemen.

The committee heard evidence and went
into the matter thoroughly, and made three
recommendations as to the best mode to
obviate the evil complained of, though
whether that evil still exists I know not.

Their chief recommendation was as
follows : —

**That it is the opinion of the committee
that the practice of jobbers and others who

3

34 Elections, Electors and Elected

buy cattle and sheep on speculation, which
are afterwards sold at advanced prices several
times before they are purchased by the
cutting retail butcher (by which several
unnecessary profits are obtained between the
former and the consumer), are the principal
causes of the dearness of butchers' meat
within the bills of mortality ; these practices,
having increased to an excessive height of
late years, ought to be abolished."

Then, ^as now, commemorative banquets
appear to have been held in Westminster
and the London district in honour of victories
at the polls, and as Mr Fox's was a most
notable one at Westminster, considering the
strong forces allied against him, on loth
October 1797, on the first anniversary of his
return, a dinner and meeting were held at the
Shakespeare Tavern, Covent Garden, to mark
that event, and Mr Fox, in the course of his
speech, made the following pointed remarks
regarding what he called ''independent
men" in the House of Commons: — ''When
the Ministers apprehend any change is likely
to take place in the conduct of one of these
gentlemen, he is immediately sent out of the
House of Commons into the House of Peers.

The Giants of the Past 35

This mode of expulsion from the House of
Commons secures to Ministers a perpetual
majority, because the man who gives up his
constituents for a seat in another place for
life is independent of them, may vote as he
pleases, he having nothing to fear with
regard to election, and his successor makes
fair promises to the constituents and then has
a number of years to do as he pleases inde-
pendent of them."

Fox united in a most remarkable degree
the seemingly opposing characters of the
mildest of men and the most vehement of
orators. In private life he was gentle,
modest, placable, kind, of simple manners,
unostentatious, and somewhat inactive in
conversation. In public life he had an un-
bounded zeal for the civil and religious rights
of all men, and by his liberal principles was
favourable to mild government, and to the
unfettered exercise of the human faculties
and the progressive civilisation of mankind.
** Fox's eloquence," says Lord Brougham,
**was of a kind which, to comprehend, you
must have heard yourself. When he got
fairly into his subject, was heartily warmed
with it, he poured forth words and periods

^6 Elections, Electors and Elected

J

of fire that smote you, and deprived you of
all power to reflect and rescue yourself, while
he went on to seize the faculties of the
listener, and carry them captive with him,
whithersoever he might please to lead."

Regarding the custom of annually making
an address to a constituency by its repre-
sentative, it may be interesting to note the
following observations made by Sir John
Hobhouse, then one of the members for
Westminster in 1827, in a speech in the
House of Commons. ''There was a
practice," he said, ** which prevailed in the
city which he had the honour to represent
(Westminster), in obedience to which the
representatives were obliged annually to
appear before the represented, to render an
account of their proceedings, and to receive
such instructions with respect to their future
conduct as the circumstances of the time
rendered expedient."

Sir Robert Peel, in speaking to his con-
stituents at Tamworth in 1835, shortly after
his conversion to the movement for Reform,
said: **I am told I am not a reformer, and that
if I am a reformer I must be an apostate " ;
and further added, later on in his address :

The Giants of the Past ^j

" I may sometimes doubt whether the evil
of the remedy is not greater than that of
the disease. If I entertain that opinion I will
avow it, in spite of its temporary unpopu-
larity; but I shall approach the consideration
of an alleged abuse with the firm belief that
if the allegation be true, a government gains
ten times more strength by correcting an
admitted evil than they could by maintaining
it, if it were possible to maintain it." Words,
it were needless to add, of pregnant import
for all time.

The great question before the country
shortly after that period, and for a succeeding
decade or two, was Free Trade. And I think
it would be interesting to give some quota-
tions from a speech from the great apostle of
that doctrine, Mr Richard Cobden, delivered
in the House of Commons. He enunciated to
the House of Commons the great dogmas he
was rousing the country to carry out by plat-
form speeches and the free distribution of
pamphlets. This speech on the Corn Laws
was delivered in the House on 27th February
1846, and in the course of it he said :

" But the truth is, that you all know that
the country knows that there never was a

38 Elections, Electors and Elected

more monstrous delusion than to suppose
that that which goes to increase the trade
of the country, and to extend its manufac-
tures and commerce — that which adds to our
numbers, increases our population, enlarges
the number of your customers, and diminishes
your burdens by multiplying the shoulders
that are to bear them, and gives them
increased strength to bear them — can pos-
sibly tend to diminish the value of land."

And he further added in this address his
views on what have been called the "good
example " theory :

'VWe have set an example to the world
in all ages ; we have given them the repre-
sentative system. The very rules and regu-
lations of this House have been taken as a
model for every representative assembly in
the whole world ; and having, besides, given
them an example of a free press and religious
freedom, and every institution that belongs
to freedom and civilisation, we are now
about to give them a greater example — we
are going to set the example of making
industry free, to set the example of giving
the whole world every advantage of clime
and latitude and situation, relying ourselves

The Giants of the Past 39

on the freedom of our industry. Yes, we are
going to teach the world that useful lesson."

Sixty years have rolled by since that great
pronouncement was made by Mr Richard
Cobden. Whether the world has learnt that
useful lesson is, of course, too controversial a
subject to touch on in these pages.

There has been probably no Minister of
the Crown since Pitt who has been more
resolved to safeguard the interests of every
British subject at home or abroad than
Palmerston (others, no doubt, may have
been equally so). In 1850, however, **his
spirited foreign policy " was challenged in
the House of Commons, and in the course
of the debate which ensued he made the
following notable remarks : —

** I therefore fearlessly challenge the ver-
dict which this House, as representing
a political, a commercial, a constitutional
country, is to give on the question now
brought before it, whether the principles on
which the foreign policy of Her Majesty's
Government has been conducted, and the
sense of duty which has led us to think
ourselves bound to afford protection to our
fellow- subjects abroad, are proper and fitting

40 Elections, Electors and Elected

guides for those who are charged with the
government of England ; and whether, as
the Roman, in days of old, held himself
free from indignity, so also a British sub-
ject, in whatever land he may be, shall feel
confident that the watchful eye and the
strong arm of England will protect him from
injustice and wrong."

There was certainly, it will be admitted,
nothing of "the Uriah Heep Little Eng-
lander " about that great and popular Minister
of the Crown.

Coming on to more recent times, a year
before the General Election of 1874, which
resulted in the overthrow of the then Glad-
stonian Administration, Lord Beaconsfield
(then Mr Disraeli) delivered a great address
to the Glasgow Conservative Association,
and at the termination of his speech used
these words : '* Our connection with Ireland
would then be brought painfully to our
consciousness, and I should not be at all
surprised if the visor of Home Rule should
fall off some day and behold a very different
countenance. Now, gentlemen, I think we
ought to be prepared for these circumstances.
The position of England is one which is

The Giants of the Past 41

indicative of danger from holding a middle
course upon such matters. . . . These things
may be far off, but we live in a rapid age,
and my apprehension is that they are nearer
than some suppose. If that struggle comes,
we must look to Scotland to aid us. It
was once, and I hope is still, a land of
liberty, of patriotism, and of religion. I
think the time has come when it really
should leave off mumbling the dry bones of
political economy and munching the remain-
ing biscuit of an effete Liberalism. We all
know that a General Election is at hand. I
do not ask you to consider on such an occasion
the fate of parties or of Ministers, but I ask
you to consider this, that it is very probable
that the future of Europe depends greatly on
the character of the next Parliament of Eng-
land ; I ask you, when the occasion comes, to
act as becomes an ancient and famous nation,
and give all your energies for the cause of
faith and freedom." It has not been my good
fortune to come across a more stirring, bugle-
like call to action before a General Election
than this speech of Lord Beaconsfield. In
this I think all, whether they agree or dis-
agree with what he then said, will concur.

42 Elections, Electors and Elected

To give examples of Mr Gladstone's oratory
before or during the great political conflicts in
which he fought, and in most of which he was
victorious, appears needless. Mr Morley,
in his *' Life " of that great man, has so ably
and so recently dealt with the various phases
of his career, that to attempt to touch on them
would be as essaying to gild refined gold.
May I, as one who sat in three Parliaments
with Mr Gladstone, humbly say, that though
opposing at that time his policy, I was spell-
bound by his oratory ? I can testify, as an old
*' Unionist" member, that never did a body
of men slowly march with greater sorrow or
greater respect through St Stephen's Hall and
down the grand Hall of Westminster, than
did the members of the Lords and Commons
behind the remains of that great statesman to
his last resting-place in the Abbey. We all
felt a giant amongst men had passed away.

If one touch of pathos could have been
added to the solemnity of the service and the
gravity of the whole surroundings, midst the
semi-darkness of the Abbey, the beautiful
liturgy, the thoughtful address, and the
majestic beauty of the sacred music, it was
the fact that the boys of his old collegiate

The Giants of the Past 43

school, the Eton volunteers, lined the
entrance to the Abbey, and formed a funeral
guard of honour to the remains of the great
statesman, soon to rest within those historic
walls with the dust of kings, heroes, patriots,
and statesmen of the past.

When elections were as protracted as they
were in the past, and prior to legislation
respecting their cost, the expenses were in
many instances terrific ; an election in York-
shire between a Whig and Tory candidate
respectively, a Fitzwilliam and a Lowther,
practically cost each of them a not inconsider-
able fortune.

That was in the days of open voting, and
in those days not only bribery, but intimida-
tion, were factors with which nearly all candi-
dates had to reckon ; though, of course, even
at that time many constituencies were above
suspicion in that respect.

It is stated that early in the last century a
respectable tradesman in Berwick-on-Tweed,
which was then a parliamentary borough,
placed in his window, about an hour before
the close of the poll — and was not ashamed to
do it — the words, ** I have not yet voted."

It was, it should be stated, a small elec-

44 Elections, Electors and Elected

torate and a close contest, and the hint was
given in this unblushing way for a visit
from an agent of either of the candidates.
In fact, bribery was then looked on as a
venial offence, and a vote was then con-
sidered by many more as a marketable asset
than as a trust to be given in accordance
with the individual opinion of the elector.

In some towns groups of ** freemen " who
had votes used to combine, in a sort of guild,
and refrained from going to the poll until late
in the contest ; their leader would then have
interviews with the agents of the respective
candidates, and whoever of them was most
lavish in his offer, found these " free and inde-
pendent" gentlemen record their votes for
his man during the last hour of the poll, who
was in consequence returned to Parliament.

There was also a system then in some
places prevalent, which, though illegal, was
occasionally resorted to, and called ''bottling
the electors." This, it is sad to relate, con-
sisted in getting a number of the supporters
of the rival candidates into a public-house,
and either plying them with liquor till they
were incapable of voting, or attaining the
same end by some other means, such as by

The Giants of the Past 45

shutting them up In a backyard of an hostelry
till the end of the poll. Another equally
unfair device was said to have been occasion-
ally practised at Liverpool and other seaport
towns, and that was to entice voters of the
opposite way of thinking on board a steamer
and then take them off, nolens volens, to the
Isle of Man, or keep them at sea till the
conclusion of the hours for voting.

Elections to the House of Commons were
simplified in the case of nomination boroughs,
where, in many instances, there were only a
few dozen or a few score electors, all under
the influence of one territorial magnate,
whose steward practically informed the elec-
tors whom they should return to represent
them in Parliament. In these boroughs there
was frequently not even the formality of a
contest.

It is a matter of note that some of our
greatest statesmen owed their first seats in
Parliament to this system of ''pocket
boroughs," including William Pitt, and also,
though in a less degree, both Gladstone and
Disraeli. But the system, notwithstanding,
was a thoroughly bad one, and it was an
anachronism that the nominal representatives

46 Elections, Electors and Elected

of a free people should be in reality the
nominees of some rich peer or large land-
owner, and it was abolished in nearly all
boroughs by the Reform Bill of 1832.

I have not before me the minute number
of electors in Old Sarum, but prior to this
Act I find the borough of Orford in Suffolk
had in all only twenty electors, described
as either Sportsmen," "freemen," or "bur-
gesses," and yet returned two members to
Parliament !

CHAPTER III

A CONTESTED ELECTION IN CUMBERLAND, 1880

It was not till the year 1880 that I was first
invited to stand as a candidate. A General
Election took place rather unexpectedly shortly
after Easter of that year, and a constituency
in the North of England which had pre-
viously been represented by a distant cousin,
then deceased, sent me an invitation to stand.
Curiously enough, however, this call came
from the opposite party to that which my
cousin had represented in Parliament. It
should also be added that there had been
a candidate in the field at a recent bye-
election in that constituency, and that gentle-
man was loth to withdraw his claims ;
however, at length the field was clear, though
rather late in the day. The rival party had
been busy for weeks, and I had to accept

the candidature by telegraph and send my

47

48 Elections, Electors and Elected

election address by the same means in order
to lose no time, and put myself in the first
express train to this northern constituency.
On my arrival it was satisfactory to find that
the committee had acted with promptitude,
and that my address was already printed and
posted all over the town. At the railway
station I was met by some of the committee,
and then went to stay at a relative's place in
the neighbourhood, which she had inherited
from my late cousin previously referred to.

Next morning, on coming down to break-
fast (being then a, comparatively speaking,
young man), I was rather amused to find
myself at once a person in whom everybody
took the deepest interest. The old butler,
who had been there in my late cousin's time,
took quite a fatherly interest in me, and
attended to my various wants at breakfast
with great assiduity. My hostess noticed
this, and remarked, '' John used to be a great
supporter of my late uncle whilst he was
member here ; you had better ask him how
he is going to vote now, as at one time John
was a great politician."

I remarked, ''Well, I suppose I must com-
mence my canvass ; what do you say, John "^ "

A Contested Election in Ctirnberlayid 49

*' Of course I'll vote for you and work for
you, sir. I'll always vote for one of the
family," was his reply.

On hearing this, my hostess laughingly
said, " A capital start for your canvass " ; and
John carried out his word thoroughly.

On a visit to my central committee room
shortly afterwards, I was introduced to the
committee, and found that body consisted of
several of the leading gentry and business
men of the locality. I also discovered that
they had retained as my election agents the
services of two young local solicitors, well-
meaning and hard-working young men ; but
this dual control did not altogether answer,
and they mostly got in one another's way.
This election was fought, it should be here
mentioned, prior to the admirable measure
steered through the House of Commons by
Sir Henry Jam.es (now Lord James of
Hereford). I allude to the Act of Parlia-
ment which has fixed a definite limit to elec-
tion expenses, and rendered illegal various
means of wasting money at elections, which
candidates then were, as a rule, in most con-
stituencies called to make, however unwilling
they may have been to do so.

4

50 Elections, Electors and Elected

Another discovery I shortly made was that
I was the happy (?) possessor of committee
rooms at nearly half the public-houses in the
town, a large portion of the remainder being
retained in the interests of my political oppo-
nent. The use of these committee rooms
was not very apparent. But they had been
from time immemorial retained in the interests
of the rival parties, in fact, known by their re-
spective colours as either blue or yellow houses
(pronounced ** yallar "). Paid canvassers were
then legal, nor did the fact that a voter,
being paid, disqualify him from exercising
the franchise, so a small army of canvassers
were retained at five shillings a day each
by the two rival candidates to visit the
electors. These canvassers were armed with
small books with the names of the voters
inscribed in them. As far as one could learn,
their canvassing consisted in sitting and dis-
cussing the election at the nearest public-house
and bringing in from time to time returns
that nearly all those whom they were
supposed to have seen were either '' Blue "
or *' Yallar," according to the party that had
retained their services.

In this borough a candidate was also

A Contested Election in Cumberland 5 1

expected to canvass the whole electorate ;
fortunately for me, as there was but little
time to spare, there were under a thousand
electors. During this canvass I was always
accompanied by a friend, and no candidate
should do otherwise, as this companion not
only introduces him to the elector, assists
him in the canvass, and shows him the
way, but acts as a witness to protect the
candidate against the risk of false statements
being made respecting him later on. On
those occasions, by taking out with me some
of the returns of my paid canvassers, I was
able to judge how fallacious they really
were.

This task of calling on the electors was a
slightly laborious one, as every house seemed
to be approached by a flight of stairs before
one arrived at the elector's actual abode.
Still it was at times interesting, and the ques-
tions one was asked were quaint ; and though
these personal interviews may have turned
a few doubtful voters, the majority of the
electors appeared to be fixedly either " Blue"
or '* Yallar," and the following conversation
as a rule took place. After I had been
introduced to the elector by an accompany-

52 Elections, Electors and Elected

ing friend, the elector would say, ** What
colour are you ? " To which my reply was
**Yallar." The elector would grasp my
hand and say, ''That's all right, I'm Yallar.
I was born Yallar." Or if he were on the
other side, " That's no good, I'm thoroughly
Blue." If one attempted to urge the claims
the party I belonged to had to the elector's
confidence and support, he would listen with
the greatest interest, and even go as far as
acknowledging " that was all right ; I like
that ; that's what I want " ; but notwithstand-
ing that, he was '* Blue," and so he apparently
remained.

It was a most interesting election ; the
meetings I held were, for the size of the
place, large and enthusiastic, but it must be
confessed that I saw the same faces over
and over again, and as a rule those present
were my supporters and enthusiastic ad-
herents to the "Yallar" cause.

On one or two occasions, with a brake-
load of friends I drove to meetings in villages
a few miles from the town, which were
inhabited by the miners and quarrymen and
their families ; this was considered quite an
adventure by some of the committee, and

A Contested Election in Cumberland 53

unprecedented in the political annals of the
place, as it was the stronghold of the " Blue "
party ; in fact, going into the enemy's country.
These meetings, if the audiences were not
enthusiastic, passed off quietly, and those
present gave an attentive hearing to the
speakers, though they asked the candidate
numerous questions.

My political opponent had one great
advantage, that not only had he strong local
influence, but also that he was the part
proprietor of the chief and only completely
local newspaper in that borough, which was
thoroughly devoted to his party and interest.
This is, of course, a great advantage in a
country borough, though not as great as it
once was. It was a constituency that not
only contained urban electors, but a sprink-
ling of rural votes, and there were in the
contiguous neighbourhood a number of coal
miners and quarrymen who formed a part of
the electorate. A party consisting of a few
friends, my wife and myself, went down a
coal mine and canvassed some of the men
in the cuttings, and whilst there we duly cut
some coal. A luncheon basket had been
conveyed down with us, and we had a light

54 Elections, Electors ana Elected

repast in one of the cuttings. I am not
certain if that would be a safe course under
the present law, lest one of the miners who
was a voter drank your health.

The constituency had nearly always been
a *' Blue " constituency, and as the majority
of the electors were on that side, and the
"• Yallar " party were at that time rather un-
popular in the country, the result could not
be doubtful. There were endless poetical
effusions, more or less cleverly written, by
poets espousing the ''Blue" or " Yallar " sides.
One day, chancing to be out riding to
canvass some outlying electors, I came
across two bill-posters of the rival parties
in the adjoining county division, and found
them quietly plastering a wall (which prob-
ably not one elector would pass in a week)
one bill over the other, first a Blue one
then a Yellow, till they had made them nearly
an inch thick. There was then no limit
either to printing or other election expenses,
and these men were paid by the number
of bills they affixed. A report was made to
the agent of the two county candidates who
were standing in the interest of the Yellow
party, though whether it resulted in checking

A Contested Election in Cumberland 5 5

this system Is doubtful, and it was no wonder
that the expenses in that division of the
county cost the three candidates contesting
the two seats in the aggregate eight or ten
thousand pounds. Another mode then of
wasting money was the hiring of carriages
to take electors to the polling-booths, and
so every broken-down trap and woebegone-
looking horse was engaged on the day of
the election by one party or the other, three
guineas being the charge to the county
candidates for the use of a horse and trap
on that day, while probably the whole turn-
out was in reality barely worth that sum to
buy right out, and two guineas was the
tariff if it were retained for the borough
election.

Though the vote was then by ballot, by
mid-day on the day of the election I saw
that I was not going to be successful. The
election was, notwithstanding my non-success,
a most pleasant one, and there were no
personalities on either side. Some of the
electors on the polling day amused them-
selves by throwing flour, coloured either
blue or " yallar," at one another. The
newly returned member travelled with my

§6 Elections, Electors and Elected

wife and myself In the same railway carriage
next day as far as Carlisle. This act of
friendliness alone is one of the pleasant
features of English political life, and would
be impossible in many countries where party
rancour is more bitter and more intense.

One thing that made the contest a difficult,
if not a well-nigh impossible one for success
in this small constituency, was that the party
I championed had not had any attempt made
to have their interests safeguarded, except
in a very perfunctory manner, at the annual
revision of the register for years prior to this
election.

The orreat Sir Robert Peel said that to win
elections a political party must always bear
in mind the ** Register ! Register ! Register ! "
That is as true now as then. People talk
a great deal about *' organisation." It is a
good five-syllable word, and no doubt in all
constituencies the side that has the best
organisation has a slight initial advantage,
but if the views of the country in nearly
every British constituency are, as they were
at that time, strongly against the views of
any political party, in no constituency in
which the majority for that party is not

A Contested Election in Cumberland 57

abnormal, can most organisations, however
perfect, return their candidate to Parliament ;
still they may considerably reduce the
majority of the successful candidate, and so
to that extent ste7n the wave against their
party, and thereby conduce to a future
victory.

No victory can be won at any general
election by a political party as a whole
unless it has, on any gravely important
question before the country, not only accord-
ing to its own lights a definite policy, but
also one clearly understandable by the elec-
tors. Still there are numerous exceptions to
this rule in individual constituencies, and at
all elections seats are lost by the party that
is apparently sweeping the country in most
places. This may be caused by the fact that
the organisation is more active on one side
than the other. But in most instances it is
that the constituency decides to return the
best candidate to represent them in Parlia-
ment, irrespective of his views on any question
of the moment.

CHAPTER IV

BYE-ELECTIONS IN THE EARLY EIGHTIES

Shortly after the General Election of 1886
trade was somewhat depressed, and it was
my lot to address many large and enthusiastic
meetings about that time on the subject of
British trade and Foreign tariffs at, amongst
other places, Manchester, Preston, Stockport,
Warrington, Hull, Scarborough, and South-
wark, and, in the autumn of the following year,
to attend a large political conference at New-
castle-on-Tyne. One interesting incident
occurred which I will here relate. The con-
ference itself might be described as a rally
of the party defeated at the polls in 1880,
and there were endless meetings, discussions,
conferences, and social gatherings for the
delegates to attend, and this political gather-
ing was concluded by an immense mass
meeting at a huge Assembly Hall.

S8

Bye- Elections in the Early Eighties 59

By that time most of those present had
had a surfeit of speeches, and the chief
speakers of that evening were not only long
and tedious (but though as a rule orators
of no mean reputation), evidently tired and
intensely dull, and a vast number of the
audience were in a more or less somnolent
condition. At length, to the relief of every one
in the audience, they ended their harangues.
But one duty remained, for someone to
propose a vote of thanks to the noble chair-
man for presiding. When the gentleman
(then as now a brilliant ornament of the
legal profession) rose to perform that task,
most of the audience were collecting their
hats and preparing to leave the hall. But
soon a change came over the scene. Like a
flash of lightning his brilliant oratory aroused
the whole meeting to the wildest enthusiasm.
All those leaving the hall turned back ; seats
were resumed, hats and umbrellas were waved,
handkerchiefs fluttered in the air, cheer suc-
ceeded cheer in deafening succession, and the
scene from the platform of that enthusiastic
concourse of people is one difficult to forget.
The twenty-five minutes he spoke and held
his audience seemed like five.

6o Elections, Electors and Elected

The London papers next morning, after
devoting column after column to the heavy
pabulum those present had been inflicted
with during the most of the evening, wound
up their report : *' After which a vote of
thanks to the chairman was carried and duly
responded to, and the meeting terminated " ;
and so is history made. The reporters
had already enough *'copy" for their jour-
nals. It struck me then that it would not be
a bad idea to keep a good speaker to the end
of a meeting to wind it up with enthusiasm
and dclat, though on that occasion it would
seem it was done more by accident than by
design. The speaker who winds up the
meeting must be content, however, to have a
brief, if any, report of his speech in the press.

It should be here incidentally remarked
that a few months after the General Election
of 1880, and prior to this conference at New-
castle just referred to, I had been called to
visit and spend a few months in Hong-Kong
regarding an estate I had in that British
possession, and whilst there was impressed
with the intense loyalty of Britons beyond
the seas and their strong sentiments of
affection to the motherland, and found it as

Bye-Elections in the Early Eighties 6i

marked as it had been when ten years pre-
viously it had been my good fortune to take
an interesting tour round the world, and in
the course of which I visited many British
colonies, as well as India, Japan, and the
United States.

My views have never since changed, and
in all my political contests have I always
maintained this : that the keystone to the
arch of our future greatness is a federation of
the whole Empire linked together by equal,
voluntary, and conjoint action in weal or woe,
in peace or war ; in a commercial, social, and,
as far as practicable, a political union. That
this will be ultimately attained I earnestly
hope and believe, and that its fruition will
come in time, by mutual concessions and by
the mutual goodwill of the peoples within
the vast dominions of the Crown, to the great
advantage and prosperity of a truly united
Empire.

Though doubtless many antiquated dog-
mas, insular and sectional prejudices, and
parochial, narrow-minded views will have to
be swept away before such a far-seeing,
statesmanlike policy will be consummated,
and the now loosely knit together congeries of

62 Elections, Electors and Elected

states, colonies, and dependencies are welded
together into a federation of eternal fellow-
ship and mutual self-interest and support.

This is no new idea. Thought over and
advocated for the last fifty years or more by
many far-seeing men, many of whom have
passed away to the bourne from which no
traveller returns, it has been gradually
growing like a sturdy oak in its forest glade,
growing by the mutual goodwill of the
peoples of this great Empire. To force this
healthy growth would be a mistake, and to
pull up the roots and examine the progress
might prove, it were needless to add, an
irreparably fatal error.

Shortly after my return to England, in
1 88 1, I was asked to stand for a west
country constituency at a bye-election, where
a noble lord who was a supporter of the
then Government and also a strong local
candidate had already come out. The chances
of defeating him seemed to me infinitesimal,
and I therefore declined that invitation, and
wrote to regret I did not see my way to
stand. However, in response to a renewed
request within the last few days before the
poll, accompanied by an experienced friend

Bye- Elections in the Early Eighties 6'^

in electioneering matters, we both decided
to run down to see how the land lay, with
a view to ascertaining what could be done
there in the future.

The express train we went by did not
stop at the town in question, but by the
kindness of the railway company we were
allowed to alight at a junction a few miles
from the constituency, and, hiring a convey-
ance, arrived at the town in question about
seven o'clock on a Friday morning, which
day, it should be mentioned, was the date
fixed for the nominations, the poll, if any,
being appointed for the following Tuesday.
On arriving at the hotel, we were sitting
down to breakfast about eight o'clock, when,
to our surprise, a visitor came into the room
and introduced himself, and said : '* If you
please, gentlemen, the committee asked me
to say that they are all waiting to see you
in a private room." We were both a bit
astonished at this early arrival of the afore-
said politicians, and wondered where they
had all sprung from ; however, we did not
delay long over breakfast, and soon joined
them, when we found about a dozen of the
local committee duly assembled. We made

64 Elections, Electors and Elected

the most careful inquiries from them as to
how the land lay, and after withdrawing from
the room and consulting together, came to
the conclusion that the chance of a win was
at the moment nil, and so, on returning to
the room, I simply thanked them heartily
for the honour they had done me by their
renewed invitation, but declined to stand.

This decision did not please them at all,
as they were spoiling for a fight, and later
in the day, about eleven o'clock, we were
informed that the committee had persuaded
one of their number to be nominated as a
candidate, and hoped the two visitors would
stay and help them in all ways in their power.
This we readily consented to do, and handed
over a draft election address we had, in case
it might be required, drawn up on the journey
down ; and by twelve o'clock, when the nomi-
nations closed, the nomination papers of the
candidate in question were handed in, and his
address was printed and issued in the after-
noon, and a large public meeting held in
his support that evening, which we addressed.

In my political experience, lasting over
nearly twenty-five years, never was it my
lot to see such a busy day as the following

Bye- Elections in the Early Eighties 65

one was ; it might be described as one long
meeting, so rapidly did they succeed one
another, some indoor and some out, in-
cluding one near a market-place, where a
temporary platform was erected. At this
meeting a good many friends of the candi-
date on the other side attended, and a few
missiles were flying about, including a rather
large cabbage, which one of the speakers
managed to field, and remarked, much to
the delight of the crowd : *' One of our
political opponents appears to have lost his
head."

There was at the time no lack of matters
to criticise, for the Government of the day
had got themselves into certain difficulties in
regard to their retirement from Kandahar,
their South African policy, and the then
disaffected and troubled condition of Ireland,
and the unfortunate number of crimes and
disturbances in the Sister Isle. A working-
man speaker got on the temporary platform
at one of the outdoor meetings, in front of
which were two or three reporters taking
notes, and was holding forth in regard to a
workmen's compensation bill proposed by a
governmental member, which he denounced

66 Elections^ Electors and Elected

as inadequate and a sham. He got so
fervent in his eloquence and so engrossed
in his subject that he took little heed of the
smallness of the rickety platform on which
he was standing, and as he was saying,
*' But that's not near enough, I will go one
step further forward," which he did, and fell
head over heels amongst an already over-
wrought press ! He escaped, however,
slightly shaken but quite unhurt, and at this
catastrophe there were, it is needless to
say, vociferous cheers and laughter from the
assembled crowd.

The coffee-room of the hotel where we were
staying was a commodious, comfortable apart-
ment, with two large windows overlooking
an immense open space calculated to hold
two or three thousand people. From one of
these windows Lord Palmerston, who for
many years had represented this constitu-
ency, had often addressed large crowds of
people. So it was resolved that a meet-
ing of the candidate whom we were assist-
ing should be held there. And, speaking
of Lord Palmerston, probably no Prime
Minister since the days of William Pitt ever
really represented the views of the great

Bye- Elections in the Early Eighties 6y

bulk of his fellow-countrymen as thoroughly
as he did.

When the evening of this eventful Saturday
in this the second day of this brief electoral
contest arrived, a comfortable supper was
served on the table of this coffee-room, and
the blinds of the two windows let down. My
friend was the first to address the crowd in the
market-place, which was densely packed with
people who had come from the town itself,
and from the surrounding neighbourhood, to
hear *'the two orators from London," and it
is to be hoped they were not disappointed.

After my friend had pulled up the blind and
opened one of the windows, he commenced
to speak in impassioned tones, and to criticise
the Government of the day. Meanwhile the
rest of us were busily enjoying the oysters
and other delicacies on the supper-table.
The speech was a good one, as my friend
was a past master in platform speaking.
I will not set it forth here, but merely refer to
an incident that occurred and to the perora-
tion. Turning round during his speech, as
an aside he said : ''I'm getting awfully dry
and will just wind up," and to me he added,
"Would you please carry on the thread of

6S Elections, Electors and Elected

my speech when I stop, and commence your
address from the other window " ; and he
then terminated his address somewhat as
follows : *' When the country demanded an
end should be put to this state of affairs, who
stepped into the breach to stand for, and I
hope win, this important constituency? A
man more honoured, more respected, more
worthy, could not have been found, a man
better known and beloved round this country-
side could not be before you ; in fact, a
better candidate in every way could not be
imagined. What is the name of this ex-
cellent candidate ? " (And turning round to
me, he said, sotto voce, amidst a general titter
in the room : ** What on earth is his name ? ")
Being reminded of the name, he continued :
" I allude to the honoured, the respected, the

well-known and the illustrious name of "

(tremendous cheering and applause). The
orator then withdrew his head from the
window and the blind was pulled down,
whilst, as requested, my head immediately
appeared from the other window, the blind
of which had been pulled up, and I continued
the discourse. Though not intended to do
so, this sudden jack-in-the-box proceeding

Bye-Elections in the Early Eighties 69

appears to have had a somewhat comical
effect from outside. For it was one or two
minutes before I could really get under way,
owing to the uncontrollable laughter of the
crowd. However, they soon settled down,
and never in my experience, though it has
been my privilege to address larger audiences
than the two thousand or more in that
market-place, did I ever speak to so atten-
tive and appreciative an audience.

It was a short, sharp fight, and the
cheeriest and most amusing contest imagin-
able, and with a few more days, no doubt,
the candidate my friend and I were assisting
would have polled even closer than he did,
but at that time, in that particular constitu-
ency, a win was impossible.

On our way back to town my friend told
me of an experience he had had a few months
previously in going down with a possible
candidate to another constituency, as follows :
On their arrival there, they had had an
interview with the committee, though of a
different natureTrom our experience previously
described, for they found them mainly small
shopkeepers of the place, and their chairman
was an immensely stout, consequential little

70 Elections^ Electors and Elected

man. It should be further said that the con-
stituency had not altogether a clean record as
to the way elections were fought in it. The
proceedings commenced by his friend, the
proposed candidate, making these worthies
a short political speech, in which he stated
his views on the political situation of the
day. On its conclusion the chairman wheezed
out : " That's all right ; your sentiments are
splendid and quite our own ; but before
proceeding further, let's get to business.
This election means a win for you if you are
our candidate and we nominate you. We
know you are a wealthy man, and there will
be a trifling sum to pay us for out-of-pocket
expenses before we select you," mentioning at
the same time a good round figure. " Now
what do you say? Hand us your cheque
and you will be sure to be an M. P. in a week
or so." His friend looked quietly round the
room, and then said : " Before answering
you, may I ask you a question?" **Oh,
certainly," said the chairman. *' Then can
you tell me if you have a Bradshaw handy,
for I want to find the next train to town."
The faces of the committee fell, for the two
visitors left by that train.

CHAPTER V

CONTESTING A SEAT IN LONDON

After the Redistribution of Seats Bill of
1885, invitations were sent to me to stand
by three constituencies at the then approach-
ing General Election, and I accepted an
invitation to be a candidate for a division
of a London borough.

Many of my friends told me this choice
was to fight a forlorn hope, but I held other-
wise, and set seriously to work to do all in
my power to win, assisted in that by a
particularly energetic committee and a small
band of willing workers in this newly-formed
division of the borough in question.

If the committee had a fault, they were
a trifle too fond of holding committee
meetings, which took up a good deal of
my election agent's time. On the com-
mittee were two solicitors, and they were

72 Elections, Electors and Elected

immensely technical as to how to carry out,
not only in the letter but also in the spirit,
the recently passed Act of Parliament intro-
duced and carried by Sir Henry James, and
called, for short, ''The Corrupt Practices Act,"
and were so determined to keep within the
letter of the law that they even objected to a
screen being hung across a street with the

words, *' Vote for " and my name on it,

•as they said it might be called a banner or
flag! and the Act forbade the use of flags
and banners. However, they kept everyone
straight, and so acted on the right side.

Though no doubt at that time some
doubted whether my friends were not un-
duly strict, it does not appear, in the light
of subsequent events and the decision of the
judges, that they were. It is clear that the
use of banners is prohibited by section i6
sub-section i of the Act referred to above.
Flags are equally illegal, providing that the
payment or contract for payment is made
for the purpose of promoting or procuring the
election of a candidate at any election. The
judges have accepted the ordinary etymologi-
cal meaning of banners in Webster's dictionary,
and have even expressed their doubts whether

Contesting a Seat in London 73

a canvas covered with placards denoting an
election room is not also an offence under this
statute, if paid for by the candidate or agent.

It should, however, be noticed, that in the
Stepney election petition of 1886 there was
an obiter dictwn that the provision of a
banner by a volunteer, not acting as an agent
for a candidate, in no way incriminated that
person. Mr Justice Vaughan Williams, in his
judgment in the Stepney case in 1892, stated
that he considered the words, " other marks of
distinction," as the governing words of the
clause forbidding the use of flags and banners,
cockades, hat cards, etc. In this election
broad strips of canvas, with the words ''Vote
for Isaacson," were stretched across different
streets throughout the constituency, and as
these were paid for by the candidate, both the
judges held it to be an illegal practice. Mr
Justice Cave said : " I am clearly of opinion
that these canvas advertisements, as they
have been called, are banners and nothing
else " ; and again he added, referring to the
Corrupt Practices Act : "What was meant to
be struck at was the waste of money at elec-
tions, which served no useful purpose at all."

It is therefore obvious that it will require

74 Elections, Electors and Elected

care at all elections, both for the candidate
and agent, to see that no such canvas, banner,
or streamer is stretched across the street and
finds its way under any heading into the
election accounts.

It was in April that my selection as candi-
date was made, and the election did not take
place till October, so excluding the months of
August and September, during which I was
in Scotland, there was plenty of time to make
myself known and to meet the electors. And
there were no lack of meetings ; and pretty
noisy some of them were at first, as it was
then a plan practised by my opponents for a
gang of men, mostly strangers to the constitu-
ency, to go round and disturb my meetings, as
well as those of the candidates who were fight-
ing on the same side in neighbouring con-
stituencies. And on one occasion it took me
an hour to make a speech which could, but
for the noise, easily have been delivered in
twenty minutes. My plan was, when the
interrupters were wearied out by their howling
and yelling, to get a sentence or two in and
then wait till they gave me another chance.

During that election the candidates in
the neighbouring constituencies often helped

Contesting a Seat in London 75

one another. On one occasion it fell to
my lot to go to speak later on at a friend's
meeting in an adjoining division after having
addressed a remarkably quiet one in the con-
stituency for which I was standing. On my
arrival on the platform of the neighbouring
candidate's meeting the noise the opposition
were making was deafening, and in the chair
sat a noble lord who has since held high office
under the Crown, looking thoroughly bored
and tired ; and well he might, for this din, I
learnt, had been going on for nearly two hours.
The meeting, however, gave me, when I was
called on to speak, a wonderfully good hearing.
A subsequent speaker appeared to annoy
some of the audience, and at last they became
so unruly and out of hand that the chairman
declared the meeting over. After he had
vacated the chair, and with the others was
quietly walking off the platform, a change came
over the scene, for sitting in front of the plat-
form were about a couple of score of young
army and veterinary college students. They
were all strong supporters of the candidate
in whose support the meeting had been held,
and had had enough of the row, and wanted,
as the term goes, **a bit back," so they

"j^ Elections^ Electors and Elected

quickly smashed a number of cane chairs in
front, used the arms and legs as weapons, and
drove the 'iambs" who had been interrupt-
ing helter-skelter out of the hall. There were
many broken heads on both sides, though
fewer amongst the students than amongst
their opponents ; but fortunately nothing of
a serious character occurred, although a good
many heads with plaster on them were seen
about the streets for a week or two following,
and the 'iambs" had enough of it and during
that election let the meetings go on quietly.

It has always struck me that if a meeting is
held in a ward or a district, and the hall will
not hold half the electors, what is the use
of having what is called an open meeting and
letting-jn all the ''noisy boys" for miles round?
It is much better, in my view, to send round
cards to all the electors in that ward, and par-
ticularly to the friends of the party who hold
the meeting, and invite them all to come to
it, and after a certain time let in anyone
who likes to come in. And that plan is now
adopted in very many constituencies ; whilst
open meetings, as they are called, both in
halls and also in the open air, should be
occasionally held.

Contesting a Seat in London yy

There is no doubt great diversity of
opinion and practice as to whether, during
an election, it is best to call a number of
large open meetings only, and to rely on
the enthusiasm they arouse, to deepen the
interest in the election amongst the workers
and the electorate generally, or to do as I found
most expedient in London — to hold only two
or three meetings of that description, at
which, in my experience, one found the
same people friendly or opposed over and
over again, many of them non-voters and
a considerable number not even residents
in the constituency, but coming from adjoin-
ing divisions or even further afield.

No hard-and-fast rule can be drawn as
to that, and each election agent, candidate,
and election committee have their own views
on that subject, which no amount of argu-
ment will change. Be that as it may, I found
that, as far as London is concerned, it was
a good plan to supplement these large, or
comparatively speaking large, meetings by a
number of ward meetings, the invitation to
these gatherings to be sent by post, enclosing
a card to be presented at the door. This
was a better plan to obtain a good audience

78 Elections, Electors and Elected

than any amount of bill-posting, and was
at the same time a compliment to the
elector — of course the usual number of bills
publicly announcing the meeting being also
duly posted or placed by friends in their
windows. At these gatherings the candidate
gets really more in touch with the electorate
than at larger ones. There should always be
time left after the conclusion of the meeting
for the chairman to introduce the candidate
to a number of the voters, when he can listen
to their views on many matters of local and
even of general interest, and discuss them
with the electors. The best chairman of
such an assembly of the electors is a leading
man residing in the ward in which the meet-
ing is held.

If there is room shortly after the commence-
ment of these ward meetings, anyone wishful to
enter should be allowed to do so, of course on
the understanding that he does not come for the
sole purpose of interrupting the proceedings.

The object of a candidate at an election
is, I take it, to be returned to Parliament,
not to make great election speeches, or to
receive votes of confidence at large gather-
ings. If he is to be returned the candidate

Co7itesting a Seat in London 79

requires the majority of the votes, and
there can be no doubt, as far as the Metro-
polis is concerned, that these small, more
friendly, and less showy gatherings conduce
to success in a greater degree than is gener-
ally believed. At the same time, the larger
meetings are essential, especially when some
leading member of the candidate's party
comes to assist him, and also to rouse the
enthusiasm, especially during the last few
days of the contest.

The first meeting of an election should be,
in my view, one at which the candidate has
his friends present in force and gets a good
hearing to give him an opportunity of stating
his views and being well reported by the press,
and a good report of the proceedings at this
assembly and his speech should be sent to
each elector, whether there is a good local
press or not.

No question of Fiscal Reform was before
either the country or that particular con-
stituency, or referred to in the rival election
addresses. The General Election of 1886,
to which I am referring, was fought through-
out the country on the Home Rule question,
and I was not a little astonished on

8o Elections^ Electors and Elected

noticing in the shop window of one of the
leading supporters of my opponent, that they
on this occasion had raked out some old-time
political stage property, and a Brobdingnagian
loaf, weighing probably some sixteen pounds,
was displayed in a window as the result of my
opponent's policy, whilst a diminutive quarter-
pound one was all that was credited to mine.
As I had made no reference to fiscal ques-
tions in any way, I was at a loss to account
for this, and learnt on inquiry that at some
meeting I had not been able to attend,
one of my supporters had said he thought
the taxation of the country required re-
arrangement, and that he could not under-
stand why tea and tobacco, which we did not
grow in these islands as articles of commerce,
should bear so large a share of taxation.

This mild observation appeared to have
roused the ire of my opponents as a covert
attack on '* Free Trade." However, the
point of these different-sized loaves was lost
to the bulk of the electors, who did not
understand that one of my supporters had
ventured, however slightly, to criticise the
mode of the imperial taxation, and it did
not influence the election in the slighte.st

Contesting a Seat in London 8 t

degree. I trust that those loaves were at
all events the result of British manufacture
and the work of British industry. The
attack fell flat, and the loaves got stale.

The South-country constituency referred
to was too large a one for a personal canvass.
I, however, called on a good many of the
leading electors, and on not a few of those
whose views were not pronounced one way
or the other, and who, in electioneering par-
lance, are described as '* doubtful voters."
My friends, however, carried out a thorough
canvass, as did those of my political oppo-
nent. The great question that has often
arisen in my mind is — Does canvassing really
do the good it is imagined ? Is it not rather
an intrusion to call on an elector and ask him
for his vote ? However, if one side does it,
it seems evident the other must, as the mere
fact of a call being made may be looked on
by some electors as a personal attention ; and
as it Is legal, probably neither side can
neglect it. Therefore, under existing circum-
stances, canvassing appears to be absolutely
necessary both in town and country.

There are, of course, constituencies so large,

and with such a large number of electors In

6

82 Elections^ Electors and Elected

them, that a personal canvass by the candi-
date, unless he has months In which to under-
take it, is a physical impossibility. If he does
undertake a general canvass, he should make
it, if practicable, a thorough one, and call on
one and all, and be always accompanied by
some of his supporters, in order that he may
have witnesses of all transactions, and that
local questions and subjects may be discussed
before local men. Except during my first
contest, in the comparatively speaking small
constituency in the North of England, I
never had the time to undertake a thorough
personal canvass of the electors. But I was
fortunate enough to have others who kindly
volunteered and carried out that work for me,
so contented myself by calling on all the lead-
ing people in the constituency, and the most im-
portant politicians whose views were believed
to be in sympathy with my candidature — or at
anyrate were not diametrically opposed to
the party of which I was the candidate —
including individuals in all ranks of society.
I also went to see a few others whom my
election agent suggested I should call on.

There can be no doubt that some of the
most efficient canvassers — and all political

Contesting a Seat in London ^Ty

parties are equally agreed as to that — are to
be found amongst the fair sex ; and they
have also this advantage, that they can
devote more time to canvassing than one's
men friends, who, many of them, are engaged
in business avocations during most of the
day. One feature in this constituency was
the willingness with which each side dis-
played their colours, and by the end of the
election there were whole streets in which
hardly a house had not a bill in the window
displaying either in blue and white or black
and yellow their wish for the electors to
vote for one candidate or the other. The
curious part about it was that in some parts
of the constituency there might be two
streets occupied by electors in the same
kind of employment and in buildings of the
same value, and yet in one street the bills dis-
played were nearly universally in favour of one
candidate, and in the next street in favour of
the other. And that was also the same in some
of the model dwellings. This might often be
largely accounted for by the fact that in that
particular street or building there was a more
than usually energetic worker on behalf of
one party or the other, who brought round his

84 Elections, Electors and Elected

friends and neighbours to his views. The
show of colours in the constituency indicated
that the parties were very evenly balanced,
and the canvass return showed the same, as
in fact the result of the poll also evinced.

The chances are that I might have been
returned at that election for this constituency
— as I was a few months later — had not
a rather sharp trick been played on me at
the end of the contest. It was as follows.
Accompanied by three leading residents, who
were my supporters, I paid a call on a
particularly influential resident in the district,
who at this interview promised me his
support, and this fact was accordingly
publicly announced both by myself and by
my committee. After all my polling cards
were posted, at the end of the election my
political opponent — whether under a mis-
apprehension of the true facts or not it is
impossible to say — the day before the poll
issued with his polling cards a statement
that this was not the case, and that our
statements were knowingly false, and though
the elector in question did all in his power
to set the matter right by writing to the
press that he had stated to me that he was

Contesting a Seat in London 85

one of my supporters, this statement only
appeared as a short paragraph amidst a
mass of election news on the day of the
poll, and was in fact too late to meet the
eye of any considerable number of the
electors, and it was not as generally known
as the original mis-statement.

Of course if my election agent had had an-
other spare set of envelopes ready addressed
to all the electors, the contradiction could
have been sent out at once, and in my three
subsequent elections, fought in the same con-
stituency, in all of which I was successful, in-
structions were always given to my election
agent to keep a spare set of envelopes to be used
if necessary for ''the last mis-statementsJ'

Fortunately, however, they were not re-
quired. And, in my opinion, even if the legal
limit of expense has been reached, I should
incur a further expense to pay to correct a
similar incorrect statement, as it would appear
certain that the courts, on application, would
allow the expenditure of that additional sum
for printing, postage, etc., if it was pointed
out it was solely incurred to contradict a
false or malicious statement made at the last
minute to affect the result of an election.

CHAPTER VI

TACTICS AT ELECTIONS

In certain election contests at which I have
assisted, the dissemination of false state-
ments by unscrupulous opponents has, I regret
to say, been quite a feature. In fact, it has
really almost taken one sub-agent's whole
time to assist the candidate by issuing posters
and in other ways refuting errors. One of
the most common, especially used by a
certain stamp of candidate in large county
constituencies, is this — if one of the candidates
is an employer of labour in a large or small
way, to allege that he underpays his work-
men and does not give them a fair rate of
wages. As a rule these statements are
generally absolutely untrue and without foun-
dation, but are, notwithstanding, extremely
difficult ones to disprove, as it is always
hard to prove an affirmative, and are calcu*

Tactics at Elections 87

lated in large constituencies to lose a
candidate many votes. This even where
the maligned individual is a local man, as
he may only be personally known in one
part.

Such a statement when false should be
refuted at once, and in no sense harped on
to give it undue importance. It should not
be treated lightly, as I once heard a candi-
date treat it, who simply said, "It's absolutely
false." In the memorable words of an ancient
speaker I would add, " I deny the allegation
and defy the allegator " ; and by another in
more stately fashion, " Slander is like the
mephitic vapour in the cave of the dogs near
Naples : it suffocates the animal that grovels,
but cannot touch the man who walks upright."

It would seem better for the candidate
thus unfairly attacked to say, *' The statement
made by my political opponent, that I do not
pay those in my employ the fair and usual
rate of wages in this locality, is absolutely
false and untrue. I am aware that as a
candidate I am protected by an Act of
Parliament from unjust attacks of a personal
character such as this, but, as my political
opponent has my distinct and unqualified

§8 Elections^ Electors and Elected

denial of this unjust charge made by him and
his supporters, I trust that as a gentleman
he will apologise to me for having made it
and withdraw it, or that, even if he does not
adopt that honourable course, he will refrain
from repeating or otherwise allowing to be
published such a false statement." A few
words corroborating the absolute truth of
this denial might be made by some well-
known local man, but it should not be harped
on, and the old French proverb should be
ever borne in mind, '' Qui s excuse, s accuse"
If this does not put a stop to it, and the
false statement is persisted in — and all elec-
tion agents know how the spirit of prevarica-
tion is abroad at the time of an election — if
this unfair mode of attack is still continued,
and it is considered of sufficient importance,
action can be promptly taken under the
Corrupt and Illegal Practices Prevention
Act, 1895, to put a stop to it, and if the
statement complained of has been printed
and published, this can be done more readily,
but, of course, otherwise, even under this
amending Act, it may be very difficult to
trace slanderous rumours to the source
whence they emanated. But where a state-

Tactics at Elections 89

ment is printed and published, this Act gives
a speedy and prompt remedy.

Upon application being made in the
Croydon election, Mr Justice Day exercised
the powers given him by granting in
Chambers an interim injunction under sec-
tion 3, which gives power to the Courts as
follows : —

'* Any person who shall make or publish
any false statement of fact as aforesaid, may
be restrained by interim or perpetual injunc-
tion by the High Court of Justice from any
repetition of such false statement or any
false statement of a similar character in
relation to such candidate, and for the pur-
pose of granting an interim injunction, prima
facie proof of the falsity of the statement
shall be sufficient."

And Mr Mead, the Stipendiary at the
Thames Court, also fined the publisher of
an East End newspaper for an offence
under section i of the same Act, and
rendered him subject to the consequent dis-
qualification for an illegal practice. This
section deals with the making or publishing
of ** any false statement in relation to the per-
sonal character or conduct of such candidate."

90 Elections, Electors mid Elected

It has always struck me the opposing
candidate, particularly if he has not a strong
case of his own, always tries to draw his
rival into a controversy of this kind to throw
a red herring over the trail. But in truth it
is best for the candidate not to notice him
too much, to refer to him by name as seldom
as possible ; if obliged to do so to simply
say, '* The candidate our political opponents
appear to have selected says." The best
thing for a candidate to do is to state his
own views and the views of those with whom
he is associated, in fact his "leaders," to
drive into the minds of the electors that
these are the right views to support, and
not in any way to advertise, as far as he can
help, his political opponent by stating his
opinions or mentioning his name.

It were almost needless to add that a
candidate should never tire an audience,
however brilliant a speaker he may be, by
too long a speech, and should at all meetings
allow some of his chief supporters resident in
that locality an opportunity of making a few
bright ten minutes' speeches in moving or
supporting some resolution. And in all cases
when practicable the chair should be taken

Tactics at Elections 9 1

at all ward or district meetings by a leading
local supporter residing in that district, whilst
at the chief or mass meetings the chairman
of his election committee or a leading elector
should take the chair. It is a great mistake,
in my view, to have too large an array of
speakers at an election meeting, either in
the town or country ; one speaker of ability,
or at most two, besides the candidate are
all that are required, together with short
addresses from the mover and seconder of the
resolution of confidence.

Election committees are sometimes alto-
gether too large, and absolutely unworkable
executive bodies. Where practicable the
best plan is to have a meeting of the whole
or general committee just before the election
starts, to make a short, stirring speech
and ask them all to work, and to appoint
two of their number, or at most three,
to assist the candidate and his agents in
carrying out the actual executive work
of the election ; or, if preferred, the candi-
date could invite these gentlemen to act
on his committee. The remainder of the
general committee should, however, one and
all, be invited to work and canvass and to

92 Elections^ Electors and Elected

otherwise help by all legal means at the
election ; but the old saying is quite true,
" Too many cooks spoil the broth," and for
the actual executive work — arranging as to
where meetings are to be, as to speakers, and
the numerous other details of an election — a
small committee is best.

Of course there are some who contend
that in ninety-nine cases out of a hundred
it would be better to have no committee,
and as far as possible to secure the formal
dissolution or suspension of all political
societies within the borough or county
division, and to rely upon individual help ;
for without doubt the appointment of a
committee at once constitutes general and
particular agency for each member elected
to such a body.

That is doubtless very true ; still, a small
committee of men who can be relied on to
work, and at the same time do so with all
discretion, is no doubt an advantage in a
large county constituency where there are
varied interests, but in a well-knit-together
borough the candidate, one leading elector and
the agent can probably do all that is needful
for the successful conduct of an election,

Tactics at Elections 93

better than if they had from time to time to
consult a larger body. On that subject I
may mention that during a contested election
fought in 1886, the committee, without either
consulting my election agent or myself, invited
my political opponent to address a meeting
called in support of my candidature and paid
for out of my election expenses, after it had
been addressed by some friends and myself,
and this course they adopted in a part of the
constituency in which we were said to be in
a minority ; and though I won that election,
it never struck me as a wise proceeding.
Nor should the candidate or his agent un-
doubtedly deal with associations or organi-
sations of any kind or description, who
voluntarily thrust themselves into elections,
but with individuals.

It is desirable for the candidate to see his
election agent by himself privately for, say, half
an hour each morning for at least the week or
ten days before the poll to talk matters over
quietly with him, answer letters, or get the
agent to answer them in his name, to glance
at bills and posters and circulars proposed to
be issued, to talk over coming meetings and
who should be invited to address them, etc.

94 Elections, Electors and Elected

Where the parties are fairly balanced, an
electioneering agent who manages things in
a quiet, methodical way, is never put out
at anything, and takes quietly the fact
that some leading supporter, for some reason
or other (sometimes for no apparent reason
at all), gets in a huff, has points in his
favour and conduces greatly to his candidate's
success.

One thing should always be seen to by a
good election agent : that is, that members
of Parliament and other speakers who, many
of them, come a distance at considerable
inconvenience to themselves, should be, as
far as practicable, met at the station, accom-
panied by a member of the committee, or
one of the clerks, to the hotel or private
house at which they are to be located, and
given definite instructions as to when they
will be conveyed to the meetings. These
little details often conduce to success ;
probably the visitor succeeds in making
a better and more telling speech if they
are attended to, and, at anyrate, they
leave a pleasant impression on those who
come to help. I am glad to say it has never
fallen to my lot to suffer in this way, but I

Tactics at Elections 95

have heard others complain a good deal in
regard to this in certain contests, and who
declined in consequence to go to help in the
same constituency again.

Referring again to this division in London
in which I was a candidate in 1885, it is
always desirable to have good scrutineers
to watch the counting of the votes. For a
matter of fact, I was informed afterwards in
that election the total number of votes
declared for the two candidates were sixty
short of the total polled number contained in
the ballot boxes. My agent did not demand
a recount, and in the course of a day or two
he received a letter from the returning officer
stating that these sixty votes had been cast
in my favour and had accidentally not been
counted. It did not affect the result, but it is
doubtless best, if there be a vote short and
unaccounted for in the aggregate of the votes
polled, plus the spoilt votes, that a recount
should be demanded. An election is too
important a matter to allow one single vote
cast for a candidate not to be duly recorded,
whether that candidate is successful or not.

After this election, in the course of a
conversation with a cousin who had sat in

96 Elections^ Electors and Elected

Parliament for nearly twenty years for a
division of Sussex, I was shown a marked
register of that county division, in which
were signified by letters the politics, as far
as they could be ascertained, of nearly
all the electors, and he dwelt on the im-
portance of having this not only done at
election times, but yearly, so that the
member or candidate has full knowledge of
who are with him, who against him, and
who more or less neutral. He also urged
that it is desirable at the election to spare no
effort to secure the support of all one's
known friends and to win over the votes
of as many of the *' doubtful" voters as
possible, that is, those who have no very
fixed political opinions — and they are in many
constituencies very numerous — and not to
waste one's time and energy in trying to
win over the convinced supporters of one's
opponent. To-day, however, party ties
have been so loosened, and the old-world
comprehensible political designations are
to some extent now a thing of the past, and
the General Election of to-day will no
longer be on machine-made party cries, so
that the candidates of all sections may find

Tactics at Elections 97

support from unexpected quarters, and so
will have to try and win the vote and support
of every elector on the register.

In certain constituencies, particularly in
large South-country cities and towns, and
notably in London, there are yearly from
twenty to twenty-five per cent, new electors
on the register, and to find out the least
trace of the political views of all these new-
comers is no light task to the canvassers,
more particularly when politics and parties
are in the kaleidoscopic and unsettled state
they are at present.

There are a great many of the electorate
in Great Britain at the present time whose
political opinions do not exactly fit in with
the tenets of any political party, and who,
I believe, in some future general election,
will form a sufficiently important and large
portion of the community to have to be
reckoned with, and be able to turn the scale
at many political contests.

There are, in this country, many broad-
minded men who are able to look at altered
circumstances as they find them, and are not
bound by any fetish in the question of taxa-
tion, of tariffs, or in the incidence of rates,

7

98 Elections, Electors and Elected

who are not hide - bound by any merely
doctrinaire opinions, but are in favour of
judiciously considered progress and reform
in all directions.

Again, the urban working-man elector is
not the " Uriah Heep " some imagine he is,
neither is he "'umble" without the ** H."
He is at heart, in nine cases out of ten, pro-
gressive, but intensely patriotic, and in many
instances genuinely imperialist.

The great mistake some make is to think
the British working man loves the alien, and
is a friend of every country but his own.
He is nothing of the sort, sad as it may be
for philosophers, young or old, to reflect on.
He is no great admirer of what he calls
''them furriners." He will help foreign
working men if he can, should they get into
trouble, not because they are foreigners, but
because they are working men, and at heart,
be it wrong or right, he thinks most of the
welfare of his own fellow-workers and his
own countrymen, though some may denounce
that as narrow - minded and selfish. He
believes in that kind of patriotism, and is not
as a rule a cosmopolitan at heart.

CHAPTER VII

THE FIRST '' UNIONIST " FIGHT AT THE POLLS

During the few months that elapsed from
the election in the autumn of 1885 to that
of May and June in 1886, the political world
was greatly stirred by the Home Rule con-
troversy, and the formation of the Liberal
Unionist party. Having been again adopted
by my supporters as their candidate, I was
busily engaged preparing for the next con-
test in the same constituency as in the
previous General Election of 1 885. Amongst
other functions I attended were many
public dinners, not a few smoking concerts,
and, together with a candidate on the same
side, was initiated and elected as honorary
member to numerous friendly societies.
Some of the initiation rites were a trifle
comical. At one of these the master of

the ceremonies, who was arrayed in a

99

lOo Elections, Electors and Elected

coloured sash over his working clothes, made
my colleague (now a noble peer) and myself
state that we would never come into the
lodge without our hands being properly
washed, and refrain in lodge from swearing,
spitting, or using offensive language. The
thing that tickled both of us so much was
that the individual who initiated us looked
like the extremely dirty man in the adver-
tisement for a certain soap, who is writing a
testimonial as follows : — ** Two years ago I
used your soap, since which I have used no
other."

Some of the public dinners were amusing,
others a bit tedious and tiring and sort of
mutual admiration societies, where each in
turn got up and praised and buttered some-
one else. One public dinner stands promi-
nently out in my memory, at which ladies
were present, and I had the good fortune to
sit next an extremely bright and amusing
young American lady who had never been to
a public dinner before, and who looked on
the whole matter as a huge joke. This
young lady was sitting on the chairman's left,
and the toastmaster with his chatelaine
round his neck interested her immensely.

The First ''Unionist'' Fight at the Polls loi

She wanted to know what his steel chain
was for, and on being jestingly informed that
it was to hang him by in case he did not be-
have himself, remarked : " Why, is that so ? "
After the loyal and formal toasts had been
disposed of, the chairman was asked the
following question by the toastmaster, which
amused the young American lady's fancy
immensely : *' Will you speak now, sir, or
shall you let them enjoy themselves a bit
longer first ? " The chairman did not look
as if he quite appreciated the way that ques-
tion was put, but when his turn came to
speak, this remark, though unintended, nearly
hit the right nail on the head. For this
speaker, after having drifted on at inordinate
length, without clearly defining to his audi-
ence what he was driving at, completely lost
his way in his notes, and then the thread of
what he was talking about altogether, so that
it ran somewhat as follows: — ''This charity
is, as I said, a kind of charity, but a — a — 3. —
the charity is.'' This caused me to whisper
to my fair friend : "If someone would pull
him down it would be a charity," to which
the lady replied : " It's like his champagne,
all wind, froth, and flummery. If he goes on

I02 Elections, Electors and Elected

much longer like that I shall either scream
or scratch him." Fortunately he then con-
cluded, though, as I laughingly remarked, "he
little knew his danger."

My next election campaign was a short,
sharp, and satisfactory one, and in the same
constituency. My political opponent com-
menced, as was his plan, by endless personal
attacks, which did not seem to me worthy of
any reply, whilst, on the other hand, in my
address I steadily pointed out the policy I
advocated and let my opponent severely
alone. This election was fought on the
same register as the previous one, and at
one of my early meetings I observed as
follows : — '' I found a curious thing in this
constituency during the election of last year,
that not only is the memory of friends who
pass away kept green by their names being
inscribed on their tombstones, but these
names are also kept on the register of
electors, and, remarkable though it may
sound, a good few of them voted last elec-
tion." (We, however, laid those ghosts at
this election, and also took other steps
to guard against the danger of persona-
tion.) A man in the hall interrupted me by

The First ''Unionist''' Fight at the Polls 103

saying: ** Well, do you know how they voted?"
To which remark I replied : '* No, sir, I do
not ; that would, I imagine, very much depend
on where they came from ! " A quick retort
to an interruption is often a useful thing to
keep a meeting in good humour.

The Marquis of Caermarthen, now Duke
of Leeds, when a young man, was fighting a
London seat, and was addressing a big
meeting the night before the poll. His
appearance then was rather youthful, and to
nonplus him, a man in the crowd called out:
"Does your mother know you're out?"
**Yes, sir, she does," was his reply, "and
she'll know I'm in to-morrow." This quick
and happy rejoinder was received by laughter
and applause, and Lord Caermarthen was a
true prophet, for he was returned by a large
majority.

Referring to the danger of personation,
this offence is not, unfortunately, unknown in
large centres of population, but it is, as a rule,
attempted more on an old register than on a
new one. Amongst the forms personation
at elections takes are the following : —

Applying for a ballot paper in the name of
another person, whether living or dead.

I04 Elections, Electors and Elected

Voting twice, or voting for two divisions
of a divided borough at the same election.

Aiding or abetting or procuring personation.

Forging or counterfeiting a ballot paper.

The mere attempt to procure a ballot paper
by personation brings the person so applying
under the penalties of the statute.

The penalty is two years' imprisonment
with hard labour. No fine can be levied,
nor is the judge allowed any discretion as to
imprisonment without hard labour.

At that election the governmental policy
was a bit obscure, nor did the speeches of
their very able leader make the policy much
clearer. Speaking on that subject at a
meeting during this election, I said : " There
is, it is said, a new life assurance company
started which offers to assure on favourable
terms the life of every candidate standing at
this election, except that of the late Prime
Minister." *' How's that ? " said a man in the
audience, *' isn't his a good life ? " " Oh, no,
that's not the reason at all," was the reply ;
''the fact is, they have not got a clerk in
their office who can make out his policy ! "
At some elections, as I have previously
indicated, it is to be feared a good many

The First ''Unionisr Fight at the Polls 105

political and other mis-statements are made,
and it would be difficult to know to whom to
give the palm in this unenviable respect.
The history of the award of a certain copper
kettle may be rather to the point at a good
many contested elections. It is as follows : —

Two men were disputing in the street ;
to them came a third and asked them what
they were talking about, and they replied :
** We have made a bet that whoever can tell
the biggest lie is to have a copper kettle."
" What a horrible wager to make," said the
new-comer. ** Why, do you know, I never
told a lie in my life." At this they both
exclaimed : '' Here, you win. Give him the
kettle!"

After the 1886 election, on going to the
hall where the count took place, about the
end of the proceedings, it was not difficult to
see by my friends' faces that I had been
returned. After a hard fight, it is satis-
factory to wake next morning and find one
has succeeded. Nor is the least pleasing
part of one's duty on the occasion of one's
return to Parliament, the returning thanks
after one's election to the cheering crowds
outside the counting hall, or committee

1 06 Elections, Electors and Elected

rooms, and receiving the congratulations of
one's friends.

A sad incident occurred during this General
Election of 1886 to a friend of mine who was
a candidate in a neighbouring borough ; for,
as this young gentleman was leaving a
crowded political meeting, he was somewhat
jostled and hustled by the crowd, and
whether it was from that, or from cold in
going home overheated outside a conveyance,
he was taken ill and died in a few days.

The actual taking of one's seat after a bye-
election has a certain amount of ceremony
about it, and the new member is always
more or less cheered by his party, but after
a General Election it is a more humdrum
affair; about a dozen or so members take
the oath together, then alternately sign the
roll, and that ends the matter. Most new
members, as there is ample time allocated for
the purpose, show no undue haste in taking
the oath, but take their turn in a quiet,
orderly, and leisurely fashion. There are
exceptions to this rule, and I remember one
instance of a new member at the beginning
of the Parliament of 1886 who, whilst a
group of others just elected were awaiting

The First ''Unionist'' Fight at the Polls 107

their turn, rushed like a bull in a china-
shop through these gentlemen, and as he
was a big burly man and took them by
surprise, knocked them right and left in
a most unceremonious fashion, thus going
through this important parliamentary pro-
ceeding a few minutes sooner than he
would otherwise have done. The art of
" push " sometimes succeeds, and in this and
in other subsequent matters he was certainly
not wanting in that, but though he was a
clever man and his party was generally in
power during the time he sat in the House,
it did not succeed in his case, and he never
held office or obtained social or other ad-
vancement.

A man soon finds his level in the House
of Commons. Take the case of a demagogue
like Dr Kenealy, who, having been the
advocate for that arch - impostor '' The
Claimant," had in some mysterious way a
great hold in many parts of the country,
and could at one time, it is said, have turned
the scale in more than a score of constitu-
encies. And people say we are a calm,
phlegmatic people of sound judgment, and
not an excitable, easy-moved race. Well,

io8 Elections, Electors and Elected

Dr Kenealy's first speech in the House
killed his absurdly over-rated position by
ridicule. He soon, like others, found his
level ; in that speech he described himself as
despising his detractors and, like a lion, ''shak-
ing the dewdrops from his mane."

Our House of Commons has been described
as the Mother of Parliaments — the old lady
is remarkably slow and deliberate in her pro-
cedure, and has an utter disregard of the
value of time. The first thing that strikes
a member as absurd is the pompous farce
at the beginning of each session of about a
third of the House of Commons introducing
Bills " in dummy," or placing on the paper
notices of motion that never come on. All
this wastes a couple of working days, and no
one is an iota the better. The House next
proceeds to discuss at large, for at least a fort-
night, the King's Speech. Everybody knows
that an address, thanking His Majesty for
his gracious speech, will ultimately be passed ;
still the farce goes on. And as to the length
of speeches — some of them, and from the
worst speakers as a rule, seem interminable.
A friend of mine. Sir Carne Rasch, has fre-
quently urged in his place that the duration

The First ''Unio7iist'' Fight at the Polls 109

of the speeches be limited to a fixed period
of time ; and everybody sympathises with his
motion except the bores.

That a change in this is desirable, all
admit ; it will come some day, probably —
who knows ? — about the end of this century.
We move very slowly in this country in any
change of effete customs, and should emulate
our brave allies, the Japanese, in the business-
like procedure of their Parliament.

CHAPTER VIII

THE house"

As this is simply a short record of election
experiences and not parliamentary ones, it is
not proposed to refer at any length to that
important assemblage except to repeat that
it is a place where a man soon finds his level.
The House of Commons is a pleasant
institution to belong to. Perhaps the best
way to get on there is to be a trifle hold-offish
and to give out one is a very superior person !
At least that seems to apparently generally
answer. Being good-natured and obliging
to one's party, and willing to assist at an
election, even at short notice ; to move for a
return for a friend, or ask a question in the
House if asked to do so, or speak if it will
help one's party, or take on an amendment
to a Parliamentary Bill at the request of a
friend — all these things, in my experience,

''The House'' iii

may make a man popular, but it won't other-
wise assist a members career — rather the
reverse. Many men come to the front by
force of circumstances, others by family
interest, and not a few by the might of
mediocrity or by constant advertisement, or
by the weight of their purse and their generous
support to the funds of their party ; they do
good by stealth and blush to find themselves
ennobled or famous, as they apparently never
tell their left hand what their right hand has
done. Some succeed by pertinacity, and
others by ability and merit.

A great deal of a member's time in the
House is devoted to what is neither more nor
less than laborious idleness. One has to be
there, and if the debate is on a subject one
does not take a particular interest in, one's
sole resource is to go into the library to write
or read and wait for the division bell to occa-
sionally record one's vote. Of course during
the summer months there is the terrace to
walk on, and last, but not least, the libraries,
the smoking, newspaper, and tea rooms, as
well as the dining rooms. When I first
entered Parliament the twelve o'clock rule
had not been passed, and one had very

112 Elections, Electors and Elected

frequently to sit to all hours of the morning
in the House. On one occasion it was my
lot to be there twenty-two hours at a stretch,
from four one day to two the next, and
then home to have a wash and change and
back again to the House by five o'clock.
That was in the days when obstruction
was easier than it is now, and the closure
required two hundred votes to carry instead
of, as now, one hundred. Sometimes then
the Government messengers had to go in
search of members to make that quorum of
two hundred at all hours of the night and
early morning, and all sorts of amusing stories
were told as to that, no doubt of an apocry-
phal nature, and the surprise caused by
the messengers' appearance in certain house-
holds asking after members whose wives
had imagined they were then at their Parlia-
mentary duties.

The new rules of procedure may have
done good, but as regards any real criticism
of estimates, that is a thing of the past. The
Government of the day decide what estimates
are to be taken, and most of the time is
occupied by a few long set speeches made
by a few leading lights on each side. The

''The House'' 113

governmental representatives do not care
how long they take in replying, as it only
occupies a part of the time of one of
the fixed number of days on estimates,
and those estimates that there is not
time to discuss are taken en bloc, includ-
ing some votes the Government are not
improbably glad are not discussed at all.
In fact, the power of the private member in
Parliament is gradually becoming a thing of
the past. Obstruction used only to be
carried out in the House itself. On the
standing committees much useful work was
done, and by a sort of unwritten law members
did not obstruct in committees. It seems a
pity that that good rule has been, on one or
two occasions lately, partially disregarded.

The House of Commons is, on the whole,
a thoroughly fair audience, if at times a
slightly cold one, more especially when there
are not many present, and most of these are
anxious to follow the then member addressing
the House and speak themselves. It resents
a bore and does not like being addressed as
if it were a political meeting or lectured by a
superior person. But be the speaker who he

may, be he a good and practised speaker or

8

114 Elections, Electors and Elected

be he not, if the subject on which he speaks
is one the House considers he is thoroughly
conversant with, it is a very indulgent audi-
ence, if the speaker is not tedious and does
not intervene when the question has been
thoroughly thrashed out and the House is
anxious to go to a division.

New members, and for a matter of fact
all members, find their time a little taken up
by answering the numerous appeals they
have from their constituents for subscriptions
for purposes too numerous to mention. One
member once jokingly told me that he had
one formula to send as a reply to these
applications, which was : '* Would that I
could, alas ! "

Any little slip in speaking sometimes
tickles the House immensely. A member in
the course of a speech on a motion, which he
ultimately carried by a large majority, said :
" But, Mr Speaker, sir, in this House in
which / am assembled." This little slip was
received with great good-natured hilarity.

By many it is considered to some extent
an advantage to address the House early in
a debate, when the subject has not been
thrashed out threadbare, unless, as is some-

** The House'' 115

times the case, one can throw a new light on
the subject, and of course those who speak
later in a debate or wind it up have the
advantage that they have the views of the
other side to criticise.

A story once went the round of the House
regarding the late Mr Bradlaugh, who was
travelling down to Northampton with his
colleague to address a meeting. He had a
plan of writing in a large bold hand on
separate sheets of paper the points he pro-
posed to speak on, such as : '* One Man, One
Vote," "The Eight Hours Bill," etc. His
colleague saw him employed in this way on
his way down, and was called on by the
chairman of the meeting to speak before
Mr Bradlaugh. The latter's notes were
lying on the table, and easily readable from
a distance, and, point after point, the first
speaker took up the subjects Mr Bradlaugh
proposed to discuss, till the perspiration was
running down the latter's brow. When the
last point in Mr Bradlaugh's notes was
reached, his colleague said : " On this point
there is much to be said, and I will simply
refer to it briefly and leave this subject to be
dealt with more fully by my worthy friend."

1 1 6 Elections, Electors and Elected

Another yarn was that a member of the
House who was travelling abroad, and who
chanced to be a voter in one of the home
counties, was staying at a German hotel,
where he had an exceedingly commodious
and comfortable set of rooms. The landlord
came to him after he had stayed there some
time and told him he regretted to say he
must put him in an inferior set, as his
were required for a German princeling who
was expected. The member expressed his
surprise, and said to the landlord, *' Do you
know who I am ? " '* No, sir." *' Well, bring
me the visitors' list, and I will add my title
to it," and after his name he added the
words, ''Elector of Middlesex!" in a large
bold hand. The landlord humbly bowed at
this, and said he did not know he was enter-
taining so great a man, and our friend
retained his set of rooms.

During the course of the 1886 Parliament I
went down to assist the Unionist candidate at
several bye-elections, including those at Win-
chester and Coventry. At the former election
my friend was returned by a large majority,
whilst at Coventry, after one of the hardest-
fought elections it has ever been my lot to

''The House'' 117

participate in, he was in the minority by
sixteen votes — the result of this election
being due to a great extent, it is said, to a
mistake made by a London policeman in
*'the Cass case." This, which had in reality
nothing to do with the questions before the
country, was made a great deal of by speakers
supporting the Opposition candidate, and at
a large meeting, at which reporters were
excluded, it is difficult to say what allegations
against the Government they did not trump
up, or how many votes they may have turned
by their rather ''smart," if not altogether
accurate, statements. Such is, however, the
fortune of war in electioneering, and we must
take things as they come.

During this Parliament, which lasted about
six years, a great portion of the time was
devoted to the alleged wrongs of Ireland.
We had Ireland from all hours of the morn-
ing, Ireland in the afternoon, and Ireland all
night, and the same impassioned speeches,
the same points came over and over again
with endless regularity, till the Unionist
members, who had at first resented being
called '' brutal and base Saxons," and other
expressions of a similar stamp, began to look

1 1 8 Elections, Electors and Elected

forward to these flowers of rhetoric on an
" Irish night," as they were called, and
cheered them to the echo, and, in fact,
treated them with ironical applause.

On one occasion I recollect well an elo-
quent and distinguished Unionist member
from Ulster had intervened in a debate,
which was, I believe, regarding certain riots
that had taken place in Belfast, and en-
deavoured to correct in the most direct way,
though in the most courteous language, some
mis-statements which in his opinion had been
made regarding the subject under debate by
certain members of the Irish Nationalist
party. This was too much for one of the
Nationalist members, who bobbed up in his
place, interrupted the honourable member
speaking, and vehemently interjected the
following : '' The Honourable and Gallant
Gintleman, sur, is a cowardly liar ! " The
conjunction of the terms ** Honourable,"
'* Gallant," and '' Gentleman " with the latter
part of the sentence was, despite the rude-
ness of this unwarrantable charge, too much
of an Irish bull to be received seriously, and
was followed by peals of laughter, in which
the honourable member thus attacked had

" The House'' 119

•some difficulty in refraining from joining.
Of course the Speaker called the Nationalist
member to order for his unparliamentary
language, and the latter apologised, and the
incident closed.

It is a remarkable fact that some members
who enter the House, and who apparently
lay themselves out to weary it in season and
out of season, and appear to take a delight in
what is called obstruction, and who rise as a
rule during the course of nearly every debate,
are not invariably merely windbags, or men
who have not proved themselves in other
walks of life to be endowed with ability, and
to understand the fitness of things. But
whether it is they are intoxicated with the
delight of hearing their own voices, or
endowed with the bump of loquacity, if
phrenology has developed such a bump
amongst public speakers, they certainly
do try their suffering fellow-creatures in the
House of Commons pretty highly.

Two or three notable instances of dis-
tinguished able and useful ex- Indian civilians
come to my mind — Sir Richard Temple, who
seemed never happier than when spinning
out a debate, and two other worthy and ac-

1 20 Elections, Electors and Elected

complished ex-o£ficers of the Crown who had
done excellent service in India, and who in
private life were pleasant enough friends
and acquaintances. These gentlemen were
respectively Sir George Balfour and Sir
George Campbell. The former, however,
tempered his obstruction with mercy, and
was occasionally concise and to the point ;
the latter certainly did not, and the '* House"
was delighted at one or two little incidents
when they had an opportunity to indulge
in their risible faculties at his expense after
the penance he had so often inflicted on
that assembly, and the cause of their merri-
ment, my late friend Sir George Campbell,
took the laughter in perfectly good part.
One instance was as follows : — In the
Parliament of 1886-92 few speakers were
better appreciated than the then First Com-
missioner of Works, Mr David Plunket
(afterwards Lord Rathmore) ; the slight hesi-
tation in his diction appeared only to em-
phasise the thoughtfulness and elegance of
his oratory and the pointedness of his
remarks. One of the best-appreciated quips
which fell from his lips was on being interro-
gated by Sir George Campbell as to certain

'* The Hotise'' 121

carved beasts and birds which had been
recently introduced into the interior decora-
tion of Westminster Hall, who, in emphatic
tones, asked him if he *'was responsible for
those fearful creatures." The First Commis-
sioner, who had replied to the previously put
question in a written official statement, came
back again to the table, and in reply to this
renewed inquiry, smilingly said, with a genial
nod to Sir George, ** No, sir, I am not
responsible for the fearful creatures in
Westminster Hall, or in the House either."
To thoroughly appreciate this good-humoured
hit one would have had to be in the House at
the time. Questions were interrupted for a
minute or two by peals of laughter, in which
even Mr Gladstone not least delightedly
joined.

It is said that soon after Mr Plunket was
raised to the peerage he was travelling
abroad, and was awoke in the middle of the
night by the guard, who came to see that the
English nobleman for whom the carriage had
been reserved was actually in it, and who
asked his name. Without thinking, he replied
David Plunket, and it took a minute or two
before the then recently created Peer could

12 2 E lections y Electors and Elected

remember his title of Rathmore and explain
his mistake to the guard.

On another occasion, Sir George had
for several days been more than usually
industrious, and had kept the House sitting
till all hours of the morning whilst he inter-
vened in debate fully a score of times, and
not any of them brief addresses. By means
of these orations and some others made by
a few of his friends, the discussion had been
prolonged and estimates prevented being
passed. After these exploits he was again
addressing the wearied House, and, anxious
that the action of himself and friends should
not be lost to history, he alluded to them
collectively as a ** band of us devoted guer-
illas " ; but the pronunciation of this latter
Spanish word did not come glibly off his
tongue, and what the House heard was
"a band of us devoted gorillas." The pro-
longed and uproarious laughter which greeted
this phrase rendered any attempt to subse-
quently correct it impossible, and Sir George
had to ultimately subside in his place. It
may be added that the members bore with
heroic fortitude the fact that he did not again
address the House for several days.

''The House'' 123

One of the bravest of men and most trust-
worthy of friends, who, with my late uncle,
afterwards General Sir David Dodgson,
K.C.B., had been on the staff of his late
father, General Sir Henry Havelock, was
Havelock-Allan, member for a division of
Durham. He had, however, a peculiar
mode of crushing his political opponents,
not only by the abruptness of his interrup-
tions (and when he chose to make a speech
he was one of the most brilliant and lucid
debaters in Parliament), but by actually and
physically sitting on them. A certain bench
on the Opposition side of the House was then
usually occupied by his Liberal Unionist
friends, and the gallant General himself,
once finding an Irish Home Rule member
in their accustomed place, he proceeded to
plump down on the bench more or less
alongside of him, landing heavily on the
member's lap, and it was merely the flattened
presentment of a member of Parliament
who rose to ask if this sort of thing was
in order.

Small items in estimates were sometimes
discussed at inordinate length, whilst immense
sums of money were often passed, it seemed

1 24 Elections, Electors ana Elected

to me, without due comment, and that is, of
course, the case now more than ever, when,
after the allotted days have been devoted
to their discussion, the remainder are passed
by means of the closure without discussion.
On one occasion a debate lasting for an hour
or two was on the salary paid to the rat-
catcher to some public building or royal
palace, I forget which. On another occasion
there was quite a full-dress debate on an item
appearing in the estimates for mending the
robes of the knights of the Order of the Garter.
A Minister, defending the vote, pointed out
that it was needful to alter that sum, in
order to maintain the dignity of that high
order, to which Mr Labouchere retorted by
asking : If the dignity of the order was
maintained by its members wearing second-
hand clothes ? This vote disappeared from
the estimates next session.

Although, no doubt, there is a committee
appointed to examine the public accounts,
their powers appear exceedingly limited ;
and there should be a strong committee
appointed, with full powers, to go into the
estimates thoroughly, and report to the
House their view, if Parliament really wishes

''The House'' 125

to have any actual power over the purse-
strings of the nation.

During the last session of this Parliament
I carried a motion by a considerable majority
that "the illiterate vote," as it is called,
should be done away with, as I alleged this
mode of permitting illiterates to vote in the
case of Ireland was abused, and that hundreds
of so-called ''illiterates" could in reality both
read and write, and only alleged their
inability to do so to the presiding officer in
the polling-booths in Ireland in order to let
the personation agents of certain candidates
know definitely how they voted, and that in
consequence this permission for illiterates to
thus vote practically evaded the secrecy of
the voting system under the Ballot Act.
The vote on my motion was by no means a
party one, and a leading and important
member of the then Liberal Opposition, Sir
Wilfrid Lawson, was one of the tellers with
myself in the division.

CHAPTER IX

IN OPPOSITION

The Parliament elected in 1886 having run its
course, another General Election took place,
which was contested with great keenness
all over the country. Members seeking re-
election are often attacked by the rival
candidates on their votes during the pre-
ceding Parliament. Is that a good policy .»*
Does it not emphasise how attentive they
have been to their parliamentary duties, and
that they had carried out the pledges in
Parliament given the electors who supported
them six years previously.

At this election I was re-elected for the
same constituency by a considerable majority.
An incident occurred on the day of the
poll which shows how careful a candidate
must be. All the private carriages which

had been lent were being used to convey

126

In Opposition 127

the electors to the poll. And in the after-
noon of the polling day a couple of friends
who were not electors were driving with me
round the constituency in a barouche which
I had hired, which could be used for that
purpose, but, being a hired conveyance, it
was not allowed by the Act to be used to
convey voters to the poll. It chanced to
be raining hard at the time, and two electors
who were walking down the road and knew
me by sight beckoned for the carriage to
stop, which it did, and alighting from the
carriage, I shook hands with them. They
asked me to give them a lift to the poll.
To that I had no alternative but to reply :
" That is unfortunately a hired carriage, and
it is illegal for me to let you drive to the
poll in that ; but, if you will allow me, I'll
walk with you down the road and dispatch
that carriage to send back one of the private
ones standing by the nearest committee room
to pick us up."

But that offer was declined. Whether
these electors proposed to vote for me, or
whether I lost their votes by my action, it
is equally impossible to say. Be that as
it may, this is most important, by what I

128 Elections, Electors and Elected

did any risk of an election petition was
obviated.

This was a very short contest as far as
this particular constituency was concerned,
barely a fortnight elapsing from the date of
the first meeting held to support my candi-
dature to the date of the poll. My opponent
had been actively working for about eight
or ten days longer, but as there were not
many supporters of the Government then in
town, and I was sitting on an important
parliamentary committee at the request of
**the Whips," I remained in my place to
help them wind up the session before com-
mencing my electoral campaign, and so gave
the other side a certain start, with no bad
results to my prospect of success, as it ulti-
mately turned out.

I have more than once been asked by
candidates for Parliament, When does the
actual contest begin ; when, in fact, does a
candidature commence ? There is in fact
no definite or clear rule as to that, except
that all expenses should be included in the
returns sent in of the expenditure incurred
during the election which are incurred before
*' the issue of the writ or declaration of the

In Opposition 129

vacancy," but after the active campaign has
begun. It is of course evident that the law
will presume the contest has commenced
after a candidate issues his election address
and commences a round of meetings to further
his candidature, and that the expenses in-
curred after that time must be returned as
election expenses, and be included within the
maximum allowed. To obviate any difficulty
the candidate should prevent resolutions of
confidence being submitted until the cam-
paign has actually started.

It is impossible to exercise too much care
in the selection of an election agent, and it is
best, where an experienced man can be found
in the locality itself, not to go further afield ;
but should the person who has worked the
organisation during this period between the
elections, although probably cognisant of the
wants of each locality and personally known
to many of the leading workers, not have
sufficient experience in the actual conduct
of an election, it would be judicious to obtain
the services of some other person as agent,
and to endeavour to secure as well the ser-
vices of the previously referred to local
organiser as one of the sub-agents or

9

1 30 Elections, Electors and Elected

''clerks " to act as the election agent's right-
hand man and to give him, when called on
to do so, all information and all assistance in
his power.

It is very desirable to have a smart sub-
agent for a county election. I was once told
a man was selected for the following reason :
he had been a canvasser for a bookseller and
obtained admittance to a publican's private
room to try and sell him a shilling book.
The Boniface told him *' to clear out of that
promptly ! " On returning through the bar,
the canvasser said to the barmaid, '* The
gov'nor says he has not got a loose shilling
about him, and to ask you for one and leave
this book," which she did. The innkeeper
hearing this was furious, and called to the pot-
boy to run after the man and call him back.
On picking our hero up the latter said, *' Oh,
that's all right. I know what he wants me
for, he wants one of these books ; give me a
bob and take it back to him at once." The
messenger eased himself of a shilling and
returned with the book. The story does not
record what the landlord said, or whether the
book canvasser proved as successful as a sub-
election agent.

In Opposition 131

In many constituencies the eve before the
polling-day is devoted to a series of meetings
to keep the enthusiasm up, and to pass at
each of them votes of confidence in the candi-
date in whose interests they have been con-
vened. There is, no doubt, much to be said
in favour of that course, though I confess the
plan I prefer is to have (at any rate in the
case of a town constituency) one large meet-
ing to be addressed by the candidate, and
that also during the same evening a series
of small ward meetings be convened,
which all the workers be invited to attend,
and that at these gatherings all the details
of the work on the morrow be pointed out
to them by the candidate, agent, or sub-agent,
and provision made, as far as practicable,
to bring up to the poll certain voters known
to be supporters, but who might not other-
wise find time or inclination to register their
votes.

On the day of the election it is desirable
that the most reliable of the workers should
be placed in charge of the various committee
rooms, and that all electors so promised are
sent for at the time agreed upon, and that
three or four persons are not sent after one

132 Elections^ Electors and Elected

voter. After the declaration of the poll,
the supporters of the candidates, victors and
vanquished alike, usually appreciate greatly
a few words from their champion at their
respective head-quarters, when the causes
which have secured victory or contributed to
non-success can be briefly entered into, and
words of encouragement or congratulation
given to those who have done their best to
secure their candidate's return.

During the election of 1892, except in a
minor degree in this constituency I am refer-
ring to, no independent organisations took any
part. Nowadays in many contests they do,
and, as has been previously indicated, it would
seem wisest for the election agent and the
candidate, and all prominent persons con-
nected with the party, to keep studiously
away from the offices of any independent
association or body interesting itself in the
election. Of course, where a powerful
organisation comes and opens committee
rooms, and does its best to secure a man's
return, it is often difficult for the candidate
to keep his agent away from the persons
acting on behalf of this organisation. Not-
withstanding that, the election agent should

In Opposition 133

impress on all his colleagues, and also cour-
teously inform the agents of the organisation
referred to, that he must not constitute them
his agents, or he would be responsible and
suffer for their acts, and their expenses would
have to go into his return.

The agent should give counterfoiled
written orders for everything which he buys
during an election, and should also post
bills at the commencement of the contest
announcing that he has been appointed
election agent and that all orders will be
made in writing over his signature, and that
he will not be responsible for any expense
otherwise incurred. A printer's proof of
every document issued in connection with
the election should be submitted to the
agent, in order that he should ascertain
that the imprint is correct, and that it con-
tains no false statements with reference
to the personal character of an opposing
candidate upon which any charge may be
based.

Should any bill appear, apparently issued
by the election agent or by the candidate,
which is in fact not so issued and which may
be dangerous, it should be at once publicly

134 Elections, Electors and Elected

repudiated, and a copy of this repudiation
should be sent in a registered letter to the
Opposition candidate, in order to call his
attention to the fact.

Nearly all over the country, during the
election of 1892, the party that had been in
power during the last Parliament were losing
seats, one of the exceptions being in the
borough a division of which I contested,
where they not only held their own, but
wrested a seat from their opponents, and both
my successful colleague and myself had the
honour of being sent for and congratulated
at the Foreign Office by the Premier on our
notable success at the polls.

Soon after the reassembling of Parliament
the Government went out of office, and we
became members of the then Opposition,
which fact gave us both more opportunity of
addressing the House if we so desired, as
private members on the ministerial side have,
ipso facto, to rather efface themselves in the
interests of their party, though that rule is
not strictly adhered to by a good number of
them in recent years, and is one now ap-
parently more honoured in the breach than
in the observance.

In Opposition 135

During this Parliament one of the numer-
ous political tours I took was to a bye-
election in North Wales, and an un-
commonly keenly contested fight it was.
Both sides displayed the greatest energy.
On one occasion, after a most enthusiastic
meeting, the crowd took the horses out of
the carriage in which another member and I
were sitting, and dragged us through the
town for about a mile.

One of the chief towns in the division had
a market-place of considerable size, on one
side of which was a comfortable hotel with
a long wooden balcony. From this balcony
the rival candidate and his friends addressed
a large gathering, mainly consisting of his
supporters. At the conclusion of their
speeches, and after this gentleman and his
supporters had left the balcony, but before
the crowd had dispersed, some friends and I
obtained permission to use the balcony and
ventilate our views in support of his oppo-
nent. Our chairman (who has since sat for
many years in Parliament) had some diffi-
culty in making himself heard, as the noise
made by the friends of the opposite party was
something deafening. At length he called

136 Elections, Electors and Elected

on me to speak, and having quietly waited my
time till the crowd had shouted and bawled
themselves hoarse, and were tired of shaking
their fists at the small group on the balcony,
I ventured to commence as follows : —

"• Gentlemen, the warmth and kindness of
your reception delights and surprises me."
This was received with renewed howls of
execration, and as they wore themselves out
a second time, I added : '* Again let me
thank you for your hearty and genial greet-
ing." This was too much even for the
bitterness of the crowd, who burst out into
unwilling laughter at this unexpected re-
sponse to their by no means cordial wel-
come. I then proceeded with my remarks,
and kept politics aside for the moment, and
regaled them with one or two anecdotes, and
got their ear, in fact interested, and to some
extent amused, them ; they put me down as
a wag, and I then gave them a good twenty
minutes' political speech, slipping into the
views of my political opponents right and
left, and ultimately induced them to carry
a vote of confidence in the candidate I was
supporting, which only shows that even in
modern times and from the lips of speakers

In Opposition 137

who do not pretend to be orators, as in the
days of old, a crowd sometimes, if properly
handled, will change its opinions.

On my return to town after this particular
political campaign, a genial and highly
esteemed member of Parliament, one not
altogether unconnected with the develop-
ment of Egypt by the construction there
of stupendous engineering works, which will
last for all time, asked about twenty other
members of the House to meet the writer of
these reminiscences at dinner at the House
of Commons, when, it were needless to say,
compliments flew round and a pleasant
evening was spent.

There was also at that time a club con-
sisting of members of Parliament, who took
an active part in supporting the political
views of one party in the State, called the
** Jubilee Club." These members used to
dine together from time to time at the St
Stephen's Club, within sound of the division
bell, to summon them to the House of Com-
mons to vote in a division, and these gather-
ings at that club were pleasant interludes in
the routine of political work in the House.
Many of the members of this club, if asked

138 Elections, Electors and Elected

to do so, used to help at the various contested
elections.

Another interesting election during that
Parliament, at which I assisted by speaking,
was one for the Brigg Division of Lincoln-
shire, which resulted in an important win for
my friends then sitting on the Opposition
benches. It was a very uphill fight. Al-
though it was known that it would probably
be a very close contest, on the afternoon of
the poll all indications pointed out that the
candidate whom, amongst other workers, I was
assisting would win, and I therefore ventured
to send a telegram to a political club in
London to foretell that result, and, as pre-
viously said, a seat previously held by a
supporter of the then Government was
carried by the " Opposition " candidate,
though only by a majority of seventy-seven
votes in a total poll of about eight thousand
votes recorded.

Although that forecast was a successful
one, it seemed to me too risky a thing to
ever afterwards attempt to prophesy about
the result of close elections. The ballot box
is an uncertain quantity and able to give
surprises.

In Opposition 139

On the evening of this election, whilst I
was sitting, shortly before the close of the
poll, in a committee room, a canvasser
stated that an elector who had just come
from work would only vote if the writer
of these reminiscences would call and ask
him to do so. In this I willingly assented,
and accordingly went to this voter's cottage,
which was, as I entered it, dark, as the
workman had just returned from the iron
works. The elector, although friendly,
said he hardly liked to shake hands, as
they were dirty, and he had not had
time to wash since his return from the
foundry. On the reply to that remark
that "an honest man's hands are never
dirty," he shook hands and agreed to go to
the poll, and duly proceeded there to register
his vote.

During that election, two amusing stories
were told me. One was by a friend, and as
follows : —

A Quaker who had been all his life
a staunch Liberal was converted to Con-
servatism in the following way. Being a
market gardener, he had patches of ground
covered with fruit and vegetables in many

1 40 Elections, Electors and Elected

localities, which gave him quite a multiplicity
of votes. Reading the address of one of the
Liberal candidates in one of these constitu-
encies in which he had a vote, he came
across a paragraph stating that this gentle-
man was in favour of ''one man, one vote."
On being called on to ask to vote for that
candidate, he said : '' What does this mean
if carried out ? Can I only vote once during
an election ? " ** Yes, that's precisely it,"
said the canvasser. " Shan't I be compen-
sated if I lose all the other votes .-^ " ** Oh,
no, that's impossible," was the reply. *' Well,
then, friend, if that's the case, I'll turn Tory."
And he did.

And the other was this one. As a rule, a
candidate canvassing is very civilly treated
by the voters, though he may meet with
numberless refusals of their support by the
electors. Nor does he as a rule receive
similar treatment to that meted out to a
candidate who, on asking an elector to give
him his vote, received the surly reply, " I
would sooner vote for the devil than for
you," who smilingly rejoined, ''Well, as I
don't think your friend is standing, perhaps
you will later on give me your support."

I7i Opposition 141

It Is very remarkable how much people
take their ideas of what poHticians are Hke
from what they read and see in the press.
Although the late Lord Randolph Churchill
was by no means a small man in stature, but
one of medium height, our old friend Pzmch,
in his friendly caricatures of him, had always
depicted him as one much below the usual
size.

That deceased statesman went, about the
year 1887, to address a large mass meeting
in a hall at Perth. It was my lot to be
one of the speakers at that meeting, and
it slightly astonished me to see that the
committee had had erected a small plat-
form behind the desk Lord Randolph was
going to speak from, ''so that the audi-
ence might see him," It was explained.
When the committee met Lord Randolph
and saw the mistake they had made, and that
he was by no means a short man, that plat-
form, it is needless to say, was hastily
removed.

Driving to address several other meetings
on another occasion, to various centres in
the Highlands, on a coach, accompanied by
several friends and an inevitable piper or

142 E lections y Electors and Elected

two, on one of these expeditions I had a
pleasant and interesting, if a somewhat noisy-
experience ; the refrain from the pipers, aided
by the vocal energies of the crowd, being, as
the coach departed on its homeward journey,
at the termination of this meeting, "Will ye
no come back again ? "

Once an incident of a less pleasant char-
acter happened to me. On driving, after
speaking at Flint, in North Wales, to the
town of Mold, in an open gig, with an Irish
jarvy, a large lump of flint stone was hurled
through the air at us by someone behind a
wall, luckily missing us both.

*' Begorra," said the driver, as he whipped
up his horse,^ '' we'd best be stepping along,
or maybe the bwoys will hit us," in which
remark, it is needless to say, there was
hearty concurrence on my part.

The largest meeting I ever had the honour
of addressing was an open-air one at Tod-
morden, Lancashire, when it was stated there
were over ten thousand people present.

CHAPTER X

ANOTHER GENERAL ELECTION

The election of 1895 came somewhat sud-
denly. That is to say, the division on
"cordite," which defeated the Government,
was an unexpected one, as it was anticipated
that their defeat (and there were only eighteen
votes between the governmental majority
and the nominal vote of the various sections
of the Opposition) would have been, more
probably, on some important amendment
in the committee stage being carried against
the Government on their Disestablishment of
the Church in Wales Bill. It was considered
at the time that the real policy of the leader
of the Opposition was the one Mr Balfour
had adopted, and that was to hang on the
flanks of the enemy, and attack them on
every point, harass them on every oppor-
tunity. This division Mr Brodrick chai-
ns

1 44 Elections, Electors and Elected

lenged on the ''cordite" vote took place on
a certain Friday. On the following Monday
it is a fact that a division would have been
reached on the Church in Wales Disestablish-
ment Bill which would have wrecked the
Government, as it was understood several of
their supporters representing Welsh constitu-
encies were going to vote for that amend-
ment, whilst others, it was said, would have
abstained from voting. I notice Mr Lucy
and others well in the know endorse this
fact. By chance, I may add, that amendment
stood in my name. It was not, to my know-
ledge, as has been stated, in consequence of
the Government of the day ''riding for a
fall," as it is called, but it was in reality in
the nature of a surprise engineered by the
Liberal Unionists in the House, who took
steps to all vote or get "paired" for the
" cordite " division, and to quietly " whip "
as many of their Conservative colleagues
as possible to be present on that occasion.
This, of course, took the ministerial members
by surprise, as the attendance having been
so close for weeks prior to that, there was
always a certain percentage who were absent
during the discussion on estimates on Ix h

Another Ge7ieral Election 145

sides, and who took that opportunity to fulfil
other duties and engagements, unless, as was
the case then, a great effort was made by one
side to whip up a larger number of their party
than usual, as was done on that memorable
occasion.

There was great excitement in the House
after the division, and members rushed to
the telegraph office to let their friends know,
but as I sat for a London seat, I knew there
was no need to do so, as the news would
be in my constituents' hands ere any
telegram of mine could possibly reach
them. The telegraph office is on one side of
the handsome central hall between the Lords
and the Commons. Adjoining that central
hall is also a corridor to the House through
St Stephen's Hall leading from Westminster
Hall. On the site of the former hall the House
once sat. It is lined with the statues of great
statesmen of the past, including, as statues
go, quite a lifelike one of Pitt. Its resemblance
to that of Mr Chamberlain is remarkable.
At Knoll there is one of even an earlier
date and finer workmanship, with a more
striking likeness to the enfant terrible to
'' Fjefi, import traders" and Little Englanders.

lO

1 46 Elections, Electors and Elected

During that Parliament, 1892-5, Mr Chamber-
lain always struck me as at his best when
answering attacks all round with cool icy im-
perturbability. The more heated and fiery
his opponents became, the more confident he
appeared to be, and the more facilely he
thrust them aside with the rapier-like points
in his arguments. Like a skilful fencer with
his back against a wall, and a slight smile
on his face, he disarmed the blundering im-
petuosity of his opponents and exposed their
fallacies. Nor did the recurrino- outburst of
storm, or if half the members lashed them-
selves into fury, ever trouble him, and while
he metaphorically laid them one after the
other by the heels, he always seemed as cool
as a cucumber.

During the election in 1895 many of my
friends who had helped on previous occasions
in the constituency I represented had either
joined the majority or were away. Mean-
while, other and new stalwart supporters
came to the front. The candidate who
opposed me was not only a diffuse but a
very brilliant speaker, and had the advantage
of numerous canvassers from outside, whereas
my friends were nearly all residents in the

Another General Election 147

locality. But what they lacked in numbers
they made up in local knowledge and energy.
During- the contest, being a bit fagged from
overwork, not only in the division I was
standing for, but in other constituencies as
well, I went down to Portsmouth, accom-
panied by my son, on a Saturday for a blow
on an Admiralty steamer and a view of the
Italian Fleet, then in British waters, and
spent a week-end down there. After this
short break I returned to town with renewed
energy for the conclusion of the contest,
and was again returned by a substantial
majority to Parliament for the third time in
succession, aided by the energy and good
work of my friends. On the day following
the declaration of the poll I left London
to assist other candidates in several other
constituencies where the elections were still
pending.

I do not here propose to refer to contests
for representative bodies other than the
House of Commons, except to say that, win
or lose, I invariably found equally kind
workers to aid me in them, and that, in con-
sequence, I was nearly uniformly successful
in those elections.

148 Elections, Electors and Elected

My experience goes to prove that with a
good cause, quite unruffled determination by
the candidate, the election agents, and the
workers, and thoughtful action in emer-
gencies, it is odds in favour of a candidate
even with a large majority against him to
start with.

Above all, a candidate should never show
he believes he is on the losing side, nor in
any way "lack courage," and endeavour to
encourage his supporters to the last. Courage
is a very useful factor at a contested election.
But speaking of that, there is a story which
would appear to show that a lack of courage
is not always an altogether undesirable thing,
which is as follows : — A certain lady who was
very much a widow, for she had buried five
husbands in succession, took an early flame,
who had never made up his mind to propose
to her, to the cemetery to see the tombs of
her departed spouses. ** Ah ! " she said,
looking at him with an arch smile, '*you
might be lying there if you'd only had more
courage ! " That widow appears to have
been one who came under the definition of
the one described by the schoolboy, who
replied, when asked as to what a widow was,

Another General Election 149

"A widow is a woman what wants a
widower ! "

It is always needful to make every effort
to keep an appointment, especially a political
one, so as not to disappoint numerous people.
Once I was unfortunate enough to miss a
connecting train at Rugby Junction owing
to my train being late, and had to post on
to near Coventry to be in time for a meeting
during a contested election. Nor did I send
an excuse as another member of Parliament
is said to have done, who was to have made
a speech at Derby, and who, being unable to
do so because the heavy rains had destroyed
the branch railway, sent a telegram as follows :
"Cannot come, wash out on line." In a few
hours the reply came : " Never mind, borrow
a shirt."

At a very important election in London
during the Parliament of 1892, another
member of the House and myself were in-
vited to speak on behalf of the Opposition
candidate, who had a remarkably striking
resemblance at that time to his political
opponent, who was standing in the interests
of the then Government. We engaged a
hansom to drive from the House of Com-

1 50 Elections, Electors ana Elected

mons to the meeting, which was in a dis-
trict in London with which we were both
totally unacquainted, and, as it turned out, so
also was our driver, to whom we gave most
careful instructions as to the name of the hall
in which the meeting was to be held, and the
street in which the hall was situated. It was
a newly built over district, and the streets were
a bit confusing, and the cabman at length
arrived at a building in which there was
evidently a meeting progressing. Alighting
from the cab, we were most courteously re-
ceived at the door, and boldly proceeded into
the hall, during our progress up which we
were received with cheers by the audience.
We saw the candidate, whom we knew only
slightly by sight, sitting on the platform, and
we imagined him to be the gentleman we had
been asked by their political friends to support.
On drawing nearer the platform we recognised
on it, to our surprise, several members of
the House who were politically opposed to
us, one or two of whom in a friendly way
waved their hands and pointed out we had
made a mistake and gone to the wrong
meeting. The audience, who evidently did
not appreciate the exact position of affairs,

Another General Election r 5 i

cheered our departure as heartily as our
arrival.

The hansom had, fortunately enough, not
left the door, and so we promptly went to our
friend's meeting, which was quite close, in
fact, within a few hundred yards. This was
even a larger meeting than the one at which
we had inadvertently made an appearance.
In addressing the latter meeting, we referred
to our slight mistake in going into our
political opponents' camp, and had, it were
needless to say, a most cordial reception at
one of the best meetings either of us had
attended in London.

Some people imagine that in speaking to
a large meeting one has to bawl and shout to
make oneself heard. That is not so ; one has
to speak slowly (but not tediously so), dis-
tinctly and clearly pronouncing each word,
even remembering there is a " d " in '* and " ;
one should try to address one's remarks to
the furthest man in the hall for him to hear.
Open-air speaking is, of course, more trying
to the voice than speaking in a hall,
but even then, if the speaker will speak
clearly and distinctly to the last man in the
crowd, not necessarily in a very loud voice,

1 5 2 Elections, Electors and Elected

and he receives a fair hearing, he will
make himself heard. If I may venture to
say so, it has often struck me that there is
one mistake which even the best and most
finished speakers make, and that is more
especially when speaking on a subject which
they are thoroughly well up in themselves,
and, so to speak, saturated with the know-
ledge of. I refer to what many unintention-
ally do, namely, speaking over the head of
their audience, and not taking the trouble
to explain to them in clear, easy, understand-
able language some of the alphabet of the
subject — in fact, giving the audience credit for
understanding the subject better than nine-
tenths of them really do. For instance, I
once heard a particularly good speaker give
a learned disquisition on '* dumping," and
when he had finished I doubt if one out of
ten he was addressing had the faintest idea
of what it was all about. John Bright was
one of the few great speakers who never fell
into that error, and also spoke in clear, simple
language, as does, as a rule, Mr Chamberlain.
To any one who takes an interest in the
racial differences to be found in the various
parts of the country, nothing is more notice-

A no titer General Election 153

able than the distinctly different look of the
audiences that confront a speaker. There
is, for instance, the strong, well-built, big
Cumberland and Westmorland men, and
others of the same physique to be found
in many other parts of the United Kingdom,
including Scotland, whilst in some of the
Midland and Southern districts the men are,
comparatively speaking, small, although, as
a rule, sturdy, well-knit-together specimens
of manhood.

Some of the audiences seem quite different
from others as to the brightness, quickness,
and intelligence with which they grasp the
speaker's ideas and cheer him to the echo, or
dissent from his views. Urban constitu-
encies, as a rule, are easier to address in this
respect and more receptive of ideas than
country ones. They see and appreciate the
good points made by a speaker, and are
more prone to understand and acknowledge
by their laughter if any humorous remark is
made to them. A Lancashire audience is
probably the quickest in perception and best
to speak to. Besides which they are com-
posed of keen and thoughtful politicians, and
are therefore more critical.

154 Elections^ Electors and Elected

Even in addressing a completely friendly
audience in some of the East Coast country
constituencies, a speech that would be punctu-
ated by cheers and laughter in many parts of
the country is received in dead silence, which
is a little disconcerting to the speaker. They
are said, however, to understand all that is
said to them, and go home and talk it over,
and, despite their silence, often vote in the
sense the speaker advocates, but appear to
think it unseemly to interrupt in any way,
even by applause.

A London audience is, as a rule, a good
one, and thoroughly appreciates a good
speech. Sometimes individual members
of the audience make strange, weird, and
pointless interruptions.

To quote an instance : It was my lot to
once address a Holborn outdoor meeting
in Red Lion Square during a bye-election,
and was pointing out the advantages of a
certain Local Government Bill, then passing
through the House ! A woman in the
audience who was standing near the carriage
from which I was speaking, with her arms
akimbo, and who appeared to be listening
intently, said :

A not her General Election 1 5 5

''That's all very fine, but what about
Jack the Ripper ? "

To which I replied :

" If you will bear with me, madam, I will
refer to that sad blot in our social life a
little later."

Another member of Parliament, support-
ing the opposing candidate, was addressing
another crowd from a cart about one hundred
yards from where I was speaking, and to
emphasise his arguments waved in the air
a thing that looked like a horse collar,
popularly supposed to be some instrument
of torture used on Irish members of Parlia-
ment when thrown into jail by their *' Saxon
oppressors," as they described the then
Government.

It always seems best, in my view, to have
a sort of time-table framed if there are to
be many speakers at a meeting, so as not
to let the first two or three monopolise all
the time. But if one of the early speakers
gets the ear of the audience and wishes
to go on, that rule should be broken through.
A speaker can always tell when he has got
hold of a meeting ; there is a sort of magnetic
current passing betwixt the speaker and the

156 Elections, Electors and Elected

audience, which seems to encourage the one
to higher efforts and the latter to enthusiastic
applause.

No platform speaker ever really gets hold
of his audience unless he is thoroughly up in
his subject, is clear and incisive, does not
speak too quickly, and practically speaks
from his heart. It is better not to use any
further notes than the headings of the subject
he proposes to speak on. Some speakers
write out the peroration or termination of
their speeches in extenso ; and I well re-
member a laughable incident occurring in
the House, of a speaker who, after a vain
search through his pockets for the manuscript
of the peroration of his speech, had at length
to conclude his remarks somewhat lamely
without its well-turned periods.

In Scotland, and in some other parts of
the country, numbers of questions are put to
the candidate. This is called ** Heckling."
If the candidate has his wits about him and
gives short and incisive replies, and not
laboured ones, he often makes good points
and scores off his questioner. Much depends
on the chairman as to how this part of the
meeting goes off A good chairman, as a

Another General Election 157

rule, will only allow such questions to be put
which are sent up in writing, nor permit the
replies to them to be commented on ; exclude
frivolous questions ; and in all cases only
allow a reasonable number of questions to
be put at any one meeting, saying to those
who propose to put others after a number
have been asked and answered : *' We have
no more time for further questions to-night ;
you had better, if you wish to ask any further
questions, come to our candidate's later
meetings."

It has always struck me that the length
of a General Election after the writs are out
is needlessly protracted. Excluding Orkney
and Shetland, of which more later, it is
usually about a fortnight from the poll being
taken in the first borough election to that
in the last county one. That keeps the
country more or less in suspense too long,
and interferes needlessly with trade and
industry. It further causes needless expense
to the candidates. Some advocate that
all the elections should be on one day,
and that day should be a Saturday. But
regarding the former suggestion, it might
be inconvenient to have all the elections on

158 Elections, Electors and Elect ea

one day, as the returning officers, polling
and counting clerks, scrutineers and police
are often in a given district the same men
in both the borough and county elections, and
they could not obviously attend both places
at once. It seems to me that it would be
desirable to fix the elections for two sub-
sequent days, one for the boroughs and the
next for the counties. That would, of course,
preclude Saturday being one of the days. Nor
am I quite certain if, in any case, Saturday is
the most convenient day. It is the day nearly
all the provision merchants and traders in
towns are busy, it is a market day in many
country towns, the streets are often blocked
by the carts and stalls of the hawkers, the
railwaymen are all extra busy on Saturdays,
and many, rich and poor alike, are anxious
to leave the towns early on the Saturday
afternoons. It is also a day that those of the
Jewish faith regard as a day of rest. In
many divisions the count could not be con-
cluded on Saturday night, and would have
to be postponed till the following Monday.
Two days in the middle of the week would
be, in my view, more convenient for Parlia-
ment to fix as the days of the polling, and not

Another General Election 159

leave the option to the returning officer, as
at present — say Wednesday for all boroughs
and Thursday for all county divisions.

The polling in Orkney and Shetland takes
place now, in this age of telegraphs and
steamers, at a ridiculously long time after
the other pollings, and a week or so after
the other elections were concluded should
be ample time for a Government dispatch
boat to go round to all the small islands
comprised in that constituency, so their
poll should take place on the succeeding
Thursday to the rest of the county elections.

In conclusion, these lines have been written
with the endeavour that they may interest
and to some extent amuse the reader, to
avoid making these reminiscences egotistical
but general, and, as far as possible, from
my varied experiences of elections in nearly
every part of Great Britain, to give a few
useful hints to all interested in elections. I
am well aware that what applies to one con-
stituency does not to another, and in all cases
the local circumstances of the case will have
to be considered, as well as the relative fitness
and ability of the opposing candidates.

There has been every wish to keep out of

1 60 Elections, Electors and Elected

these reminiscences party names or party
cries. It seems, to me certain that at the
present day any election will be more difficult
for a man to win who has not made up his
mind, and who cannot state his opinions
clearly and frankly. It does not now depend
altogether on old-world catch cries, nor can a
candidate screen his views from the electors
(if he fails to have any thoroughly convinced
opinions of his own) by saying, '* I vote for
our leaders " or *' I support the Government
or the Opposition," but he must have the
courage of his opinions, if he indeed has any.
In laying down my pen, I do so with the
hope that at all future elections the country
will send to the House of Commons a legis-
lative assembly worthy of the Mother of
Parliaments — a great council of the nation
which will give liberal and constitfltconal
progress and pros'perity to this historic land
and empire.

PRINTED BY NEILL AND CO., LTD., EDINBURGH.

GENERAL LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA— BERKELEY

RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED

This book is due on the last date stamped below, or on the

date to which renewed.

Renewed books are subject to immediate recall.

r._. ' ' -.13

FEB 7 1951;

RECD L.O

NOV x9 1957

IviAR 1] 1959

3IMar'59hA

Rli-C ' LD

MAfi I :i 1959
8Apr'S9BPl

REC'^j LD

MAfi .' ,j 1959

m 10 '64 E

f=?eC'D LC
'""5 '64 -5 P

NOV IS '66^,

/6/(

Pr'SSAJ

-«^.->

59Fl'f

APr>

LD 21-lOOm-l, '54(1887816)476

tmm^'m^^m^m0

Support Home Industries and purchase
Fry's Cocoas and Chocolates, v^hich are
manufactured by British Labour. . • •

PURE CONCENTRATED

I ^S

**l have never tasted Cocoa that I like so w&ll." —
Sir CHAS. CAMERON, C.B., M.D.,

Ex-President of the Royal College of Surgeons, Ireland.

TRY ALSO

FRY'P

i»^. TED COCOA

of Fry's Pure Cocoa and
:rys' Extract of Malt.

.commended by the Medical Faculty.

\tt*m^