‘I like that,’ said the Tory candidate to his agent; ‘all the respectable people will vote for me.’
‘Confound the fellow!’ said Sir Watkin, in a rage. ‘I shall have hard work to beat that, and if I did the people would never believe I meant it. I am of an old Whig family, and it is hard to give up one’s principles.’
‘We shall have to _finesse_ a bit,’ said Sir Watkin’s agent and confidential man. ‘Suppose you placard yourself as the working-man’s friend.’
‘Suppose we send agents to break up all his meetings, so that he can’t be heard.’
‘Suppose we get the Rev. George Windbag, the leading Dissenting minister in the town, to make a grand speech at our first meeting, to talk of the need of unity and the danger of splitting up the Liberal Party. We can secure the man at once, Sir Watkin, if you will but ask him to dinner at the Hall. There is not a bigger tuft-hunter in the county, and he has immense weight with the respectable shop-keeping class.’
‘And suppose we get one or two Chartists from town. They will be sure to come. Pay them well, and feed them well, and you can do anything with them.’
‘And we might get a Socialist or Republican down.’
‘But I hate them like poison,’ said the Baronet.
‘Never mind,’ said the agent. ‘You need not appear in the matter. Leave them to me. I know how to secure them. This ain’t the first time I’ve been electioneering.’
‘So it seems,’ said the Baronet. ‘All I say is, keep me out of a scrape.’
‘That is not quite so easy as it was. Yet the thing can be done; Parliament, naturally being in favour of returning rich men to Parliament, is never much in earnest in attempting to put down bribery and corruption.’
‘Ah! my father had never much difficulty in securing his seat,’ said the Baronet in a tone of regret.
‘Yes; but he spent a good deal of money, as I have heard.’
‘That was true; but he got it all back again.’
‘Yes, he had an easy life of it. I was looking over Oldmixon, and he thus describes the borough as it was in the good old times. You recollect the town sent two members till the Reform Bill of 1831 robbed us of one?’
‘I have heard my father say so; but read what Oldmixon says.’
‘“SLOVILLE.—This is a large town, containing more than a thousand houses, where the right of election is confined to a corporation of twenty-four individuals, who elect each other. The inhabitants have no share in choosing the members or magistrates, and as all these corporations—possessing exclusive rights of electing Members of Parliament—have some powerful nobleman or opulent commoner who finds it his interest to take the lead and management of their political influence, the election of the members is directed by this patron. The Earl of Fee-Fum, who has a seat at Marbourne, within seven miles of the town, and Watkin Strahan, Esq., of Elm Hall, whose residence and estate are also in the neighbourhood, have first command of this corporation.” At that time the number of votes, according to Oldmixon, was twenty-four.’