Part 2

At length the town of N---- was reached. As quietly and mysteriously as possible the vehicle was driven by the strangers, its occupants, up to the hotel of our opponent; and, after ringing the bell, refusing to accept the servants' answer, and insisting upon awakening the host, my man tried to strike a bargain with the hotel-keeper (putting him under confidence) to let his house as the central committee-room of the "independent candidate." Boniface was proof against temptation. He had let his house to Mr. Sallow Twitch, the Whig candidate, and he was "not a-going to break his engagement--not he." He never had done such a thing in his life, and never would. They must go elsewhere, he said; and the interview was closed by the irate landlord sheering off to bed, telling them he didn't want to have no more to do with them.

Next the party went to the hotel where Mr. Jollefat was staying, and in which he held his quarters. A similar interview with Mr. Bung, at that establishment, ended not unlike the conference with Mr. Boniface.

At last a solitary medieval-looking policeman was observed torpidly creeping along the Market-place, and for a consideration he undertook, in the first place, to find the best quarters now available, and in the second to keep the arrival of his patrons as quiet and as solemn as death.

It was unfortunate, he said, that they had come into the town so late, because the other parties had been in the field so long, and had got the regular start of them. However, there was a tidyish sort of a place, which had always been the head-quarters of a third candidate; and, for his own part, he did not think it much mattered, if the candidate was "a regular gentleman," which house he put up at. This shrewd policeman thought it would be all the same, if the candidate had about him friends who knew their business.

The policeman's advice was taken in the selection of a central committee-room,--the Green Swan with Two Tails, which, let me confess and regret, was a comparatively humble place for head-quarters. I should have very much preferred the first hotel in the town; and if that had been possible, I would have yielded up the place in which Mr. Jollefat was enthroned. However, as the sequel will show, this matter did not influence the success of the _coup_.

Without further loss of time--that is to say, early next morning--my man went to work. The first person to whom, as the agent of the independent candidate, he paid his addresses, was not the mayor of the town, nor the town-clerk, nor an alderman, nor a town-councillor, but he was--a bill-sticker.

There consequently appeared upon the walls an address, which ran as follows:

"_To the Free and Independent Electors of the Borough of N----._

"GENTLEMEN,--Your borough has too often been the arena of faction fights. You have been regarded as the supporters of Whig and Tory. Your grand historical traditions and your eminent public virtues have not been respected, cared for, understood, or apparently known to your representatives in Parliament, or even those who have hitherto aspired to the most honourable distinction of representing you in the Legislature.

"Gentlemen, although a stranger among you, having resided many years abroad, and having but lately returned to my native country; having studied the political institutions of Europe and America, and seen them in practical operation; and having, moreover, read the history of your ancient town, which forms so many brilliant pages in the grand history of our native country; and having had the good fortune to inherit an ample estate,--I have resolved to place my services at the disposal of my country, with a special desire to serve the interests of a free and enlightened constituency, such as that of N----.

"Gentlemen, under these circumstances I offer myself as a candidate at the forthcoming election for the representation of your borough; and although I shall immediately do myself the honour of waiting upon you individually, and canvassing each of you at his own fireside, I think it right to lay before you concisely a statement of my political principles.

"Gentlemen, I am in favour of the broadest and most comprehensive scheme of reform which political philosophy can devise. If you should do me the honour to return me to Parliament (as I feel confident you will), I shall, by my speeches and votes, support every measure which tends to increase the happiness of the people, by extending the demand for labour, increasing the wages of industry, at the same time adding to the profits of capital, and promoting the comfort of every man, woman, and child throughout her Majesty's wide dominions.

"Gentlemen, I am in favour of other measures of political and social amelioration which benefit all, but injure none, in their comprehensiveness and beneficence, that I find it impossible to properly explain, within the limit of a printed address, but upon which I shall have many opportunities to offer explanations when I meet you face to face in public meeting, in your own houses, and upon the hustings on the day of nomination.

"Gentlemen, I have the honour to subscribe myself, Your very faithful and obedient servant, HORATIO MOUNT-STEPHEN FIPPS."

The bill-sticker lost no time in placarding the walls of the town; but his functions had been largely anticipated by the disclosures of the toll-bar keeper, Boniface, his boots, Bung, and his ostler.

The town was set in a commotion. The Green Swan with Two Tails was crowded in the bar-parlour, in front of the bar, and in every public room it had. Mr. Smith (I mean Mr. Horatio Mount-Stephen Fipps) received a dozen offers of professional assistance, two or three score of requests for the honour of making his acquaintance, letters innumerable for his autograph, with other delicate and indelicate overtures of good-will and friendship,--all within a few hours. Mr. Fipps, after he had returned to London, and been retransformed into "Smith," told me it was the "jolliest spree" he had ever been engaged in during his life; and my man told me that the fictitious candidate played his part with the skill of a genius.

In the course of the morning a crowd assembled in front of the Swan with Two Tails, and loud huzzas were heard in honour of "the independent" and now "popular candidate." A speculative printer had, without orders, either in the excess of political zeal, or in reliance upon a careless auditing of accounts, got another placard stuck upon the walls, which read thus:

"FIPPS FOR EVER!!!"

The mob became towards afternoon a little impatient and uproarious, and the candidate had to present himself on the balcony of the hotel, and harangue his admirers. I regret to say, no short-hand writer being present, I cannot give the reader a report of this speech, which I am sorry for, because I have been told it was one of the grandest orations of the kind ever uttered by a pretended or real candidate. However, let that pass.

Towards evening a deputation asked permission to wait upon Horatio Mount-Stephen Fipps, Esq., to express their admiration of the principles so clearly and exactly enunciated in his address, and so beautifully illustrated and enforced in his most eloquent speech. Their request was granted with the utmost cordiality by that great man, and he supplicated them to do him the honour of dining with him.

The hospitality of the Green Swan with Two Tails was, I am told, worthy of a more pretentious establishment; and ample justice was done, as the penny-a-liners say, to the culinary skill of the hostess. Mine host's vintages were also duly appreciated, or at least I judge so by the items of account which I afterwards saw under the date of this entertainment. It is true that the good things bore familiar names; but that circumstance may rather be ascribed to the English character of the candidate and his admirers, than to the limited capacity or means of the landlord and his better half. Sherry and port and champagne--champagne and port and sherry--seemed to have been mingled in profusion with cigars that, in the aggregate, weighed a few score pounds, and were (I take it from the price they cost me or my principal) the finest that Havannah could produce.

At this improvised banquet speeches were of course delivered, toasts were drunk, and songs were sang, until the _finale_,--a medley of variations from "Rule Brittania," "God Save the Queen," and "We won't go Home till Morning,"--which last chorus embodied a resolution that the patriotic admirers of Fipps did faithfully perform.

Out of this party a committee was formed by the sober men; for, let it be observed, Smith--that is, I mean Fipps--kept faith by keeping sober with a constant eye to results; and all now was expected to go on merrily as a marriage-bell.

The next day was spent very much as the previous one had been, except that the third and popular candidate, as a matter of form, called upon a number of respectable inhabitants, and went through the _rôle_ of a candidate's duties, such as shaking hands with one or two loungers in front of the hotel clad in soiled smock-frocks, kissing a few slobbering babies, talking pleasantly to the voters' wives, and expounding principles to the voters themselves.

On this day the attorney of Mr. Twitch sent a note by hand to the attorney of Mr. Jollefat, proposing that these ravens should meet in confidence, and without prejudice, to discuss a matter of importance to both the candidates. Mr. Jollefat's legal adviser replied by assenting to the conference. They met. Fipps's candidature was the theme of discussion. Twitch's attorney said he had telegraphed to Brookes's, and the Reform, and to Mr. Coppock, but he could learn nothing about Fipps. He was not known to the party, and they thought he must be some adventurer, whose wealth, if it had any other than an imaginary existence at all, must be grossly exaggerated. Mr. Jollefat's attorney said that he had in like manner inquired at the Carlton, but could learn nothing about their opponent. The Liberal was discouraged; the Conservative did not take the matter to heart. They were agreed that nothing could be done to spoil the new candidate.

My man went to a local printer and got some forms printed with counterfoils, much after the manner of tradesmen's "delivery note-books" or bankers' cheques, the use of which will immediately be seen. He also contrived to make the acquaintance of a few leaders of the people,--what the French would call "men of action,"--not spouters or loudly boasting partisans.

On the evening of the second day after Mr. Fipps's arrival at N----, my man had a consultation with about half a dozen of the principal of these men, who may be called the heads of gangs of voters; persons who regarded the franchise as a property to be sold in the market, like any other commodity; except that this article called a vote must be purchased by a candidate in retail quantities, in order that he might sell them, as a constituency, in a lump or by wholesale. The result was a compact or understanding, which I have no doubt would have been faithfully kept by the vendors. These men always keep faith with their purchaser, if no other candidate, supposed to have still a heavier weight of metal with which to solve their honesty, should arrive on any subsequent night between the date of the arrangement with them and the day of polling.

This part of the business requires to be explained with much precision, or the reader may not perhaps observe the central point or pivot of the Great Electioneering Trick which it is my intention now to explain.

My man had occasion to address one of the vendors of the franchise to the following effect. He explained that the law against bribery was rather severe; and Horatio Mount-Stephen Fipps, Esq., was a gentleman of extremely delicate sensibilities, whose honourable feelings would recoil from venality; and that if there were no law on the Statute-book or among the precedents for its punishment (which indeed there was), all must be free and above board,--or at least it must be made to appear so to the eyes, not only of policemen, or judges, or Parliamentary Commissioners, or other judicial officers, but also to that most upright, righteous, and wealthy man, the "popular candidate" himself. The agent went on to say that he came down to the town with the gentleman whom he had the honour to serve. He could not have supposed that the state of the borough would have entailed upon him the necessity of doing things which he saw were essential to the success of Mr. Fipps, but yet, being in it, he was determined to go on and secure a triumph for the distinguished and generous-hearted man he represented at that interview. As for money, that did not matter. Mr. Fipps was rich enough in all conscience. Any thing they might have to pay would not hurt him--not a bit of it; but his character must be above reproach at the clubs and in his own eyes. One way out of the difficulty, my man went on to observe, had occurred to him, and he had already resolved to pursue that course, or to withdraw his candidate at once before any money worth mentioning had been spent; because although it was true Mr. Fipps had enough, and more than enough, for every necessity, he did not like squandering it, and losing the object of his ambition also. At this suggestion of the removal of the candidate and his cash-box, the leaders of the people looked somewhat blank or alarmed. They said a man like Mr. Fipps was sure to win if he went the right way about it, and they thought it a pity he should run away after the handsome manner in which he had been treated by all classes.

Some further parleying took place, when it was agreed that late at night the several leaders of the people should, one by one, take my man round to the residences of the free and independent electors who were in reality to be bribed, and that that operation should be colourably done in the way arranged.

A contract was made with each elector that he should fill the post of flag-bearer, messenger, check-clerk, polling-clerk, or something or other, and should receive 10_l._ at the close of the election for so doing. He was guaranteed payment of that money to his perfect satisfaction, by a printed form of engagement, or an agreement in law, on a slip of paper, signed by my man with his bold clear autograph, and on the stump counterfoil of which the lured voter wrote his name or made his mark (+). Just by way of a present balm to each hired elector, the sum of 5_s._ was given him when his engagement was effected.

Next day the nomination took place. Mr. Twitch, the Whig candidate, was received with derisive shouts, and a greeting of missiles. Mr. Jollefat fared no better, and in his heart of hearts cursed the borough, with that ambition or folly which had induced him to enter the lists as a candidate; and he stopped at the conclusion that of all the vanities which have marked humanity since the days of Solomon, nothing equalled that of desiring to be the representative in Parliament of such a free and independent constituency as the borough of N----.

Mr. Horatio Mount-Stephen Fipps was the hero of the day. If any thing checked the outpouring of his eloquent tongue, it was the rapid appreciation of his audience, which overtook the completion of his sentences. They cheered, and shouted, and hurrahed, and made every conceivable, and, to the reader, many unconceivable demonstrations of affection for his person, and of admiration for his principles. But for these exuberant manifestations of attachment and devotion, I certainly might give the reader a splendid specimen of what a speech on the hustings may be. The hurrahs and the huzzas broke up Mr. Fipps's arguments, and the coruscations of his eloquence into fragments. Let it suffice to say, it was a brilliant and a grand speech.

On the show of hands being called for, a few were held up for Mr. Twitch, a few more for Mr. Jollefat, and a whole forest of uplifted palms testified their desire to have Horatio Mount-Stephen Fipps as the member for N----. The returning officer, of course, declared the choice of the electors, by an open vote, to have fallen upon that honourable gentleman, and a poll was demanded by each of his antagonists.

The most important thing to be now effected was an escape from the town. This was not in reality a very easy thing, although to the reader nothing may perhaps appear more easy of accomplishment. By this time every body in the place knew the three conspirators, and neither the "candidate," nor his two immediate associates, were often left alone during five consecutive minutes. To quit the place by either of the ordinary roads, in the ordinary way, would have been likely to excite suspicion. To have moved off singly, but simultaneously, by three different roads, would have excited less suspicion perhaps, but would have been more damnatory if discovered. To move off other than simultaneously would have been to peril, perhaps, the lives, and certainly to have perilled the chastisement, of one or two who might remain after the flight of one had been ascertained.

Detection was, moreover, a thing likely, under any circumstances, to follow rapidly on the retreat. My man had noticed the presence of at least half a dozen strangers in the camp of the enemy. These strangers had a knowing look, and wore a metropolitan aspect. He suspected them of being spies upon us. Mr. Fipps's antecedents might, for any thing we positively knew to the contrary, have been ascertained, and become known to the Liberal candidate, whose game he was trying to spoil, although that gentleman and his friend might not deem it expedient (if they could not exactly prove the connexion between the party of Fipps and that of Mr. Jollefat) to explode the fiction of the former's candidature. However, get away they must, and that before the polling of to-morrow, or they would not get away until too late.

It was part of my design that the scheme should explode, and that the match should be applied at this exact point of the scheme.

We had arranged to keep the poll open for Fipps, notwithstanding his flight. No official notice of the abandonment of his candidature was therefore served upon the returning officer.

In fact, although Fipps ran away, Fipps must still be a candidate. Our head lawyer thought that necessary, and also thought it wise to poll one man at least for the runaway.

After deliberation, it was arranged between the intended fugitives that morning should be chosen for their flight, and that they should fly in company. After the nomination, high revelry had been kept at the Green Swan with Two Tails. Every section of the community of N---- had its representation there: the lower orders being provided for in rooms, and with refreshments suited to their tastes, while the topsawyers and municipal notabilities who had attached themselves to the popular and winning cause of Fipps, were being entertained in a better room of the house. Fipps himself, and my man and the attorney, being in the company of the latter, carefully guarded against any thing like excess. They were the only prudent people in the lot. This revelry lasted through the night, and until morning. Mine host himself, knocked up by fatigue and potations, retired to an uneasy couch. The hostess had snatched a little rest, and resumed charge of the house while her lord slumbered. As for Mr. Fipps, my man, and the attorney, they contrived to disentangle themselves from their supporters about three in the morning, under strong protestations of anxiety for the welfare of those gentlemen, who were urged, for appearance' sake and their own health's sake, to retire home and get a few winks of sleep, and come refreshed in the morning to the poll. By this means the multitude surrounding the candidate, except his two confidants, were got rid of. So far good.

About six in the morning, Fipps,--oppressed with an imaginary headache and sense of fatigue; my man, in like condition; and the attorney, in a similar state,--called for soda-water with a dash of brandy, and began, in the presence of the hostess, to bewail their unfitness to go through the labours of the approaching struggle. My man suggested that it might be as well to take a stroll, if they could get out quietly and not have a rabble at their heels. They asked if that were possible. The landlady consented to let them out by a back-door across a meadow which formed part of her lord's tenancy, where they could strike off into some by-lanes, and get what they so urgently needed--"a breath of fresh air." This suited admirably. My man had already taken soundings of the roads, and knew that by this means the party could walk or run off a distance of only five miles, and meet an up-train to London at the ---- Station at eight o'clock a.m.

Not a soul was astir on the outskirts of the town, save here and there a rustic labourer walking to his toil or engaged thereon--rude, unlettered men, without political thought or character, who took no interest in the great struggle at the borough of N----, and who cared to do no more than return the salutation of "Good morning" to the gentlemen wayfarers.

The absence of Mr. Fipps and his agent and attorney was soon discovered, and it was at once suspected to have a sinister object. This notion spread like wildfire throughout the whole borough, and a scene of excitement ensued which literally beggars description; nothing has ever equalled it in electioneering development. The Green Swan at one time ran great risk of utter demolition. A few innocent people, suspected of participation in the fraud, were punished by the mob, who must have a victim or two, and who wreaked their vengeance upon suspects in the absence of those real delinquents that by this time were safely proceeding southwards to the great metropolis in the train which they had met.

The windows of Mr. Fipps's hotel were broken. The remonstrances of the landlord were not believed by a large portion of the crowd, although, for that worthy's reputation, it may be stated a large contingent of the rioters did put faith in his asseverations.