_pièce de résistance_, fairly astonishing "Hodge"--their enthusiasm knew
no bounds. They cheered and cheered again. Hand shaking went on all
round, whilst the biggest Radical of the lot stood up and shouted, "You
be a little Liberal, I know, and the other blokes 'ave 'ired [hired]
you." Whether we won any votes that evening I am doubtful, but certain I
am that this meeting, which started so inauspiciously, was more
successful than many others in which I have taken part in a Radical
place, in spite of the fact that we left it amid a shower of stones from
the boys outside.

I do not think there is anything I dislike more than standing up to
address a village audience on the politics of the day. Unless you happen
to be a very taking speaker--which his greatest friends could not accuse
the present writer of being--agricultural labourers are a most
unsympathetic audience. They will sit solemnly through a long speech
without even winking an eye, and your best "hits" are passed by in
solemn silence. To the nervous speaker a little applause occasionally is
doubtless encouraging; but if you want to get it, you must put somebody
down among the audience, and pay them half a crown to make a noise.

I suppose no better fellow or more suitable candidate for a Cotswold
constituency ever walked than Colonel Chester Master, of the Abbey; yet
his efforts to win the seat under the new ballot act were always
unavailing, saving the occasion on which he got in by three votes, and
then was turned out again within a month. An unknown candidate from
London--I will not say a carpet-bagger--was able to beat the local
squire, entirely owing to the very fact that he was a stranger.

There is a good deal of chopping and changing about among the
agricultural voters, in spite of a general determination to be true to