Page:Doctor Thorne.djvu/175

Rh labour: of the weary days passed in the house; but, nevertheless, the prize is one very well worth the price paid for it—well worth any price that can be paid for it short of wading through dirt and dishonour.

No other great European nation has anything like it to offer to the ambition of its citizens; for in no other great country of Europe, not even in those which are free, has the popular constitution obtained, as with us, true sovereignty and power of rule. Here it is so; and when a man lays himself out to be a member of parliament, he plays the highest game and for the highest stakes which the country affords.

To some men, born silver spooned, a seat in parliament comes as a matter of course. From the time of their early manhood they hardly know what it is not to sit there; and the honour is hardly appreciated, being too much a matter of course. As a rule, they never know how great a thing it is to be in parliament; though, when reverses come, as reverses occasionally will come, they fully feel how dreadful it is to be left out.

But to men aspiring to be members, or to those who having been once fortunate have again to fight the battle without assurance of success, the coming election must be matter of dread concern. Oh, how delightful to hear that the long-talked-of rival has declined the contest, and that the course is clear! or to find by a short canvass that one's majority is safe, and the pleasures of crowing over an unlucky, friendless foe quite secured!

No such gratification as this filled the bosom of Mr. Moffat on the morning of the Barchester election. To him had been brought no positive assurance of success by his indefatigable agent, Mr. Nearthewinde. It was admitted on all sides that the contest would be a very close one; and Mr. Nearthewinde would not do more than assert that they ought to win unless things went very wrong with them.

Mr. Nearthewinde had other elections to attend to, and had not been remaining at Courcy Castle ever since the coming of Miss Dunstable: but he had been there, and at Barchester, as often as possible, and Mr. Moffat was made greatly uneasy by reflecting how very high the bill would be.

The two parties had outdone each other in the loudness of their assertions, that each would on his side conduct the election in strict conformity to law. There was to be no bribery. Bribery! who, indeed, in these days would dare to bribe; to give absolute money for an absolute vote, and pay for such an article in downright palpable sovereigns? No. Purity was much too rampant for that, and the means of detection too well understood. But purity was to be carried much further than this. There should