Page:Thomas Hare - The Election of Representatives, parliamentary and municipal.djvu/111

 many miles. Of this the borough of Shaftesbury may be taken as an example, which was made to indude thirteen surrounding parishes. In other cases, several towns, sometimes with their adjoining parishes, contributed to form a district of boroughs, and were empowered to return one member. In the Ayr district, for example,—Ayr, with portions of two adjoining parishes, having, in 1851, 17,624 inhabitants,—Campbeltown, 6880 inhabitants,—Inverary, 1064 inhabitants,—Irvine, and part of an adjoining parish, 7534 inhabitants,—and Oban, with part of an adjoining parish, 1742 inhabitants, were formed into such a constituency. In the case of a very large population, as in the metropolis, a district was formed by combining groups of contiguous parishes into a borough returning two members, as Finsbury. In other cases, where the neighbourhood of an ancient borough had become populous, the surrounding population was taken within the precincts of the parliamentary borough, as Exeter, a city of 34,317 inhabitants, which, for parliamentary purposes, was made to include parts of the parishes of Topsham, Heavitree, St. Thomas, and Alphington, containing together 6371 inhabitants. The principles involved in these forms of division or annexation exhaust all that has been proposed by reformers in this country. The plan of the Duke of Richmond is perhaps the nearest approach to that which was adopted in France by the National Assembly, and there founded on the several bases of territory, population, and contribution; the territorial basis being created by a division into departments, communes, and cantons.

The annexation of several agricultural parishes to a borough in their centre, as in the case of Shaftesbury, would seem to be a recognition of the fact that the alleged distinction between the interests of the borough and the county electors is but imaginary; for, if any real distinction existed, injury would have been done to one or the other. It would have been an injustice to hamper the action of either set of electors by