rs.

Montague and Secretary Vernon were the ministerial candidates for
Westminster. They were opposed by Sir Henry Colt, a dull, surly,
stubborn professor of patriotism, who tired everybody to death with
his endless railing at standing armies and placemen. The electors were
summoned to meet on an open space just out of the streets. The first
Lord of the Treasury and the Secretary of State appeared at the head of
three thousand horsemen. Colt's followers were almost all on foot.
He was a favourite with the keepers of pot-houses, and had enlisted a
strong body of porters and chairmen. The two parties, after exchanging
a good deal of abuse, came to blows. The adherents of the ministers were
victorious, put the adverse mob to the rout, and cudgelled Colt himself
into a muddy ditch. The poll was taken in Westminster Hall. From the
first there was no doubt of the result. But Colt tried to prolong the
contest by bringing up a voter an hour. When it became clear that this
artifice was employed for the purpose of causing delay, the returning
officer took on himself the responsibility of closing the books, and of
declaring Montague and Vernon duly elected.

At Guildhall the junto was less fortunate. Three ministerial Aldermen
were returned. But the fourth member, Sir John Fleet, was not only
a Tory, but was Governor of the old East India Company, and had
distinguished himself by the pertinacity with which he had opposed the
financial and commercial policy of the first Lord of the Treasury. While
Montague suffered the mortification of finding that his empire over the
city was less absolute than he had imagined, Wharton, notwithstanding
his acknowledged preeminence in the art of electioneering, underwent a
succession of defeats in boroughs and counties for which he had expected
to name the members. He failed at Brackley, at Malmesbury and at
Cockermouth. He was unable to maintain possession even of his own
strongholds, Wycombe and Aylesbury. He was beaten in Oxfordshire. The
freeholders of Buckinghamshire, who had been true to him during many
years, and who in 1685, when the Whig party was in the lowest state of
depression, had, in spite of fraud and tyranny, not only placed him at
the head of the poll but put their second votes at his disposal, now
rejected one of his candidates, and could hardly be induced to return
the other, his own brother, by a very small majority.

The elections for Exeter appear to have been in that age o