The Express.
London, England, 1849-03-29 00:00:00

no means the man to relinquish hie seat without a
s'ruggle. His party had recourse to public-house entet-
teinments, and such like meats of p rsuading a consti-
tuency, and despi:n the genet al feeling of the petinle,
the contest was by thee mesn. made extremely cicse.
The numbers on this occasion were, for Rich 172,
Langdale 124, Lawson I'lB. The two former were
returned.

In the place of two tories, two liberals were now
sectcll fir the borough. One of these was a Roman
catholic. Now knaresborough has the character
of being a particularly protestant town. It ac-
gifted the repata•ion in the civil wive, when t' e
large.t landowner in the neighbourhood, pcor
Sir Henry Slingsby, had his bead cut off for
his devotion to his king and to his church. There
is, in reality, noground whatever for the allegation that
Knaresbotonsh is les a " Popish" now a days thsn any
other place in the locality, but people think it so
anti tot3athe people flank it so There are readmits w}.°
fancy that the impression is a fact. So, no sooner was
was this dectien over then a "Nopopery" my was
got up against Mr. Langdale, and i• w-s determined
to hcund him down for 'the offence of holding to his
fai•h.

Mr. Langdale, being a very cenac'entions Roman
catholic, was by no means the sort of man to give
way upon matters of religion from fear of arousing
hostility in Knareshorough. He certainly gave his
opponents all the opportunities they could possibly
have desired. In the House of Commons he was
quite the leader of his sect, as Lord Arundel is now.
IL neglected no opportunity of advancing catholic
interests, and the protestants at Knaresbcrough, of
course, declared that he was inattentive to all
others.

The Boundaries Act left within the limits of the
Inrough a few folds ch'eily in the possession of a
single individual. That individual is a parson of
t'o Church of England. This gentleman ap-
pear, d with oth rs to be quite determined
that " the town should not be disgraced
by a papist again." The very laudable plan he
adopted to prevent " the disgrace," was to erect in his
field sheds for cows, and to let them to Ede men, who
were imme3iately ',heed upon the register. Alto-
gether n arly 30 cow-shed voters were created under
this a) stem. The botui fide constitusrcy consists of
about 200 electors, of whom 80 may for one reason or
another be inclined to vote for a tory. This was about
the number of planners Mr. Lawson at this time
could rely upon. Thirty split votes wou'd make him
nearly equ..l with the liberal, so that the cow-house
rtes gave him a decided preponderance, and made
him perfectly secure whenever an election might
occur.

Such was the sate of Knareaborough when the
dim:trim took place is 1841. Mr. Lawson " was
made safe ;" Mr. Langdale had no chance. But the
liberal party had made a canvass for Mr. Rich, and bad
found that if a third candidate should enter the field,
that gentleman was certain to head the poll. The
probabilities, however, were, that there would be a
tacit compromise, and that Messrs. Rich and Lawson
would come in without ary poll being taken by •
third candidate.
On the eve, however, of the dissolution an
address dated from " London, June 5," appeared io
Knaresborough, subscribed by Mr. Rich, in which
that gentleman announced "that circumstances pre-
vented his suliciting the honour of again representing
them." 'What the "circumstances" were, was
never explained. " I leave the party," wrote Mr.
Rich, "far stronger and more united than I found it.
I flinch from no dereat, for I may say that my return
was nearly certair." An immediate commonica'ion to
Mr. Rich was made, strongly urging him to recor.-
eider his determination, and pointing out the difficul-
ies to which his resignation would subject his friends.
The hon. gentleman remained inflexible. Mr. Ding-
dale was sent f, r, but he found the "No popery " cry
bad done its work. He could not have succeeded.
The liberals now looked about the neighbourhood for
a candidate; but whilst they deliberated their chance
was los'. Some of the tory party, finding their
dilemma, brought down Mr. Ferrand, who had
actively engaged himself in the West Rid-
ing contest then going forward, and the
constituency. being canvassed without a liberal in
the field, soon became compietely pledged. On the'
day of election Messrs. Lawson and Ferrand were
elected with merely a nominal opposition from
a Mr. Sturgeon, who came down from London
on the day preceding the nomination, and who polled
85 votes without a canvass, Mr. Lawson having 150,
and Fcrrand 122.

During the canvass of Mr. Lawson and Mr.Ferrand
the system punned at the preceding ek ction —of giving
" eveniag parties" at different public-houses—was fol-
lowed to some extent. No allegation was made by
the liberals that there had been a more general cor-
ruption, nor from the nature of the diction was it
likely that there should have been. In the autumn
of 1842, however, the following letter appeared in
Knaresborough:

TO MR. 3011I.TRIMIDAI.11, BOTAL OAK. INAILTSBOROCOIi.
Mr,—lhave this morning received your letter, in which you
say that yon feel yourself very much injured and inconve-
nienced by not having what you are pleased to call your ac-
count against me settled. You richly deserve to be so. You
ran up this bill not only against my most positive ordirs,
but without the slightest knowledge on my part that you had
done so until you presented the account to me, and on my
expressing my strong disapprobation of your conduct you
distinctly stated that you expected Mr. Lawson to pay me
halt of it, and that you only considered me liable to one-half.
After the time had expired which would have allowed my
opponent to petition against my return, I consented to pay
one-half of the bill, and that I shall do, although I am highly
to blame for doing so ; and I hare no hesitation in saying
Mat the borough is as sure to be disfranchised when another
elation takes place, if Me electors are again guilty of the
corruption which disgraced the borough at the last election,
as that I should hare lost my
.seat had a petition been pre
seated against me.—l am, sir, yours very faithfully, W.
BURFEILD FIELILANI!. .

nes is the only instance we ever met with of a
candidate acknowledging himself the representative
of corruption. It was well said at the time by a
liberal elector, "Whether indignation should be
poured on the party corrupted equally with the
wealthy corrupters, or not, there can be only
one opinion of the man who site in par-
liament a self-condemned, illegitimate member
thereof: and who, in his wrath at being called
ea to pay the price of his seat, threatens to
take from has constituents the power to elect any
member or members in future." But what renders
this charge a) especially curious is, the very small
foundation which really appears to have existed for
it. If the election of 1837 had been referred to, there
might have been grounds for imputing corrupt prac-
tices; bat in 1841 there was no real contest, and, oon-
uquently, no occasion for expenditure. What
ever Mr. Ferrand, therefore, paid in bri-
bery and treating, must have been a pure
free will offering at the shrine of corruption, and he
had no business to visit his own sins upon those he
had led into error. Looking at the matter in this
light, we are not disposed to place much reliance upon
Mr. Ferrand's self-accusation of wholesale corruption
on the occasion to which he here refers. It seems
another " Mott case" in all its essentials.
It is almost needless to may that a charge made in
this way against all his constituents was not calcu-
lated verb highly to elevate Mr. Ferrand in their
eyes. His course in parliament—the war in which
other serious charges were made and disposed of—
caused a large body of the electors to feel extremely
anxious to be quit of this unfortunate connexion.
The outcry which Mr. Ferrand made about the poor
law was not echoed in any way by the town. The
subject was one upon which his constituents had no
strong feeling, and its constant reiterat on by their
member occasioned no smell dissatisfaction.
An opportunity was given to the party who enter-
tained these opinions of their precious representa-
tive to record their votes for a candidate of very dis-
similar character. Mr. W. S. Lucca", who
was (upon petition) declared elected for Wake-
field in 1841, had grown too liberal for
those who had supported him in that town
and was consequently obliged to seek ano-
ther constituency. The Harewood family have a
property three miles out of Knaresborough,
and it was determined to ask this gentleman to come
forward. He did so, and it was soon evident that he
would come in at the head of the poll. Mr. Found
in his tarn was supplanted. Ho mule avoured to re-
treat under cover of afire upon the Earl of Harewood,
whom he charged, in a handbill. with support-
ing his brother, a free trader, in preference
to him, Mr. Busfeild Ferrand, a protectionist.
Lord Harewood with severe politeness replied to this
grave imputation, that though he had taken no part
an either side he certainly did prefer his brother to
Mr. Basfeild Ferrand. And strange as it might seem
to Mr. Ferrand, all the gentlemen. of the cpuatry
thought his lordship decidedly right in his pre-
ference.