Forest of Rossendale. 247 



;^iooo, on the condition of fifty others giving a like amount ; and 

 was on all occasions by far the largest subscriber in Liverpool. 



He was also from the first a zealous supporter of the Temper- 

 ance cause, opening his house to its advocates from all parts of the 

 world ; and himself incurring no small amount of labour in its 

 advocacy. In 1845 he refused a seat for Stafford, because it vi^as 

 to be gained only by bribing, and keeping open house for the 

 electors, so encouraging corruption and drunkenness. Being a 

 director of the Midland Railway, and a popularly known political 

 reformer, led to his receiving an invitation to contest Derby, on the 

 unseating on petition, after the general election in 1847, of Messrs. 

 Strutt and Gower, and in August 1848 was returned for that 

 Borough, with Mr. M. T. Bass. 



Notwithstanding the unprincipled contest, on the part of his two 

 opponents, at his two elections for Derby, he persisted in maintain- 

 ing inviolable his resolve made at Stafford, not to owe to bribery 

 his seat in his country's honourable House of Commons ; in which 

 resolve he was nobly sustained by his constituents. Besides having 

 an abhorrence of bribery, Mr. Heyworth denounced the payment 

 of charges at elections of what are called legitimate expenses. He 

 held these demands to be a most vicious usage, pregnant with 

 political prostitution. He deemed it an outrage on the first 

 principles of political economy, that an honest servant, be his 

 engagements private or public, should be obliged, or even allowed 

 to invest money in obtaining the onerous duty of serving in 

 Parhament ; and that there is but a step from this legalised 

 obligation to an act of bribery and political dereliction. Mr. 

 Heyworth spoke but seldom in the House. His chief speech was 

 in support of one of Mr. Cobden's motions for Financial reform, 

 wherein he urged the importance of direct over indirect taxation, 

 and was heard with full attention. He was in favour of Universal 

 Suffrage, and Vote by Ballot ; and opposed to Church rates. His 

 age exempted him from serving on Committees, but he expressed 

 his willingness to do so ; and was in other respects a diligent 

 Member of Parliament. 



