270 
Gregory—Political Corruption. 
bey and the parliament buildings loomed up before, delighting 
him with their noble outlines and their still nobler memories so 
closely interwoven with the history of our race and our insti¬ 
tutions. He walked up the great hall of William Rufus, 
whose oaken roof had echoed to the coronation festivities of 
many kings and to the death sentence of one, to the eloquence of 
Burke and Fox and Sheridan at the trial of Warren Hastings, 
and whose walls were adorned with the marble effigies of the 
monarchs of Great Britain, and remembering, even amid these 
inspiring scenes, the practical aphorism whispered by a fellow 
traveler that any one in England from the Prince of Wales 
down will take a shilling in his palm in exchange for a favor, 
he gave the policeman on guard a little silver to get a per¬ 
mit from a member to visit the house of commons. So he pres¬ 
ently found himself in the strangers’ gallery, listening to a de¬ 
bate, and there staid till late in the night. The two principal 
figures in the debate were Sir Henry James, attorney general, and 
Sir Farrar Herschell, solicitor general, now Lord Herschell and 
lord chancellor. They were advocating and defending in the 
style of an auimated conversation the present Corrupt Practices 
Act of Great Britain, drafted by Sir Henry, and for which he 
had then battled for two and a half years, and which with some 
modifications, passed in the succeeding month, and became a law, 
being known as (chapter 51, 46 and 47 Victoria (A. D. 1883), 
“An act for the better prevention of corrupt and illegal prac- 
tices at parliamentary elections. ’ ’ 
This great statute, which marks perhaps the highest achieve¬ 
ment of legislation against electoral corruption, covers forty- 
three printed pages and is substantially the present law. It 
makes treating by any one, a candidate or not, for corruptly in¬ 
fluencing voting an offence by all parties to it, and under this 
clause Mr. Clayton, who had paid £326 for bills contracted by 
the conservative association of his district for treats, excursions 
and picnics enjoyed before his candidacy, was held guilty and 
unseated after the last election. It provides against any threats 
to intimidate voters of any kind, either of spiritual or temporal 
injury, and under this clause Patrick Fullam, anti-Parnellite of 
South Meath, was after the same election unseated by two 
