The eve of polling-day was now at hand. This is the most critical period of an election. All night parties in disguise were perambulating the different wards, watching each other’s tactics; masks, wigs, false noses, gentles in livery coats, men in female attire, a silent carnival of manoeuvre, vigilance, anxiety, and trepidation. The thoughtful voters about this time make up their minds; the enthusiasts who have told you twenty times a-day for the last fortnight, that they would get up in the middle of the night to serve you, require the most watchful cooping; all the individuals who have assured you that ‘their word is their bond,’ change sides. Two of the Rigbyites met in the market-place about an hour after midnight. ‘Well, how goes it?’ said one. ‘I have been the rounds. The blunt’s going like the ward-pump. I saw a man come out of Moffatt’s house, muffled up with a mask on. I dodged him. It was Biggs.’ ‘You don’t mean that, do you? D----e, I’ll answer for Moffatt.’ ‘I never thought he was a true man.’ ‘Told Robins?’ ‘I could not see him; but I met young Gunning and told him.’ ‘Young Gunning! That won’t do.’ ‘I thought he was as right as the town clock.’ ‘So did I, once. Hush! who comes here? The enemy, Franklin and Sampson Potts. Keep close.’ ‘I’ll speak to them. Good night, Potts. Up rather late to-night?’ ‘All fair election time. You ain’t snoring, are you?’ ‘Well, I hope the best man will win.’ ‘I am sure he will.’ ‘You must go for Moffatt early, to breakfast at the White Lion; that’s your sort. Don’t leave him, and poll him your-self. I am going off to Solomon Lacey’s. He has got four Millbankites cooped up very drunk, and I want to get them quietly into the country before daybreak.’ ‘Tis polling-day! The candidates are roused from their slumbers at an early hour by the music of their own bands perambulating the town, and each playing the ‘conquering hero’ to sustain the courage of their jaded employers, by depriving them of that rest which can alone tranquillise the nervous system. There is something in that matin burst of music, followed by a shrill cheer from the boys of the borough, the only inhabitants yet up, that is very depressing. The committee-rooms of each candidate are soon rife with black reports; each side has received fearful bulletins of the preceding night campaign; and its consequences as exemplified in the morning, unprecedented tergiversations, mysterious absences; men who breakfast with one side and vote with the other; men who won’t come to breakfast; men who won’t leave breakfast. At ten o’clock Mr. Rigby was in a majority of twenty-eight.