‘I am come,’ he said, ‘to put you on your guard, to ask you not to be led away by clap-trap, to tell you that all my life I have been fighting on behalf of the people, to lift up my voice on behalf of Peace, Retrenchment and Reform. You have a serious duty to discharge: to send a member to Parliament to help the good old cause of liberty and freedom and human progress.’ Again his voice was lost in an uproar. ‘You have,’ he continued, ‘rights to be won, a victory to achieve.’ Again there was an uproar. ‘You have three candidates before you, one of them a Tory. What, I ask, have Tories done for you and yours?’—more insane clamour. ‘You know better than I do, they are not the friends but the foes of the people, that it is only as you have triumphed over them that you have become free, that the history of Toryism is a record of resistance to popular rights—’ ‘And precious freedom,’ said a socialist, who darted up from the mob, amidst cheers on every side. ‘You Liberals give us liberty to work and slave and starve. What with the landlords who have robbed us of the land which belongs to the people, and what with the millowners who grind us in their mills, and your priests who make earth a hell, and then bid us think of a better land, what have we to thank our leaders, be they Whig, Tory or Radical, for? We are nothing to society, whose laws are framed for the purpose of securing the wealth of the world to the haristocrat or the rich snob, thereby depriving the larger portion of manhood of its rights and chances.’ This was a new doctrine for Sloville, and it was resented accordingly, and the socialist orator was pulled and hustled out of the hall, amidst increasing cries of order and police. The poor frightened chairman bolted out of the chair, much to the delight of the Tory roughs, and then one of the biggest of them moved a resolution to the effect that Mr. Wentworth was not a fit and proper person to represent the borough, and that he be requested to retire, and without calling for a show of hands, or putting the contrary, declared the resolution carried. At length Mr. Wentworth succeeded in getting him to do so, and the motion was lost. However, it was felt to be a farce to attempt to do any sane business that night, and Mr. Wentworth, as he left the hall, was heard loudly asserting that they would hear from him again, whilst from the far end of the hall there came many who claimed to be his supporters, and who assured him that he had but to continue his meetings and he would be sure to win.