The Radicals began to quake for their victory. Speakers were sent for from London, but could not even get a hearing, owing to the enemy's supplies of bad eggs. Meetings were everywhere broken up in disorder, and the Captain was reported to have said that the Liberal party ought to offer a knighthood to anyone who would poison Backfield's beer. § 18. So time passed till within a week of polling day. The feeling in the district grew more and more tense--no prominent member of either party could appear in Rye streets without being insulted by somebody on the opposite side. Meetings were orgies of abuse and violence, but whereas the Radical meetings were invariably broken up in disorder by their opponents, interruptions at Tory meetings resulted only in the interrupters themselves being kicked out. For the first time it looked as if a Conservative would be returned for Rye, and the Colonel knew he owed his success to Backfield's agricultural party. Then suddenly the unexpected happened. At the end of one of Reuben's most successful meetings in Iden Schoolhouse, a mild sandy-haired person, whom nobody knew, rose up and asked meekly whether it was true that the Scott's Float toll-gate was on Colonel MacDonald's estate, and if so, what use did he make of the tolls? He was answered by being flung into the street, but afterwards the Conservative tenant of Loose Farm on the Marsh remarked to Reuben that it was "a hemmed ark'ard question." Reuben, however, absorbed by his enthusiasm for Protection and a restricted franchise, scarcely thought twice about the toll-gate, till the next day a huge poster appeared all over the district: "MACDONALD'S GATE" "Sing ye who will of Love, or War, or Wine, Of mantling Cups, Bright Eyes, or deeds of Might-- A theme unsung by other harps is mine-- I sing a Gate--a novel subject quite. O Tolls! ye do afflict us all--a bore! E'en when by Law imposed on evil slight! Who has not loaded ye with curses sore When in this Coat of Proof enveloped tight? Therefore to what is Law I say 'content'-- But for a Private Man to raise a toll, To stop the public, tax them, circumvent, Moves me to passion I can scarce control, Makes boil the rushing blood and thrills my very soul." Hitherto any verse that had been written in the controversy had been meant for street singing, and turned out in the less serious moments of politicians who certainly were not poets. But "MacDonald's Gate" impressed the multitude as something altogether different. The sounding periods and the number of capitals proclaimed it poetry of the very highest order, and its prominent position throughout the town soon resulted in the collection of excited groups all discussing the Scott's Float toll-gate, which nobody hitherto had thought much about.