I have but a moment to tell you I am engaged in the severest contest that ever was known. On Wednesday the Poll began, and closed leaving Milton in a Minority, but yesterday we got near three hundred ahead, by getting early possession of the advances to the Polling Booths. To- day, Wilberforce, who was last yesterday, is regaining his lost ground fast, and I fully expect Lascelles will beat the young Lord, but the contest will be dreadful and the cost enormous. I like your eagerness, but you are full as well where you are. Were you here, you would have a fair chance of a Fever. I am a good deal heated, but not ill. We poll 2 or 3,000 a day. What a charming account we have of William. We are all in high spirits this day. Wilberforce is the head of the Poll and Lascelles has gained upwards of fifty upon Milton. _May 27th._--Hoping that Lascelles is above 300 ahead, I left York this morning. I send you an Electioneering song I wrote, but you must not let anyone have a copy of it. SONG. Wave the flag, hoist the pennant, Hear our great Lord Lieutenant Who would save us the trouble of choice. "Let not Lascelles content you, Milton _shall_ represent you, And I'll in the House guide his voice!" Wise in speech, look, and act (I appeal to the fact), At nineteen he determined to marry, And all I could say, Till his twentieth birthday, Would hardly persuade him to tarry. Ere at years of discretion, He sat a whole Session, E'en Grantham made way for the boy. Who's the fittest law-maker? He that's first a law-breaker; To catch thieves you a thief should employ. What a lordling it is, With his carrotty phiz, So cried up, so flattered, so built on. You may oft take a rule From a nickname at School, And the boys named him _old Lady Milton_. Oh patriot revered Go shave for a beard! Hie to Wentworth and finish this strife, York, Malton, the county, Disdained to be bound t'ye, Go and cherish your nice little wife, Oh! soon may she bear You a fine son and heir; Then ten oxen whole you may roast; May Fitzwilliam carouse With _two boys_ in the house Nor bewail _Milton's Paradise Lost_! The contest lasted three weeks, while the actual polling occupied fifteen days, during which 25,120 votes were tendered. It is thus described in the _Annals of Yorkshire_:--