At eight o’clock sharp the doors of the polling station are opened. Usually a number of electors are waiting outside, some to compete for the empty distinction of recording the first vote, and some anxious to discharge the task or duty before going about the day’s business. The official register sets forth the name, address, number, and qualification of every man and woman in the district entitled to vote. When the poll clerk is satisfied with the identity of the applicant, the white ballot paper is stamped with the official mark, back and front, and handed to the elector, and a short horizontal line or tick is drawn against his name on the register to show that he has voted. The ballot papers are made up like cheque-books, each paper having a counterfoil, and are numbered consecutively on the back. As the poll clerk gives a ballot paper to an elector he writes on the counterfoil the elector’s number on the register. Thus the vote of every elector can be traced should any circumstances arise to make this necessary. The voter, provided with the ballot paper, retires to a compartment where, alone and aloof and screened from observation, he or she places his or her two pencil strokes, the simple “X,” and that only, in the space to the right of the name of the candidate by whom he or she wishes to be represented in Parliament. Then, folding up the ballot paper so as to conceal the mark, but leaving the official stamp exposed in order to satisfy the presiding officer or the poll clerk, by a cursory glance, that it is the genuine paper, the voter drops it into the ballot box through the slit in the lid, and with a pleasant sense of self-importance immediately quits the polling station.