To the Editor of the Salisbury and Winchester Journal. MR. EDITOR, I am a freeholder of the county of Wilts, and must own that, till lately, I have always felt a peculiar satisfaction in having property in a county, so distinguished and so respected throughout the kingdom for the liberal, gentleman-like,, honourable, and pleasant manner in which its public business has been conducted, as long as I can remember. I am therefore deeply concerned to witness the change that has begun to take place, by a breach in the most important part of it-that of its election of a repre sentative of the county in Parliament. There are now three Candidates for that honour-all of whom have every pretension necessary for the situation, except one: that one was in their power, if they had thought fit to have availed themselves of it; and they will have cause, no doubt, in six months' time, bitterly to regret that they did not embrace it; and it is the approbation of a county meeting, where every freeholder in the county, who thought it worth his while, might have attended, and held up his hand in favour of those two out of the three that he deemed most worthy of the situation. This is the mode of proceeding that has been the practice of the county for the last forty years, and in which Mr. Penruddocke, Mr. Goddard, Sir James Long, and Mr. Wyndham, &c. were elected; and so numerous was the attendance of the freeholders on these occasions, that the meeting has been held in the open air, for want of a room large enough to contain them; and where every freeholder, as I said before, held up both his hands, if he liked it, for the man of his choice. The observations, therefore, of the writers in your and other papers, who call this keeping the county in a state of bondage-and the members being chosen by a Quorum and by two clubs (the whole of which Quorum and clubs alluded to do not consist, nor ever did, of thirty or forty persons altogether)-would be hardly worth noticing, if the assertion of the county being in a state of bondage to them had not been so frequently repeated, as that ignorant people may be induced to believe there is some truth in it: and one cannot but regret that this idea has been at least encouraged by, if it has not originated with, persons whose respectability, one should have thought, would not have suffered them to have countenanced so absurd a supposition. If the elections were so smuggled by thirty or forty persons, where were the remaining four or five thousand freeholders? where were all these strenuous advocates for liberty, that so exclaim against M M Quorums and clubs, that they did not come forth, in opposition to such a monopoly of patronage? Why, Sir, they know that there is not a word of truth in all this assertion: they know that every freeholder had a power who chose it, and did exercise the right of voting, by holding up his hand, as he pleased, at every one of these elections. But, unfortunately, there are some classes of men in the county whom so quiet, harmonious, social way of settling the business did not exactly suit: they thought it very wrong that the Candidates should put an advertisement in the county paper expressive of their intention to offer themselves, if approved of at a county meeting; and await patiently the sense of such a meeting, and yield to its decisions:-there were no public dinners, no canvassing, no flattering speeches, that gratified either their pride or their appetite-and no ale. houses opened. Ambition is certainly a very prevailing passion; and we must not be very much surprised to see men of good abilities, high character, and ample possessions, carried away by it. Such I sincerely believe the three present Candidates are. But will they permit a freeholder, without taking offence, to put a question or two to them?-they may answer them, or not, as they please. It is supposed, that, if they stand a poll, the expense of it cannot be much short of 20,000l. each. Is there not some danger that, however pure their intentions are now, they must, if successful, be obliged either to submit to priva tions unbecoming the members of so great a county as the county of Wilts; or, what is still worse, and which I am sure their honourable minds would revolt at, to make a sacrifice of their independence, if the ministers of the day should think it worth purchasing? or of becoming the tools of faction, with a hope of being rewarded hereafter? Perhaps some of the Candidates may say-" We are in no fear of being so involved; for our votes will be chiefly carried by our friends, at their own expense." But it must iminediately strike such a Candidate, that, in accepting their generous offer, he binds himself to fight their battle to the last vote, though his utter ruin be the consequence now, and at all future times; or to forfeit that which is still dearer to him-his honour: at least, I would recommend him to accept their offer with a qualification to have a right to withdraw whenever he pleases. The next question I would ask the Candidates, is-Have they reflected on the incalculable good that even half the interest only of 20,000l. will enable them to do to their country, when disposed of judiciously, in support of public institutions in the county, and private charities, in addition to what they expend that way at present instead of expending it all at once in injuring the morals and disturbing the peace of the county? The third question I would take the liberty to ask of them, isHave they coolly considered the consequence of this con test, unless they now, even now, stop short?-the ill blood they will create amongst neighbours? (they all have children) the value of this 20,000l. to their younger children? Would it not be more for their honour and happiness to call on their friends and agents to stop their unbecoming paper war-to meet together in a friendly way to join, in a request to the sheriff, to call a county meeting, at some impartial place, (in the middle of Salisbury Plain, or Stonehenge, if they please), and to abide by what the High Sheriff shall declare to be the sense of that meeting-to cease their endeavours to vilify and degrade all the most respectable men in the county in the eyes of their tenants and neighbours? Such language might do very well from Hunt at Spafields, but is totally misplaced in a contest for the county of Wilts. -I trust I have said nothing in this letter that they, or any one else, can take offence at; if I have, I beg that individual's pardon. My hope is to conciliate-not to inflame. I have now done, and shall take my leave, by signing myself A FRIEND TO PEACE & GOODWILL. To the Printers of the Salisbury and Winchester Journal. GENTLEMEN, I TRUST that the attention of the freeholders of the county will be particularly directed towards the last address of Mr. Long Wellesley, and that they will form a correct judgment of the extraordinary production which it contains under the signature of Thos. Pik: that judgment must also refer to an authentic production of the same person, Thomas Pike, of Heytesbury, which has since been published. I readily acquit Mr. Wellesley himself of suspecting that the paper which he 'sanctioned by making it a part of his address to the county was in fact both falsehood and forgery. One must lament that the pretensions of a Candidate for the representation of Wiltshire should in any degree have been made, by his too zealous friends, to rest on such foundations. I have a personal wish also that the various letters addressed to me in the various news papers, and circulated through the county by the adherents of Mr. Long Wellesley, at very great expense, should be attentively read by every freeholder. The task will be laborious, as the matter is nauseous and offensive. The freeholders cannot but lament that the pretensions of any Candidate for the representation of Wiltshire should in any, degree be made, by his too zealous friends, to rest on such foundations. Mr. Wellesley is truly told that Mr. Everett, of Heytesbury, is a member of the Deptford Inn Club, and that with many other gentlemen of the county he has undertaken to bring to the poll the freeholders of his own immediate neighbourhood in the interest of that gentleman's opponent, free of any expense to themselves or to their favourite Candidate. き Does a Candidate for Wiltshire deem it disgraceful to be the member of a club upon which its enemies cast no reproach, without admitting that when the independent freeholders wanted protection against the pretensions of a single family it was found there, not in favour of one of their own members, but in favour of a gentleman of North Wiltshire, till then unknown to them? Its bitterest enemies admit that in some measure the freeholders are indebted to that club for the glorious triumph of 1772. Does a Candidate for Wiltshire deem it an objection to any gentleman, that though not possessed of redundant wealth, he will concur with others in enabling his less opulent neighbours to offer their independent voices at the poll, without expense to themselves or injury to their families? Is that the homage which we might expect a Candidate to render to the independence of the county ? Mr. Everett, of Heytesbury, is too well known, and wherever known too much respected, to suffer in his reputation from any publication. He is not an oppressor of the poor, nor is he a tyrant to control the freedom of those around him who flourish in his prosperity. Censure upon him must be founded in falsehood. The advantages to be derived to any Candidate from any aspersion cast upon his name, and upon other persons far inferior to him, can be but momentary. They may be very malignant, but they cannot add to the triumph of any virtuous cause. The day is fast approaching when the principles of the glo rious election of 1772 will be once more triumphant, or when the representation of Wiltshire will once more be esteemed as an appendage to the honours of a single family. Who shall doubt of the result of such an alternative? I remain, Gentlemen, your constant reader, THE OLD MOON-RAKER. Swindon, June 12, 1818. GENERAL ELECTION. Bless every man on earth, who ought to give- To William Long Wellesley, &c. &c. &c. Esq. THAT the voice of praise as well as flattery has its charms in the eyes of men, I will not say wiser, but certainly older than yourself, and whose wisdom has been more practically conspicuous than your own, is a proposition I think no man will be bold enough to deny the full force of. I do not mention this as an important, though trite truism, but I suggest this as a plausible extenuation of that vanity which has elated you beyond the bounds of reasonable exultation and common prudence, and taught you to hail the pot-house scurrility of a coldblooded libeller against your rival, as the honest effusions of patriotism, and devoted attachment to your person. Having said this honestly on the one hand, I will act as candidly by you on the other, and express my indignation at the manner in which you also have been treated, and cannot but blush for my county, when I consider the offensive line which has been adopted to exclude a stranger from its representation. I shall not sully my paper by further allusions to those disgusting and disgraceful transactions. But, Sir, you have laid yourself lamentably open, and I am by no means astonished that you were attacked; I only regret the mode of the attack, and that it was made unfairly. All the electioneering contrivance to defeat your sudden invasion of this bequorummed county, was indeed called forth by your unguarded professions of motives. What were they? Not your ambition of representing this independent county; not even your particular desire of representing a county which had the honour of being selected from the map of England for your enterprise; but your selfish wish of restoring to the house of Draycot (the house of Draycot indeed) an heir-loom which it never considered as its own, and which you would lose possession of, with every acre which you have in the county, in case of your lady's decease. Be assured, Sir, this letter flows from no unfriendly pen, from no hired scribbler, but from one who has been a silent listener to all that has been said on this occasion; from one who has seen too much of the follies and frailties of human nature to expect perfection from any man, much less from a young man cradled in extravagance, nursed in luxury, and placed by marriage in a situation at once the object of envy, flattery, and jealousy. You have not been used to truth, and perhaps it may not please you: I will not press it too strongly upon you, as you |