to speak ungallantly, but I am compelled to say that in the overwhelming majority of cases it has been a corrupt and almost as often a corrupting influence. Nor need the advocates of woman's suffrage (I am one of its sincere and candid advocates myself) take alarm at this, or attempt the futile task of disproving it. Irresponsible, illegitimate and subterranean influences nearly always are corrupt. The fact is rather an argument to establish, than an argument to disprove, the necessity of the political enfranchisement of women.
Corrupt, however, the political influence of the petticoat in England assuredly is—mean-spirited, ignoble, selfish and demoralizing. Let us begin at the base of the social pyramid. The influence of the wives of uneducated or half-educated voters in the smaller boroughs is immense. The wives are almost always to be reached by bribes or presents or promises or flatteries. An election agent of experience once told me that when he had secured the wives he cared nothing about the husbands. The eloquent and judicious candidate always pays special attention to the task of flattering and winning wives. In almost numberless cases detailed before election committees the business of bribery was carried on directly with the wife, who undertook, plain and square, to manage her husband. Not all these good ladies of course dealt so roundly with the matter as the worthy matron of whom the story goes, that being pressed by the friends of a certain candidate to procure for him her husband's "plumper" (the full vote given for one candidate especially where there are more than one on the same side), promptly replied that if he hesitated a moment about doing so she would give him a "plumper." But the average Briton of the lower-middle class in smaller boroughs, the stout personage who spends his evenings regularly with the same circle of cronies in the same public-house, is apt to be for the most part under the complete control of his wife. Only when he is sustained by the excitement of some great public question and the common action of his fellows would he be likely to struggle long against her dominion over his political conduct. She therefore, being wholly irresponsible to public opinion, and as a matter of course almost wholly unscrupulous, is eagerly sought after by candidates or their agents. She insists that the husband shall not lose sight of his own interests; that he shall not throw away a good chance; that he shall not injure her and himself and the children by disobliging this powerful landlord or that wealthy customer. Sometimes the husband is willing enough to be corrupted, provided he can in any way persuade himself that he relieves his conscience, as Adam did, by throwing the blame on his wife; sometimes he would vote for disinterested principles if he was quite free; but he has not patience and marrow and backbone enough to resist the influence of the matronly angel in his house. Of course there is bribery which is done not with foul shekels of the tested gold. Where the electors are of a somewhat higher class than those whom I have just been describing, there are influences of a more delicate order brought into operation. There are, of course, the agent's flattery, the candidate's flattery: sweeter and more seductive than all, the flattery brought to bear by the candidate's gracious wife. So pray do not mistake the meaning of the kind of influence to which the virtuous and corrupt spouse of the British elector commonly yields. It is the sweet condescension of higher rank which conquers her; and this is far more sweet and conquering when it comes from the candidate's wife or sister than from the candidate himself. For although it is an exquisite sensation to Mrs. Plumper to see the honorable candidate, son perhaps of a peer, take off his hat to her and bow and smile, to hear his winning voice and feel his shake of the hand, yet it is a prouder moment by far when the candidate's wife or sister calls upon her and recognizes with gracious courtesy her social existence. Here we have the power of the
