Page:History of the Anti corn law league.pdf/44

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28
MR. STANLEY.

the full reward for his labour; if these results did not follow the bill, the same noble spirit which caused it to pass, would cause its amendment. The mayor then appeared, and declared the state of the poll: Thicknesse, 302; Potter, 296; Kearsley, 175; Whittle, 12.

On a previous visit with Mr. Potter to Wigan, I had a short conversation with Mr. Stanley, now the Earl of Derby, and prime minister. At the end of 1830, after having taken office in the whig administration, he had been ousted from Preston because he had given a peremptory and emphatic "No" to the question if he would vote against the Corn Law. He was now on his way to offer himself as candidate for North Lancashire. He asked me who would be returned for Manchester. I said, " We shall send Mr. Poulett Thomson, partly as an expression of gratitude to ministers for the Reform Bill, and that he may tell his colleagues that we demand the repeal of the Corn Law as the first practical measure of relief to the people." " You will make a very good choice," he replied. I said, "And we shall send our townsman, Mr. Mark Philips, to show you that we want the adoption of the ballot, and the repeal of the Septennial Act, as additions to the Reform Bill." "It will be a good choice," he said, but he did not look as if he was altogether pleased with the information he had received.

At Bolton two reformers, Colonel Torrens, the author of an able work on the corn trade, and Mr. Ashton Yates, of Liverpool, would have been returned, but for the introduction of Mr. Eagle, a Cobbettie, who divided the reform interest. Mr. Bolling was the only tory candidate. Great tumult took place on the first day of the election, and the military were called in. On the second day Bolling shot ahead of Yates, and at the close of the poll the numbers were, Torrens, 626; Bolling, 499; Yates, 482; and Eagle, 107.

The result of the general election, although exhibiting