Once on the level the indignant animals felt themselves
lashed into an unaccustomed gallop; they lumbered along at a clumsy
canter, shaking the solid ground as they pounded it with their heavy
feet, the ancient Clarence, enchanted at this last rollicking
adventure, swaying and rolling behind them like a boat in a heavy sea.
This extraordinary-looking turn-out continued its headlong course over
bog-roads and through rough country lanes, to the astonishment of the
inhabitants, till the lame farmer's house was reached. He was
carefully lifted into the carriage, conveyed to the polling-place, and
recorded his vote at 7.54 p.m., with just six minutes to spare before
the poll closed. As it turned out I won the seat by fifty-six votes,
so this rapid journey was really superfluous, but we all thought that
it would be a much closer thing.
In the North of Ireland where majorities, one way or the other, are
often very narrow, electioneering has been raised almost to a fine
art. A nephew of mine was the Unionist candidate for a certain city in
the North of Ireland during the 1911 election. Here again it was
certain that his majority could only be a very small one, and as is
the custom in Ulster every individual vote was carefully attended to.
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