The Tyrone election has resulted in the return of the
Hon. Captain Corry (Tory) by a majority of 36 over his opponent, Mr. Macartney, who is said to have united the suffrages of the Roman Catholic priesthood and peasantry with those of a section of the Orange democracy. Mr. Macartney claims that he was, nevertheless, duly elected, as it appears that some 200 voting- papers were vitiated by a blunder of the -Sheriff's deputies, and there may, therefore, be a judicial inquiry. But in any case the result is significant. Tyrone has always been supposed to be the most Tory constituency in Ulster, and the Corrys have repre- sented the Tory interest in Tyrone from time immemorial,—say, ever since the Restoration. The late Mr. Corry sat for the county without anything like a serious contest for forty-six years. if in Tyrone, voting by Ballot, a Corry is barely able to save his seat by a doubtful majority of less than forty in a constituency of nearly 9,000, what may be expected to happen in the other Ulster constituencies ? We fully expect that ten years hence a Tory M.P. will be as much a rara avis in Ulster as in the some- what cognate constituencies of Scotland. There will be no diffi- culty even at the next election in carrying nearly all, if not all of them, against the most stupid and pragmatical batch of Tories in the House,—as the Ulster Members unquestionably are,—if the Roman Catholic party are not silly enough to alienate Protestant Liberals and what is called the Orange democracy" by starting Home Rulers.
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