The result of the polling in Buteshire was announced on
Saturday. Mr. Graham Murray, the Unionist candidate, polled 1,365 votes, against 990 polled by his opponent, Mr. MacCulloch, and this secured a Unionist majority of 375. In 1886, Mr. Robertson polled one vote less than Mr. Murray, but as the Gladstonian poll at that election was less by 171 than on Saturday, the Unionist majority was then 545. In 1885, the Conservative majority was 284. The figures, like those of most of the by-elections, show that while there are no Unionist defections, the Gladstonians manage to sweep far cleaner than they did in 1886. In reality, however, the only thing worth noticing about the election is the extraordinary constitutional anomaly under which, in a remote portion of Scotland, 1,365 voters are able to send a Member to Parlia- ment. In Manchester, as was shown last week, it takes over 4,000. Yet the Gladstonian leaders, though professing demo- cratic principles, carefully abstain from any undertaking to reform this blot on the Constitution. A fair distribution of the electoral privilege is apparently the one thing they will not promise.
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