The vote of the " working majority," which was last
week in jeopardy, has been cut off and added to the Opposition : Notting- ham has elected Mr. WALTER in the room of Sir RONALD FEE- Guson. Within the half year, the very small majority (if it may still be termed a majority) has lost five votes,—Walsall, Canter- bury, Monmouthshire, Carlow county, and Nottingham. The last blow was the least expected. For thirty years Nottingham had been in the hands of the Whigs. At the last election, the Minis- terial candidates, Sir JOHN HOBHOUSE and General FERGUSON, were returned by a majority of more than 490 over the two Oppo- sition candidates : now the Oppositionist is returned by a majority of 238. But here there is not only the blow to the Whig strength, but to their great measure the New Poor-law : though Air. WALTER is a Tory to all intents and purposes, and his votes will tell for the Tories in the House, it is as the bitter enemy of the New Poor-law that he is returned. The Ministerial journals derive what consolation they can from that fact, and deduce from it that it was no party triumph at Nottingham : but it was a party defeat. And, taken in conjunction with the recent defeats in the House of Commons, it cannot be denied that it has contributed to place Ministers in a position much worse than they have before occu- pied; even worse than they themselves—who must all along have been most conscious of their own feebleness, want of purpose, and want of courage—could have foreboded. They may go on, as Lord HOW1CK anticipates, for "another session"; but in order to do that, they must enforce better discipline among their Radical retainers, and lay a strict injunction on their Whig voters not to die and subject them to another half-dozen elections.
