Mr. Gladstone made on Thursday, at West Calder, a speech
which seemed to promise real guidance on the labour question, but which, directly it came to its operative part, quavered off into uncertainty and hesitation. He began, of course, by a song of triumph over the Eccles election, with which we can find no fault, except his obiter dictum, that by-elections are specially unfavourable to the Liberals. According to our ex- perience, they are apt to be specially unfavourable to the party in power, whether Liberals or Conservatives, but not more to Liberals than to Conservatives. The reason which Mr. Glad- stone gave,—namely, that the faggot-votes (which, by-the-way, in 1885 he so anxiously defended) are all given in a by-election, and are often wasted in a General Election,—is a very in- sufficient one. As a matter of fact, we suspect that faggot- voters make a very much greater effort to vote in a General Election than they do in a by-election, and as the elections are not all held on the same day,—we wish they were,—the poll probably shows a larger proportion of faggot-votes in a General Election than it does in an ordinary by-election.
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