The tide of Liberalism has flowed with almost unabated strength
since Our last Lime. On Friday and Saturday last, it is trtie, there was a slight set-back, the Unionists recapturing five seats on Saturday which had been lost at the by-elections,— an achievement for -which an exact parallel can be found in the Election of 1895, when the Liberals won back an even higher proportion of seats lost during their term of office. Of the results declared on Friday week, the most noteworthy were the defeats of Sir Robert Finlay and Mr. Bromley-Davenport,. while on Saturday Sir William Hart-Dyke--whose removal from the House will be sincerely regretted on all hands—was ,badly beaten by a Labour candidate in the Dartford division of Kent. Of Saturday's returns, however, the most sensa- tional was that in the Romford division of Essex, where Mr. Louis Sinclair, though polling 2,000 votes more than in 1900, was defeated by Mr. Bethel' by a majority of nearly 9,000; while in the Wansbeck division of Northumberland Mr. Charles Fenwick, one of the most respected of the Labour Members, was returned by a majority of 7,176, or more than twice his opponent's poll.
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