28 SEPTEMBER 1889, Page 2

Mr. Chaplin has been re-elected for Sleaford by 4,386 votes

to 3,078, being seven more than his majority in 1885, when he polled 4,761 votes to 3,460 given to Mr. Sharpe. The reduced figures are due, it is said, to an actual decline in the register, and the total lesson of the election would seem to be that the history of the last year, and the oratory of all the Glad- stonians, have left country electors absolutely unaffected. Mr. Chaplin had the help, no doubt, of the Liberal Unionists, but the Gladstonian candidate had the assistance of any amount of Irish oratory, and of a wide belief that his rival had opposed the grant of allotments. The steadiness of the vote is most satisfactory, more so, perhaps, than an increase would have been. That might be due to a passing feeling; but steadiness such as that exhibited in Sleaford springs from a conviction beyond the power of talk to alter.