Mr. Knowles, the Editor of the Nineteenth Century, sent to
Tuesday's Times a letter of Mr. Childers's, written on August 22nd last, predicting, with curious acuteness, though even less favourably to the Liberals than the actual result, the proportions of the various parties in the Parliament just elected. This, is the letter:—" I believe that Scotland and Wales will return about the same number of Conservatives as now ; that in Ireland the Parnellites will gain largely at our expense, and slightly at the expense of the Conservatives ; that in England Lancashire will be Conservative, and Yorkshire and the other Northern counties Liberal ; that in the East and South-west we shall also gain largely, and slightly in the Midland counties. The Conservatives, on the other hand, will, I expect, gain a good deal in the Metropolis and its neighbourhood. I estimate the aggregate result roughly,—Liberals, 330; Conservatives, 250 ; Parnellites, 90. This is a much less sanguine estimate than that of many leading Liberals, but I believe that I shall not be much out.—Yours, &a, HUGH C. E. CHILDERS." Certainly a prediction closer to the truth was never made.
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