[TO TEE EDITOR OF rim " SPECTATOZ.'1
Sin,—It must be very distressing to many people to read the complaints of defeated candidates at the General Election. The charges of bribery and intimidation could not be more vague, but they seem to be more frequent than before. No one would wish to defend any agents who have bribed or really intimidated, nor even to make excuses for the folly of any ladies who have worked unwisely in what they thought a good cause. But the chief charge, to my mind, is against the electors. Personally I do not believe in a wholesale degenera- tion since 1906, when we heard far less complaining. But if a man can be bribed, he is morally unfit to vote ; if he can be intimidated, he is no less unfit, either through real misfortune, or, I suspect, in most eases from misfortune allied to stupidity and weakness of character. Surely the more dignified and in every way more desirable course for these defeated candi- dates would be to advocate a restriction of the franchise, whether upon an educational or what qualification I leave to them. Doubtless they could frame a scheme which they could advocate with a view to excluding at any rate a large number of people whom they consider liable to bribery or intimidation, or too prone to beer to be fit electors. When the candidate who was defeated in the division of Surrey where I live will advocate this course at a public meeting, "may I be there to see."—I am, Sir, etc., dirateros.
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