Mr. Courtney was returned for the Bodmin Division of Cornwall
on Thursday week (the poll was not declared till late yesterday week) by an increased majority, a result on which we heartily congratulate both South-East Cornwall and Mr. Courtney himself. The majority over Mr. J. McDougall was 543, whereas three years ago Mr. Courtney's majority over the Gladstonian candidate was only 231, so that he had considerably more than doubled it. In his speech on the declaration of the poll, Mr. Courtney said that his -constituents had sanctioned the principle "of independence and of sincerity of action," and had approved his course in having sometimes "cut himself of from precious friends right and left, believing and trusting that in the heart 'of the nation there was a desire for something that shotild be beyond the falsities of parties, and which should re- present honesty." "Many an hour of anxiety," he said, he must have given to his Conservative friends ; "and even the Liberal Unionists must now and then have had their doubts." And we confess that when he gave a general support to the "Evicted Tenants Bill," we ourselves, though amongst the sincere admirers of Mr. Courtney's independence, felt something a good deal stronger than doubt,—convic- tion that in his sturdy independence he had made a very serious mistake. You may show independence by stand- ing alone when you are wrong as well as when you are right, and Mr. Courtney, we think, has sometimes shown it in the latter way as well as in the former.
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