for treating after the testa of the writ. In some cases those charges have been objected to, but in others they have been paid. The legal agency was about £350, but there were other persons who had money given to them for services renderd(sic), the total being about £250. I became acquainted with the fact that money had been spent in direct bribery after the election, though I knew nothing of it at the time. I think it possible that from £1,200 to £1,500 might have been distributed among about 50 of the mechanics and low labouring people who were scot-and-lot votes and Reform Bill ten-pounders, who are usually in some sort of difficulty at election times. I should say that the treating was about the same one one side as on the other. Paid messengers to do something or nothing is a species of bribery that prevails in Lewes to a considerable extent, it being the custom for persons to come and demand to be "put on". There was also some cooping of voters to avoid being annoyed by what were called ballies. About a dozen had to be taken care off(sic) who went to the Globe Inn at Brighton, and some others who went to Patcham. Being engaged to defend the petition, it became necessary to investigate the cases of bribery, and I learnt that of the more than £1,200 there was £25 given to one man. I got up the defence brief for the seats, but Mr. Parkes was the London agent. I still think we could have successfully defended the particular cases of bribery that would be brought against us, but it is likely we should have failed in the charges of treating.
Then the sitting Members would have been unseated. But I had an enormous mass of evidence of bribery and treating on the other side that would have ousted the two gentlemen if they had taken the unseated Members places. The paper that I was desired to lay before the committee is as follows:-
| "Treating Accounts: | |||||
| £ | s. | d. | |||
| Gift of Tea and Sugar, about ... | 133 | - | - | ||
| No. 1 ... | 233 | - | - | ||
| 2 ... | 89 | 13 | - | ||
| 3 ... | 18 | 12 | - | ||
| 4 ... | 114 | - | - | ||
| 5 ... | 168 | 8 | 9 | ||
| 6 ... | 68 | 2 | 2 | ||
| 7 ... | 49 | 2 | 9 | ||
| 8 ... | 69 | 2 | 6 | ||
| 9 ... | 95 | 13 | 6 | ||
| 10 ... | 5 | 18 | 6 | ||
| 11 ... | 95 | 1 | 7 | ||
| 12 ... | 91 | 15 | - | ||
| 13 Tavern ... | 230 | 8 | 5 | ||
| Ditto, Tap ... | 31 | 17 | 6 | ||
| 14 ... | 123 | 17 | 1 | ||
| Beer-shops, various, about ... | 250 | - | - | ||
| Servants, about 5 per cent. on the above accounts." | |||||
I have to explain that instead of the names of the parties, I have represented them by figures - 1, 2, 3, &c. The commodities were bought of tradesmen in the town, and were sent round to the voter's wives as the "free gift of a lady", an electioneering liberty with the name of a lady being thus taken, as was done on the other side, but which the candidates themselves knew nothing about.
With such admissions before them, the readers of this investigation may well question if there could have been a much more glaring system of bribery and corruption even in the palmy day of rotten boroughs.
I was nearly forgetting that at our January Quarter Sessions, the Recorder (E. Clarke, Esq.) complimented the borough on the comparative lightness of the preceding year's calendar, thus showing, as he said, a fair condition of morals. Of those who were brought before him more than half could neither read nor write and the rest were more or less deficient of education.
The said Sessions were held at a time when Sir Jas. Graham was censored by Radicals in the Town Council for his appointment of three Tory magistrates. Also when the gaol question was being discussed, and the magistrates in their endeavour to comply as far as possible with certain instructions from the Secretary of State, recommended to the Council that the then Gaoler who was 71 -
