ctable majority.

For once Mahony did not grumble at his outlying patients; was only too
thankful to turn his back on the town. It was pandemonium. Bands of
music, one shriller and more discordant than the next, marched up and
down the main streets--from the fifes and drums of the Fire Brigade, to
the kerosene-tins and penny-whistles of mere determined noise-makers.
Straggling processions, with banners that bore the distorted features
of one or other of the candidates, made driving difficult; and, to add
to the confusion, the schoolchildren were let loose, to overrun the
place and fly advertisement balloons round every corner.--And so it
went on till far into the night, the dark hours being varied by
torchlight processions, fireworks, free fights and orgies of
drunkenness.

The results of the polling were promised for two o'clock the following
day.

When, something after this hour Mahony reached home, he found Polly and
the gentle, ox-eyed Jinny Beamish, who was the present occupant of the
spare room, pacing up and down before the house. According to Jerry
news might be expected now at any minute. And when he had lunched and
changed his coat, Mahony, bitten by the general excitement, made his
way down to the junction of Sturt Street and the Flat.

A great crowd blocked the approaches to the hustings. Here were the
four candidates, who, in attending the issue, strove to look decently
unconcerned. John had struck a quasi-Napoleonic attitude: his right
elbow propped in the cup of his left hand, he held his drooped chin
between thumb and forefinger, leaving it to his glancing black eyes to
reveal how entirely alive he was to the gravity of the moment. Standing
on the fringe of the crowd, Mahony listened to the piebald jokes and
rude wit with which the people beguiled the interim; and tried to
endure with equanimity the jostling, the profane language and offensive
odours, by which he was assailed. Half an hour elapsed before the
returning officer climbed the ladder at the back of the platform, and
came forward to announce the result of the voting: Mr. John Millibank
Turnham topped the poll with a majority of four hundred and fifty-two.
The crowd, which at sight of the clerk had abruptly ceased its fooling,
drowned his further statements in a roar of mingled cheers and boos.
The cheers had it; hats were tossed into the air, and loud cries for a
speech arose. John's advance to grip the railing led to a fresh
outburst, in