The elections for Exeter appear to have been in that age observed by the nation with peculiar interest.  For Exeter was not only one of the largest and most thriving cities in the Kingdom, but was also the capital of the West of England, and was much frequented by the gentry of several counties.  The franchise was popular.  Party spirit ran high; and the contests were among the fiercest and the longest of which there is any record in our history.  Seymour had represented Exeter in the Parliament of James, and in the two first Parliaments of William.  In 1695, after a struggle of several weeks which had attracted much attention not only here but on the Continent, he had been defeated by two Whig candidates, and forced to take refuge in a small borough.  But times had changed.  He was now returned in his absence by a large majority; and with him was joined another Tory less able and, if possible, more unprincipled than himself, Sir Bartholomew Shower.  Shower had been notorious as one of the hangmen of James.  When that cruel King was bent on punishing with death soldiers who deserted from the army which he kept up in defiance of the constitution, he found that he could expect no assistance from Holt, who was the Recorder of London.  Holt was accordingly removed.  Shower was made Recorder, and showed his gratitude for his promotion by sending to Tyburn men who, as every barrister in the Inns of Court knew, were guilty of no offence at all.  He richly deserved to have been excepted from the Act of Grace, and left to the vengeance of the laws which he had so foully perverted.  The return which he made for the clemency which spared him was most characteristic.  He missed no opportunity of thwarting and damaging the Government which had saved him from the gallows.  Having shed innocent blood for the purpose of enabling James to keep up thirty thousand troops without the consent of Parliament, he now pretended to think it monstrous that William should keep up ten thousand with the consent of Parliament.  That a great constituent body should be so forgetful of the past and so much out of humour with the present as to take this base and hardhearted pettifogger for a patriot was an omen which might well justify the most gloomy prognostications.

When the returns were complete, it appeared that the new House of Commons contained an unusual number of men about whom little was known, and on whose support neither the government nor the opposition could with any confidence reckon.  The ranks of the staunch ministerial Whigs were certainly much thinned; but it did not appear that the Tory ranks were much fuller than before.  That section of the representative body which was Whiggish without being ministerial had gamed a great accession of strength, and seemed likely to have, during some time, the fate of the country in its hands.  It was plain that the next session would be a trying one.  Yet it was not impossible that the servants of the Crown might, by prudent management,