Now that Soviet rule in England is apparently so imminent it seems to me
that we ought to consider a little more closely the application of its
practical machinery. The morning papers reach this village at three o'clock
in the afternoon, so that nobody is in to read them, and when one comes
back in the evening one is generally too lazy, but a couple of rather
startling sentences about the coming Communist _régime_ have recently
caught my eye.
"The people of England, like the people of Russia," runs the first, "will
soon be working under the lash." And the second, so far as I remember,
says, "Our rations will no doubt be reduced to half a herring and some
boiled bird-seed, which is all the unhappy Russians are getting to eat."
Before these changes fall suddenly upon us I think we should ponder a
little on the way in which they will affect our urban and agricultural
life.
Take the House of Commons. A very large and symbolic knout might occupy the
position of the present mace, and from time to time the SPEAKER could take
it up and crack it. As this needs a certain amount of practice it will be
necessary to select a fairly horsey man as Speaker, and the Whips, who will
follow the same procedure, should also be skilled practitioners. I see no
difficulty in applying the same method to commercial and factory life in
general, still less to the packing of the Underground Railway and the
loading of motor-omnibuses and trams.
It is rather when we come to scattered rural communities that the system
seems likely to break down. Take the case of George Harrison in this
village. When I first met George Harrison, and he said that he thought the
weather was lifting, he was carrying a basket of red plums which he offered
to sell me for an old song. On subsequent occasions I met him--
1. Driving cows. (At least I suppose he was driving them; he was sitting
sideways on a large horse doing nothing in particular, and some of the cows
were going into one field and some into another, and a dog was biting their
tails indiscriminately.)