_Tuesday, February_ 29th.--Mr. LLOYD GEORGE announced to-day that the
Members of the Cabinet had decided to take one-fourth of their salaries
in Exchequer Bonds. Murmurs of applause followed, and before they had
died away Mr. HOGGE launched his great joke. Leading up to it with the
remark that Exchequer Bonds can be sold the next day, he asked, "Would
it not be a good idea to call them the Laughing Stock?" Mr. HOGGE is not
one of the chartered jesters of the House so his _jeu d'ésprit_ just
caused "a laugh," as the reporters say, and nothing more.
On the Third Beading of the Consolidated Fund Bill Sir JOHN SIMON
renewed his attack upon the Military Service Bill. The tribunals, he
declared, were disregarding the appeal of the widow's only son; the
Yellow Form, of which the late Home Secretary takes the same jaundiced
view as he did of the Yellow Press, was being sent out indiscriminately
to all whom it did not concern: the War Office had issued a misleading
poster; and everywhere men were being "bluffed" into the Army. He
himself would have been inundated with correspondence if he had not had
the happy inspiration of diverting the flood into Mr. TENNANT's
letter-box. Passionately he called upon the Government not to imitate
Germany's brutality.
Mr. LONG, suave as usual, deprecated Sir JOHN SIMON'S ferocity, reminded
him that all cases of hardship could be considered by the Appeal
Tribunals, and promised to investigate the cases that had been
mentioned. "May I send in my list too?" asked Mr. WATT. But Mr. LONG,
unwilling to share the fate of Mr. TENNANT, suggested that the SECRETARY
FOR SCOTLAND would form a more appropriate dumping-ground for Mr. WATT'S
_dossier_.
After Mr. SNOWDEN, Sir THOMAS WHITTAKER and Mr. LOUGH had reinforced Sir
JOHN SIMON'S case with added instances the Government found an
unexpected champion in Mr. HEALY. He was amazed to hear the late HOME
SECRETARY--"one of the Ministers who made the War"--gloating over the
inefficiency of the War Office at a moment when round Verdun was raging
a battle in which the fate of Paris, and perhaps of London, was
involved. Why had he not imitated the monumental silence of Mr. BURNS?
Instead, he, the suppressor of obscure Irish newspapers, had done more
to injure recruiting than any Connemara editor.
I never expected to live to hear the Bank of England described in the
House of Commons as a useless institution. In Mr. HEALY'S opinion, "The
Old Lady of Threadneedle Street," like the other who lived in a shoe,
has too many children, and her attempt to get 190 of them exempted from
military service moved him in a moment of "vituperative irrelevance," as
Mr. PRINGLE subsequently described it, to say the rudest things about
her financial capacity.
_Wednesday, March 1st._--Sir OWEN PHILLIPS, once Liberal Member for
Pembroke, returned to the House to-day as Unionist Member for Chester.
To signalise the capture of so gigantic a prize--he is 6ft. 6in. in his
stockinged feet--Lord EDMUND TALBOT and Sir G. YOUNGER, Unionist Whips,
conducted him to the Table; and as they are both of moderate height the
procession gave the effect of a _Mauretania_ going to her moorings in
charge of a couple of tugs.
When Dr. MACNAMARA moved a Supplementary Estimate of £10 for the Navy, I
was reminded of PRAED'S lines "On seeing the SPEAKER asleep in his
chair":--
"Hume, no doubt, will be taking the sense Of the House on a
saving of thirteen pence."
But there were differences. The £10 was not an ordinary "ten-pun' note"
but was a "token" representing something like four and a half millions
received by the Fleet for services rendered to Foreign Powers and
others; and Mr. WHITLEY, who was in the Chair, too so far from being
asleep, was intensely wide-awake. Members who sought to discuss Naval
policy generally were promptly pulled up, and the SECRETARY OF THE
ADMIRALTY, when in his third or fourth attempt to explain the Vote he
remarked hypothetically, "Suppose we were to sell a battleship----" was
himself called to order, Mr. WHITLEY evidently regarding such a
reduction of the Fleet as unpatriotic even in imagination.
A vote for £37,000 to extend the British Consulate buildings at Cairo
united both sides of the House in criticism. Mr. ASHLEY thought what was
good enough for Lord CROMER should be good enough for his successor. Mr.
HOGGE, by a somewhat obscure process of reasoning, now understood why
the Germans were so anxious to get to Egypt. In vain Mr. LEWIS HARCOURT,
usually so persuasive, explained that they were now buying for £3 10s. a
metre land for which the owner wanted £12 a metre not long ago. Sir F.
BANBURY, shaking his _pince-nez_ at the Treasury Bench, retorted that
he might ask £5 for this pair of glasses, for which he had paid
half-a-crown (more war economy), but he would not expect to get it.
A vote for £50,000, to complete the purchase of the estate of Colonel
HALL-WALKER, who has presented his racing stud to the Government, evoked
some opposition and much facetiousness. Mr. ACLAND, who proposed it, did
not help his case by remarking that personally he regarded racing as a
low form of sport. The fact that some of the horses have been leased by
the War Department to Lord LONSDALE for racing purposes "on sharing
terms" caused Mr. MCNEILL to inquire whether Mr. TENNANT would act as
the Ministerial tipster; and Mr. HOGGE, who displayed a knowledge of
racing which will, I fear, shock the unco' guid of East Edinburgh,
thought it ridiculous that Ministers should preach economy in the City
and start a racing stud at Westminster.
* * * * *
[Illustration: IN HAPPY DAYS TO COME. _The Coalition Owners (Mr. ASQUITH
and Mr. BONAR LAW _) LEADING IN A WINNER.]
* * * * *
_Thursday, March 2nd.--Ariel_, Earl of DERBY, has not entirely left the
Earth for the Air. His head, at any rate, is not in the clouds, for his
speech on the working of his own scheme was full of practical wisdom. He
was not afraid of the exemptions that the tribunals might give if left
to themselves, but he was a little concerned about SIMON and his scratch
crew of pro-shirkers who seemed to be doing their little best to prevent
the country from getting men.
* * * * *