_Monday, June 14th._--As an Ulster Member, Mr. LINDSAY protested
against the availability of return-tickets between Ireland and England
having been reduced from six months to two. Sir ERIC GEDDES explained
that the change had been made to stop the illicit traffic in
return-halves, though he hastened to disclaim any suggestion that
Members of Parliament were concerned in it. The grievance is probably
not of large dimensions. It is difficult to understand why anyone
leaving Ireland in these days should want to go back there.
The PRIME MINISTER did not seem to favour the suggestion, pressed upon
him from many quarters, that the Government should cause an estimate
to be made of the national income, and then limit public expenditure
to a definite proportion of that amount. A private person may cut
his coat according to his cloth, but the Government, he argued, is
unfortunately obliged by circumstances to reverse the process. Even so
the taxpayer may be forgiven for thinking that the State costume still
bears some superfluous trimmings.
When economy is proposed, however, it is not always popular. Sir JOHN
BUTCHER, in protesting against the Government's proposal to sell
the _Brussels_, the late Captain FRYATT'S ship, was expressing a
wide-spread feeling. But Colonel LESLIE WILSON disarmed criticism by
pointing out that if all British vessels with heroic associations
were to be kept as exhibition-ships a large proportion of the British
mercantile marine would be laid idle.
A few years ago the General Manager of one of the English
railways--the late Sir GEORGE FINDLAY, I think--declared that he could
look after the whole of the Irish railways and have three days a week
left for fishing. Nowadays, I suppose, the Irish lines are not laid in
such pleasant places. At any rate the best part of two days has been
occupied in deciding whether in the new scheme for the government of
Ireland they should be administered by the Central Council or the two
Parliaments, and under the compromise eventually reached they will be
more or less subject to all three authorities.
The debate was chiefly remarkable for the evidence it provided that
the Ulstermen are developing into the strongest of Home Rulers--almost
Sinn Feiners, according to one of their critics--where their own
province is concerned.
_Tuesday, June 15th._--Mr. CHURCHILL had again to withstand attacks
upon his Army uniform proposals, this time on the ground that the
reversion to scarlet and pipeclay would entail extra labour and
expense upon the private soldier. His confidence that Mr. Atkins would
not grudge the short time spent on cleaning his full dress, so closely
bound up with regimental traditions, was endorsed by Mr. BILLING, who
said, "The time occupied is about twenty minutes, and I speak from
experience."
[Illustration: THE BUTTON EXPERT.
"ABOUT TWENTY MINUTES, AND I SPEAK FROM EXPERIENCE."--_Mr BILLING._]
A statement that the issue of bagpipes to certain Irish regiments
was under consideration brought protests from Scottish Members, who
evidently thought that their own national warriors should have a
monopoly of this form of frightfulness. But Mr. CHURCHILL pointed
out that the Irish Guards were already provided with bagpipes, and
Lt.-Commander KENWORTHY horrified the Scots by declaring that the
pipes were not an indigenous product of their country, but had been
imported from Ireland many centuries ago.
[Illustration: MR. ASQUITH IS DEEPLY STIRRED.]
Further progress was made with the Government of Ireland Bill. A
proposal to strengthen the representation of the minority in the
Southern Parliament was sympathetically received by Mr. LONG, who
thought, however, that the Government had a better method. As that
consists in a proposal to exact the oath of allegiance from every
candidate for election and to give the KING in Council power to
dissolve any Parliament in which more than half the members have
not taken the oath, it is sufficiently drastic. Having regard to
the present disposition of the Sinn Feiners there seems to be mighty
little prospect of a Parliament in Dublin before the date known in
Ireland as "Tib's Eve."
_Wednesday, June 16th._--In both Houses Addresses were moved praying
His Majesty to appoint two additional Judges of the King's Bench
Division. The motions met with some opposition, principally on the
score of economy, and it was suggested that no additions to the Bench
would be required if the existing Judges resumed the old practice
of sitting on Saturdays. This drew from the LORD CHANCELLOR the
interesting information that the Judges devoted their Saturdays to
reading "the very lengthy papers that were contained in their weekly
_dossier_." It is no doubt the great length of these documents that
accounts for the peculiar shape of the bag that Mr. Justice ----'s
attendant was carrying when I met him at Sandwich a few Saturdays ago.
Lord BIRKENHEAD soothed the economists by pointing out that the new
Judges would probably more than earn their salaries of five thousand
pounds a year. In accordance with the prevailing tendency court-fees
are to be raised, and at Temple Bar as in Savile Row our suits will
cost us more.
Until Colonel LESLIE WILSON moved the Second Reading of the Nauru
Island Agreement Bill I don't suppose a dozen Members of the House of
Commons had ever heard of this tiny excrescence in the Western Pacific
with its wonderful phosphate deposits. Captured from the Germans
during the War, it is now the charge of the British Empire, and the
object of the Bill was to confirm an arrangement by which the deposits
should be primarily reserved for the agriculturists of Australasia,
New Zealand and the United Kingdom. It produced a debate of
extraordinary ferocity. Young Tories like Mr. ORMSBY-GORE vied with
old Liberals like Mr. ASQUITH (on whom the phosphates, plus the Louth
election, had a wonderfully tonic effect) in denouncing the iniquity
of an arrangement by which (as they said) the principles of the League
of Nations were being thrown over, and this country was revealed as a
greedy monopolist. Thus assailed both by friend and foe Mr. BONAR LAW
required all his cool suavity to bring the House back to a sense of
proportion, and to convince it that in securing a supply of manure for
British farmers the Government were not committing a crime against the
comity of nations.
Answering questions for the Irish Government in these days is rather
a melancholy business, but the ATTORNEY-GENERAL for IRELAND resembles
Dr. JOHNSON'S friend, in that "cheerfulness will keep breaking in."
Thus he excused the Government's non-interference with the Sinn Fein
"courts," whose writ now runs over half Ireland, on the ground that
for all he knew they might be voluntary courts of arbitration; and
when Major O'NEILL expressed the hope that he would at least take
steps to protect the British public from the criminals "transported"
by sentence of these mysterious tribunals he blithely disclaimed
responsibility, and said he was quite content that they should be out
of Ireland.
Considering the counter-attraction of the Ascot Gold Cup, Mr. BALFOUR
had a surprisingly numerous audience for his discourse on the League
of Nations. His enumeration and analysis of the League's various
enemies were in his happiest vein of philosophical humour. His
conclusion was that the League had much less to fear from its avowed
foes than from its fanatical friends, who were already attempting to
put upon it tasks for which it was unfitted, and even to supply it
with an International Police Force. Its proper weapons were not armies
and aircraft, but Delay and Publicity.
This formula, so reminiscent of Wait and See, did not prevent Mr.
ASQUITH from hinting in the politest manner that the League was not
likely to prevent the wars of the future unless it made some effort to
stop those now in progress.
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[Illustration: _Nephew_ (_after several hair's-breadth escapes_). "NOT
FEELING NERVOUS, ARE YOU, AUNTIE?"
_Aunt._ "I AM, RATHER. YOU SEE, THIS IS ONLY MY THIRD EXPERIENCE OF A
MOTOR-CYCLE."
_Nephew._ "WELL, YOU'VE BEAT ME; IT'S ONLY MY FIRST."]
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