The Government had other troubles on hand. The two principal causes for anxiety among these, if not actually of their own hatching, had certainly sprung from a common stock.
The Parliament sitting at College Green deemed the moment opportune for issuing a Declaration of Independence and proclaiming a republic. Three years before, all Irishmen had been withdrawn from the British army and navy on the receipt of Dublin's firmly-worded note to the effect that since the granting of extended Home Rule, Irishmen came within the sphere of the Foreign Enlistment Act. These men formed the nucleus of a very useful army with which Ireland thought it would be practicable to hold out in the interior until foreign intervention came to its aid. Possibly England thought so too, for Mr Strummery's Ministry contented itself with issuing what its members described as a firm and dignified protest. Closely examined, it was discoverable that the dignified portion was a lengthy recapitulation of ancient history; the firm portion a record of Dublin's demands since Home Rule had been conceded, while the essential part of the communication informed the new republic that its actions were not what his Majesty's Ministers had expected of it, and that they would certainly reserve the right of taking the matter in hand at some future time more suitable to themselves.
The other harassment was that Leicester lay at the mercy of an epidemic of small-pox which threatened to become historic in the annals of the scourge. In the second month the average daily number of deaths had risen to 120, and there was no sign of a decrease. In the autumn it was hoped that the winter would kill the disease; in the winter it was anticipated that it would die out naturally under the influence of the spring sunshine. The situation affected Mr Chadwing more closely than any of his colleagues, for Leicester had the honour of returning the Chancellor of the Exchequer as one of its members. Under normal conditions Mr Chadwing made a practice of visiting his constituency and addressing a meeting every few weeks, but during the six months that the epidemic raged he found himself unable to leave London. His attitude was perfectly consistent, in spite of the hard things that some of his supporters said of him in his absence: like the majority of his constituents, he had a Conscientious Objection to vaccination, but he also had an even stronger conscientious objection to encountering small-pox infection.
The 24th of November ushered in a new phase of the strife. It marked the beginning of the Dark Winter. Early in December the newspapers began to draw comparisons between the weather then prevailing and the hard winters on record. At that date it was noticeable how many rustic-looking vagrants were to be seen walking aimlessly about the streets of London. The unemployed from the country were beginning to flock in for the mere sense of warmth. The British Museum, St. Paul's Cathedral, the free libraries, and other places where it was possible to escape from the dreadful rigour of the streets, were crowded by day. At night long queues of miserable creatures haunted the grids of restaurants, the sheltered sides of theatres, the windows of printing houses, and any spot where a little warmth exhaled. On the nights of the 4th, the 5th, and the 6th of December the thermometer on Primrose Hill registered 3° below zero. On the 7th pheasants were observed feeding among the pigeons in the main street of Highgate, and from that time onwards wild birds of the rarer kinds were no unusual sight in the London parks and about the public buildings. In the country it was remarked that the small birds had begun to disappear, and the curious might read any morning of frozen goldfinches being picked up in Camberwell, larks about Victoria Park, and starlings, robins, blackbirds, and such like fry everywhere. By this time dairymen had discovered that it was impossible to deliver milk unless they carried a brazier of live charcoal on their cart or hand-truck. Local correspondents in the provinces had ceased to report ordinary cases of death from cold and exposure; there were cases in the streets of London every night.
Early in December Sir John Hampden was approached unofficially by a few members of Parliament, including one or two of minor official rank, to learn his "terms." The suggestions were tentative on both sides, and nothing was stated definitely. But out of the circumlocution it might be inferred that he expressed his willingness to rescind the boycott, and to devote five million pounds to public relief at once, in return for certain modifications of the franchise and an immediate dissolution. Nothing came of the movement, and during the first week of December the Government sent round to the post-offices and to all the Crown tax collectors notices that the licences ordinarily falling due on the 1st of January must be taken out on or before the 15th of the current month, and the King's Taxes similarly collected in advance. The League did not make any open comment on this departure, but every member merely ignored it, and when the 16th of December was reached, it devolved upon the officers of the Crown to enforce the payment by legal process. In the language of another age, the Government was faced by five million "Passive Resisters." It soon became apparent that instead of getting in the taxes a fortnight before their time, the greater part of the revenue from that source would be delayed at least a month later than usual.
On the 20th of December one million and three-quarters State-supported unemployed of various grades presented themselves at the appointed trades unions committee rooms, workhouse offices, employment bureaux, Treasury depôts, from which the Fund was administered, to receive their weekly "wage." As they passed in they were confronted by a formal notice to the effect that the disbursement was then reduced to half its usual amount. As they passed out they came upon another formal notice to the effect that after the following week the Grant would be "temporarily suspended." Possibly that also embodied an idea of "breaking it gently."
The cry of surprise, rage, and terrified foreboding that rose from every town and village of the land when the direful news was at length understood, can never be described. Its echoes were destined to roll through the pages of English history for many a generation. The immediate result was that rioting broke out in practically all parts of the country except the purely agricultural. The people who had been promised a perpetual life of milk and honey had "murmured" when they were offered bread and water. Now there seemed every prospect of the water reaching them as ice, and the bread-board being empty, and their "murmuring" took a sharper edge. In some places there were absolute stampedes of reason. In justice it has to be remembered that by this time the most pitiless winter of modern times had been heaping misery on misery for a month, that the chance of finding work or relief was recognised to be the forlornest hope, and that very, very few had a reserve of any kind.
The indiscriminate disturbances of the 20th of December were easily suppressed. A people that has been free for generations loses the gift for successful rioting in the face of armed discipline, even of the most inadequate strength. But for constitutional purposes the body of one dragooned rioter in England was worth more than a whole "Vladimir's battue" east of the Baltic.
On the 27th of December the certified unemployed drew their diminished pittance for the last time. They left the buildings in many places with the significant threat that they would return that day week, and if there was nothing for them would "warm their hands" there at the least. There was renewed rioting that day also. The forces of law and order had been strengthened; the rioters appeared to have been better organised. In one or two towns the rioting began to approach the Continental level. Bolton was said to have proved itself far from amateurish, and Nuneaton was spoken of as being distinctly promising. At the end of that day public buildings had to be requisitioned in several places to lay out the spoils of victory and defeat.
Two days later every newspaper contained an "open letter" from Sir John Hampden to the Government, in which he unconditionally offered them, on behalf of the Unity League and in the name of humanity, sufficient funds to pay the half grant for four weeks longer. It was a humane offer, but its proper name was strategy. It embarrassed the Government to decide whether to accept or decline. It embarrassed them if they accepted, and if they declined it embarrassed them most of all. They declined; or, to be precise, they ignored the offer.