Lord Winterton and the other "Young Turks" were again inquisitive about the suppressed report of the alleged Greek outrages at Smyrna, until Mr. Lloyd George put an end to the catechism with the remark that "Even Christians are entitled to a fair trial."
Chafing under the accusation that the trade unions are largely responsible for preventing ex-Service men from obtaining employment the Labour Party pressed the Prime Minister to produce his evidence. To-day they got it, in stacks. All the unions, in principle, are in favour of training disabled men, but in practice most of them require that a workman shall have worked at his craft for from three to six years before being admitted to their ranks. "You have fought for us, but you shall not work for us" is their attitude.
On the Army Estimates Sir Samuel Scott pleaded for the formation of an Imperial General Staff. Even in peace-time there were plenty of problems to be solved. We should never be really at peace, moreover, so long as there were tribes on our frontiers who looked upon war as an amusement and a pastime, "as hon. Members look upon golf." Surely this is to underestimate the devotion of our earnest golfers. Judging by the condition of the links on Sunday I should say some of them look upon it as a religion.
Mr. Neil Maclean pretended not to understand why we wanted an army at all. Was not the last war "a war to end war"? But his main point—in which he will be surprised to find many quite respectable people agreeing with him—is that it should not be officered from one class. Mr. Maclean is not so revolutionary as he thinks himself. The most insurgent thing about him is his hair, and even that is not more rebellious than Mr. Dan Irving's.
The Addison Bird. "Beautiful spring weather, John."
John Bullfinch. "Yes, my dear. But you don't seriously mean to start building—what?"
Tuesday, March 23rd.—Lord Peel was evidently surprised at the amount of opposition encountered by the Silver Coinage Bill. Having a specimen of the new shilling in his pocket he himself was feeling particularly bobbish, and could not understand the gloomy vaticinations of Lord Buckmaster and Lord Salisbury as to what might happen in West Africa and elsewhere if we depreciated our currency. But his usual self-confidence so far deserted him that he confessed that he could not "answer for the whole of the British Empire at a moment's notice."
The Lord Chancellor refused to accept Lord Balfour of Burleigh's proposal to abolish the D.O.R.A. regulation forbidding the sale of confectionery in theatres, on the ground that it would be unfair to the ordinary shops to allow this competition, and that the business of the theatre was to supply drama not chocolate. Lord Balfour was unconvinced. His imagination boggled at the thought of a Scotsman, at any rate, paying for a seat in a theatre in order to purchase a shilling's worth of "sweeties."
The House of Commons has a childlike sense of humour. There is nothing that it enjoys more than to have a Minister struggling with the pronunciation of some outlandish place-name. When, therefore, Mr. Illingworth, posed with the deficiencies of the mail service to Bryngwran and Gwalchmai, made a gallant but ineffectual effort to get over the first obstacle and evaded the second by calling it "the other place," Members roared with delighted laughter.