HIS FIRST PATIENT.
Persia. "THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR YOUR ADVICE."
Dr. Curzon. "NOT AT ALL. THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR ASKING FOR IT."
ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
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.