ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
Tuesday, June 1st.—Tempted by the fine weather a good many Members had evidently determined that the country was good enough for them and that Westminster could wait. But Viscount Curzon was not of their number. Was it not on the glorious First of June, a hundred and twenty-six years ago, that his great-great-great-grandfather won victory for his country and immortal fame for himself? On such an anniversary he was obviously bound, no matter at what personal inconvenience, to show a like public spirit. Accordingly, with a full sense of responsibility, he addressed to the appropriate Minister this momentous question: "Whether any fried fish shops are now the property or under the control of the Ministry of Munitions; and if so how many?" The House paused in awed anticipation of the reply, but breathed again when Mr. Hope announced that "No fried fish shops are now nor, so far as is known, were ever conducted by the Ministry of Munitions."
No other episode of Question-time rose to this high level. Next in importance to it were Mr. Baldwin's revelations on the subject of "conscience-money." It seems that in one particular instance it cost the Treasury eleven shillings to acknowledge the receipt of half-a-sovereign; but that was because the dilatory tax-payer insisted that the depth of his remorse could only be adequately exhibited by a notice in the "agony-column." In ordinary cases no charge is incurred.
Any conscientious Sinn Feiner who may have been fearing lest the recent destruction of Inland Revenue offices in Ireland should prevent the authorities from sending out the usual demand-notes, may now forward his contribution direct to the Treasury without hesitation. Mr. Baldwin is doubtless relying upon the wide adoption of this practice, for he stated that, although the damage might cause delay in the collection, it was not expected that the ultimate yield of the tax would be seriously affected.
From left to right:—The Whirlpool of Charybdis; The First Lord of the Admiralty; The Rock of Scylla (Sir Edward Carson).
The discussion on the Navy Estimates was chiefly conducted by Lieut.-Commander Kenworthy, who made half-a-dozen set speeches, besides any number of informal interjections. To place them in order of merit would be impossible, but of single passages that which perhaps carried most conviction with his audience was the description of the pre-war Navy as "a sort of pleasant service into which the fools of the family could be put."