ENGLAND EXPECTS.
[With Mr. Punch's best hopes for the success of the National Industrial Conference.]
ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
Monday, February 17th.—On the motion for the rejection of the Bill to relieve Ministers from the necessity of re-election, Mr. PEMBERTON-BILLING incidentally revealed the horrifying fact that he has compiled another Black Book, containing a full list of the PRIME MINISTER'S election pledges. They do not quite come up to the notorious figure of 47,000; but they total 1,211, which seems enough to go on with, and they are all "cross-referenced."
More serious, from the Government's point of view, was the criticism of some of their regular supporters. Lord WINTERTON, speaking as an old Member of the House—though he still looks youthful enough to be its "baby," as he was fifteen years ago—affirmed the value of by-elections as a gauge for public opinion; Major GRAEME, one of the new Coalitionists, thought it would be a mistake to part with a means of testing the record of a Ministry which the War has "swollen to the size of a Sanhedrim."
As the soft answers of the ATTORNEY-GENERAL—whom the late Mr. ROOSEVELT would have probably termed "pussy-footed"—failed to quell the rising storm, the LEADER OF THE HOUSE bowed before it and offered to agree to the insertion in the Bill of a time-limit.
