GERMANY DRAWS THE PEN.
ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
Monday, May 5th.—Sir AUCKLAND GEDDES is the maid-of-all-work of the Ministry. Deputising for the PRESIDENT OF THE BOARD OF TRADE he had an opportunity of displaying an encyclopaedic knowledge which fully justified his position as President-elect of a Canadian University. Mr. JOYNSON-HICKS probably thought he had floored him with a poser on "gas-scrubbing," but Sir AUCKLAND knew all about it.
He is discreet as he is erudite. An inquiry about meat-imports elicited plenty of information about "ewe-mutton" and "wether-mutton," but not a word about the Manchurian and other exotic beef recently foisted upon London consumers.
Mr. REMER is one of the most attractive and enterprising of the new Members. But I am afraid, despite his cheery appearance, that he is a bit of a pessimist. With Peace believed to be so near, it was distinctly depressing to find him calling attention to the danger of a deficiency of pit-props "in any future war," and refusing to be put off with the usual official answer, "in view of the urgency of the question."
There are few topics which excite more general interest in the House than the shortage of whisky. When, in reply to a complaint by Colonel THORNE that a firm of Scotch distillers had refused to furnish their customers with adequate supplies, Mr. GEORGE ROBERTS remarked that he would like to be supplied with "specific cases," he was, no doubt unconsciously, expressing an almost universal desire.
Before the War, as we learned from Mr. ILLINGWORTH, Government offices used to send on the average about forty thousand telegrams a month. At the end of it the number had risen to close on a million. Much of the increase is due, no doubt, to zeal for the rapid despatch of public business, but some, one fears, to the natural tendency of dug-outs (even in Whitehall) to protect themselves with wire-entanglements.
If one were to believe all that the Scottish Members said about their own country in the debate upon the Housing (Scotland) Bill Dr. JOHNSON'S gibes would be abundantly justified. Half the population, according to Sir DONALD MACLEAN, are living in such over-crowded conditions that the wonder is that any of the children survive to man's estate, and still more that they retain sufficient energy to run most of the British Empire. But in the circumstances a certain amount of exaggeration may be forgiven. When it is a case of touching the Imperial Exchequer for local advantage the Scot is no whit behind the Irishman in "making the poor face."