Punch, or the London Charivari | Page 9

that spouse of his; Not knowing you, how could they learn What true perfection is? Of all your sex you stand most high By far and very far Who mid your Christmas gifts can buy A smokeable cigar.
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[Illustration: THE ECONOMISTS.
SCENE.--The Coalition Golf Club de luxe.
MR. BONAR LAW. "DARE WE HAVE CADDIES?"
MR. LLOYD GEORGE. "NO, NO. WE ARE OBSERVED. THE PLACE IS ALIVE WITH ELECTORS."
("Watch your M.P.!"--Poster of Anti-Waste Press.)]
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ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
[Illustration: THURSDAY.
[After the Painting by W. DENDY SADLER.]
SIR D. MACLEAN, MR. HOGGE, MR. G. LAMBERT, MR. G. R. THORNE, MR. ASQUITH, MR. ACLAND, GENERAL SEELY.]
Monday, December 6th.--"Logic has never governed Ireland and never will," said Lord MIDLETON to-day. It was certainly conspicuous by its absence from a good many of the speeches made in Committee on the Government of Ireland Bill. Representatives of Southern Ireland have been clamouring for greater financial control, but they quite changed their tone when Clause 24, enabling the Irish Parliaments to impose a surtax upon residents in Ireland, came up for discussion. While professing the greatest confidence in the desire of their fellow-countrymen to treat them fairly, Lords DROGHEDA, SLIGO and WICKLOW agreed in thinking that this was too dangerous a power to entrust to them; it would breed absenteeism and drive capital out of the country.
Lord FINLAY, to whom as a Scotsman logic still makes appeal, was for the deletion of the whole clause. But the Irish Peers again objected; for they desired to preserve for the Irish Parliaments power to remit Imperial taxes, on the off-chance that some day it might be exercised. And they carried their point.
According to Lieut.-Colonel CROFT the pencils used by the British Post-Office are procured from the United States. As one who has suffered I can only hope that Anglo-American friendship, already somewhat strained by the bacon episode, will survive this revelation.
On the strength of a rumour that the seed of Irish peace had been planted in Downing Street, Mr. HOGGE promptly essayed to root it up in order to observe its progress towards fruition. The PRIME MINISTER, however, gave no encouragement to his well-intentioned efforts. Nor did he satisfy Lieut.-Commander KENWORTHY'S curiosity as to whether Father O'FLANAGAN was "a Sinn Feiner on the bridge," beyond saying "that is what we want to find out."
Tuesday, December 7th.--After a week's interval for reflection and study Lord LINCOLNSHIRE moved the rejection of the Agriculture Bill. Adapting an old joke of Lord SPENCER'S, made in "another place" a generation ago, he observed that this was no more an agricultural Bill than he himself was an agricultural labourer. He knows however how to call a spade a spade, if not something more picturesque, and he treated the measure and its authors to all the resources of a varied vocabulary. Possibly his brother peers, while enjoying his invective, thought that it had been a little bit overdone, for of the subsequent speakers only Lord HINDLIP announced his intention of voting against the Bill, the others being of opinion that parts of it were, not excellent perhaps, but at least tolerable.
In the Commons Viscount CURZON pressed upon the Government the desirability of licensing side-car combinations as taxi-cabs. The idea might, one feels, appeal to a Coalition Government but Sir JOHN BAIRD for the Home Office hinted at the existence of "serious objections."
Collectively the House has an infantile mind. It went into kinks of laughter over a question put by Dr. MURRAY regarding the "daily mail service" between one of his beloved islands and the Scottish mainland. The author of the joke--and small blame to him--quite failed to appreciate how funny he had been until his neighbours muttered in stage-whispers, "Daily Mail!" "Daily Mail!" Then a wan smile broke over his own features.
It has been stated in certain newspapers that Mr. CHAMBERLAIN has refused the Viceroyalty of India in consequence of the weak state of his health, and that for the same cause he is likely to vacate shortly the Chancellorship of the Exchequer. All I can say is that on the Treasury Bench he betrays no outward sign of this regrettable debility when dealing with critics of the Treasury. It is not easy to puncture the ?s triplex of Mr. BOTTOMLEY, but two words from Mr. CHAMBERLAIN did it this afternoon.
Sir ROBERT HORNE got a second reading for the Dyes Bill, a measure which he commended as being necessary to protect what is a key-industry both in peace and war. Dye-stuffs and poison-gas are, it seems, inextricably intermingled, and unless the Bill is passed we shall be able neither to dye ourselves nor to poison our enemies.
Wednesday, December 8th.--The Agriculture Bill found one thoroughgoing supporter in the Duke of MARLBOROUGH, an "owner-occupier" so enamoured of Government control that he desires to see the whole of the