of the Divine blessing on "their arduous and protracted

labours."

At the hour of the prorogation the Chancellor of the Exchequer was speaking at a luncheon in his honour arranged some days before the rejection of the Finance Bill at the National Liberal Club. Dismissing the Bill after a few sentences, he said that its rejection had initiated one of the greatest and most promising struggles of modern times. The issue would be the supremacy of the House of Lords. Its insolence had grown by immunity. It was purely a branch of the Tory organisation. He would not remain a member of a Liberal Cabinet for an hour unless full powers were accorded it enabling it to pass into law a measure securing that the House of Commons could carry Bills in a single Parliament either with or without the sanction of the House of Lords. He contrasted the composition of the two Houses; the Commons represented every trade, profession, and industry; these had some representatives in the House of Lords, but they did not dominate it, and they represented only capitalists and employers. Many Peers would take a commanding position in the Commons; but these had not counselled the rejection of the Budget. Against the rejection were Lord Balfour of Burleigh, Lord James of Hereford, Lord Rosebery, Lord St. Aldwyn-all of whom he briefly characterised; for it were Lord Lansdowne (who was forced into rejection), Lord Curzon, Lord Milner, whose career he contrasted with Lord. Cromer's, and whose motto was "Damn the consequences." The weightiest Conservative papers had been against the rejection; on the other side was "practically one very able but illbalanced journalist " [Mr. J. L. Garvin, of the Observer and Daily Telegraph] formerly an ardent Parnellite. As to Lord Rothschild's and Lord Revelstoke's opposition, they were great exporters of British capital and "very good salesmen," and he ridiculed Lord Rothschild's attacks on the "financial inquisition," and Lord Rosebery's account of "bonds ballasting ships." Unemployment had actually gone down since the Budget was introduced. After referring to the action of the Peers in rejecting Bills, Mr. Lloyd-George declared that "every grain of freedom is more precious than radium"; the right of the Commons to grant supplies and make the redress of grievances a condition of them "drenched England with blood," and he did not believe Englishmen meant to surrender it without striking a blow.

On the same evening the Marquess of Lansdowne and Mr. Austen Chamberlain addressed an enthusiastic meeting of over 7,000 persons held in connection with the annual meeting of the Liberal Unionist Council at the Drill Hall, Plymouth. Lord Lansdowne declared that the Government was notoriously out of touch with the people; the Lords had suspended the Budget for a few weeks that members of the Commons might obtain the opinion of their constituents. He denounced the proposed

new taxes, and described the issues as Tariff Reform, singlechamber government, and the advance of Socialism. He enumerated some of the important Bills recently passed by the Lords, and, referring to their rejection of the Finance Bill, asked what was the value of a right that was never to be exercised? If the Commons alone could carry Budgets, a Finance Bill might dissolve the Union with Ireland or disestablish the Church. The Lords were fighting for the liberties of the people. The working-men wanted reasonable hours of labour, freedom to combine, healthy surroundings, steady employment, to own their own house and be their own master inside it. The Peers had appealed to the people, and awaited the result with confidence. Mr. Austen Chamberlain said that though bread had risen-perhaps partly because the Government had done nothing-he was confident that there was nothing in the Unionist proposals which would raise its price.

The Conference earlier in the day had endorsed the action of the Lords, Tariff Reform and the two- Power standard; denounced Home Rule, and approved the policy of increasing the number of freeholders, both peasant proprietors and yeoman farmers (p. 231), and this latter proposal became a regular "plank" in the Unionist electoral platform, though the Unionist Small Holdings Act of 1891 had not had much result.

Sir Edward Grey, speaking at Leith next day, said that the struggle had been bound to come since the last general election; the Lords had waited to choose their ground. The right of the Commons over supply was the bed-rock of English liberties; the Liberal party intended to fight the Lords' claim to the end, and after the struggle to assert for ever the right of the Commons to be uncontrolled as to finance, and also relations between the two Houses, making it possible for a Liberal Government to hold office on fair and equal conditions. The Lords talked of reforming their House; the only real reform would replace the hereditary principle by popular election. The Lords' real motive was to get Tariff Reform and throw out the Liberal Government. Without that Government, however, they would not have got Army reform, or the grant of self-government in South Africa which led to the Union. Sir Edward Grey then defended the Budget at length, saying that the real rock of offence was the land taxes and still more the valuation; and-dismissing Mr. Balfour as "the Nicias of Tariff Reform ". he commented caustically on the Tariff Reformers' adaptation of their proposals to their audiences. The election was fraught with tremendous consequences; some larger aspects of the struggle than could yet be realised would develop; but the Liberal party would fight for liberty and trust the people, and with its help would prevail.

"Financial chaos" had been freely predicted as the result of the rejection of the Bill; but the trades concerned with the Customs and Excise duties accepted the official suggestion that

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on taking delivery of goods they should deposit the amount of the duties payable under the Budget resolutions, subject to refund if the duties were not legalised by the new Parliament. It was generally recognised that the next Ministry, whether Liberal or Unionist, would be compelled by the needs of the revenue to re-enact these duties, at any rate for the current financial year; and, had the traders not paid them, a demand for reduced prices would have proved irresistible. The retail prices of beer were reduced in some places, but this was regarded as an electioneering manoeuvre.

The Treasury offered to accept death duties either on the old scale, subject to a supplementary collection, or on the new scale, subject to a refund, according as Parliament might eventually decide. Income tax at the new rate of 14d. in the pound was deducted, as it had been since May, from dividends; the collection of income tax on income from land, farming and earnings was generally, but not universally, postponed till after the passing of a new Finance Bill. Where collected, however, it was, of course, subject to refund; but here also it was clear that no Government could afford to reduce the existing rate.

The Manifestoes were speedily issued, and other efforts made by various bodies representing special interests and aims. National Liberal Federation (Dec. 1) denounced the Lords' action, and demanded the veto as its necessary sequel; the Parliamentary Committee of the Trade Union Congress denounced the House of Lords as a menace to political freedom, declared for the Unemployed Workmen Bill, old-age pensions at sixty, and the removal of the pauper disqualification, poorlaw reform on the lines of the Minority Report, free education, from the primary school to the university, State payment of members, and returning officers' expenses, the holding of general elections on one day, amendment of the Corrupt Practices Act, adult suffrage, redistribution of seats, the abolition of plural voting and university representation, and the establishment of an eight hours' day. It urged Trade Unionists and other wageearners to work for the maintenance of the supremacy of the Commons and the abolition of the House of Lords. The Independent Labour party, while agreeing in these aims, maintained its detachment from Liberalism. The Standard, on the other hand, raised 6,0781. odd to enable Unionist working-men to stand as candidates; and four were enabled to stand, for Clitheroe (Lancs), Leicester, Swansea District, and Orkney and ShetEffective aid was also rendered to the land respectively. Opposition by the Anti-Socialist League, formed some time. earlier by Sir William Bull, Unionist M.P. for Hammersmith, which selected and trained speakers of both sexes, who practically served as Unionist irregulars.

The Education Settlement Committee a little later (Dec. 17) deprecated the giving of binding pledges on the education

question by candidates; but the Free Church Council and the Joint Religious Education Campaign Committee prepared respectively to put test questions, the latter specially seeking the help of the beneficed clergy, the former specifying not only unsectarian education and popular control of the schools, but the principles of the Licensing Bill and the Lords' Veto. The Licensed Victuallers' Defence League also prepared test questions; and a Nonconformist Anti-Socialist League was formed, virtually to oppose the Finance Bill and its authors. The National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies drew up test questions likewise, and started petitions in favour of the cause in nearly 400 constituencies in Great Britain. The Women's Social and Political Union urged opposition to Liberals; the Women's Freedom League opposition to Cabinet Ministers, and abstention from support of other candidates.

But the extravagances of the militant Suffragists had virtually thrust their cause into the background of the contest. The controversy, indeed, was vigorously continued; the Anti-Suffragist Society worked hard in the North of England; a Unionist Women's Franchise Association and a Men's League for Women's Suffrage agitated on the other side. But the Suffragist outrages at Bermondsey and the Guildhall (pp. 232, 243) had been followed by window-breaking at Bristol, when Mr. Churchill and Mr. Birrell attended the Colston banquet (Nov. 13), and Mr. Churchill had actually been attacked ineffectively by Miss Teresa Garnett with a dog-whip. Mr. Lloyd-George's presence at the Savoy Theatre had been the signal for a disturbance; and other Ministers were assailed likewise. In prison the Suffragists had continued refractory, and at Manchester the fire-hose had been used on one prisoner who stood behind her cell-door when it became necessary to force an entrance. In the courts, moreover, the Suffragists were unsuccessful. The Bermondsey outrage, avowedly the outcome of careful premeditation, had brought on Mrs. Chapin and Miss Neilan three months' imprisonment for interfering with the ballot box, and on the former four months for assault; and as plaintiffs the Suffragists had failed also. Very bitter feeling had been aroused by the forcible feeding of the "hunger strikers," which had led to questions in the Commons; and it was intensified by the release of Lady Constance Lytton, ostensibly for reasons of health, while her fellow-strikers of lower social position had been subjected to the process. The Home Secretary had defended his action in a correspondence with the Fabian Society (Nov. 19-22). But an action brought by Mrs. Leigh against the Home Secretary and the Birmingham prison officials in the High Court (Dec. 9) failed, though Sir Victor Horsley was one of the medical witnesses for the plaintiff. The question as to the right of petition (Pankhurst and Haverfield . Jarvis, the latter an Inspector of Police; p. 154) also resulted in a verdict for the defendants, the Lord Chief Justice holding that the

right existed, but that the manner of exercising it was illegal and contrary to the sessional order.

The treatment of the women suffragists estranged a few Liberals from the party; but there were local differences both among the Unionists and the Labour men. A demand that Messrs. Burt and Fenwick, the Northumberland miners' Parliamentary representatives, should sign the constitution of the Labour party was carried on a ballot of the miners by a small majority, but eventually was not pressed. The long-standing dispute between the official Unionist organisation in East Marylebone and the Independent Tariff Reformers who supported Mr. Richard Jebb, an ardent Imperialist and contributor to the Morning Post, had resulted successively in the substitution of Lord Charles Beresford for Lord Robert Cecil, who, as a Free Trader, was relegated to Blackburn, and, when Lord Charles Beresford was called to Portsmouth (p. 246), in the adoption of Mr. Boyton, a prominent house-agent in the borough, as the official Unionist candidate. Mr. Jebb, however, insisted on going to the poll, and much friction was locally engendered. There were rival Unionist candidatures also at Southampton, Canterbury, Lincoln, and Oxford University; for this latter constituency Lord Hugh Cecil, a Unionist Free Trader and High Churchman, was selected by the Unionist organisation, but was opposed on both grounds by Dr. Arthur Evans, the explorer of Crete and keeper of the Ashmolean Museum, an ardent Tariff Reformer and a University reformer also. The Liberals failed to find a candidate; but eventually, at the request of Lord Lansdowne, Dr. Evans withdrew from the contest.

It may here be noted that Mr. Foxwell, a well-known economist and sometime Professor at University College, London, warned candidates on both sides through the Times (Dec. 3) not to pledge themselves specifically that the cost of food would not increase under Tariff Reform or Free Trade respectively, since the steady increase in the output of gold might easily send prices up by 10 per cent., "within the limits of a single Parliament," and the home demands in the United States and other countries might increase also. But the warning was

unheeded.

It was recognised on the Liberal side that Lancashire must be retained for Free Trade; and Mr. Winston Churchill (p. 244) opened a campaign in its defence with a speech at Manchester on Monday, December 6. He insisted on the danger involved to the cotton industry in raising the cost of production by Protective tariffs, and asked if India would be allowed a like freedom to protect her own cotton manufactures; he elaborately answered the critics who had expressed fears of the export of British capital, pointing out that the credit of Manchester stood above that of Germany, and of Liverpool above that of Italy, after the Budget had passed. The exports from the United Kingdom for November, 1909, were above those for November,