"HERE, I SAY, STOP! YOU'RE
HURTING ME! [_Aside_] IF I ONLY WHINE ENOUGH I MAY BE ABLE TO WRIGGLE
OUT OF THIS YET."]
* * * * *
ESSENCE OF PARLIAMENT.
_Tuesday, February 11th_.--The KING's Speech outlined a programme
of legislation which would in the ordinary way occupy two or three
Sessions. But the Parliamentary machinery is to be ruthlessly speeded
up and "a short cut to the Millennium" is to be discovered by way
of the Committee-rooms. Precisians observed with regret that the
customary reference in the Speech to "economy" had by some oversight
been omitted; and the prospective creation of several additional
Departments led Lord CREWE to express apprehension lest the country
should be "doped" with new Ministries, to the detriment of the
national health.
[Illustration: THE OPPOSITION FREAK.
THE ADAMSON-MACLEAN COMBINATION.]
"Where are they gone, the old familiar faces?" was the question
one asked oneself on looking at the crowded benches of the House of
Commons. It was said of a Past President of the United States that he
was the politest man in America--"he gave up his seat in a street-car
and made room for four ladies." The gap made on the Front Opposition
Bench by the involuntary retirement of Mr. ASQUITH--to which generous
allusion was made by the PRIME MINISTER--is so vast that the joint
efforts of Sir DONALD MACLEAN and Mr.
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