shall not find the leader of our hopes until we meet with a statesman who has faith in quiet action and plain speech, who does not believe that the world can be remade merely by talking about it. A the craving of the people. For many years surrender has been the sole hope and policy of our demagogues. Not only have the demagogues given the people whatever they thought they wanted, they have yielded, without a murmur, to the country's bitterest foes. The term "Die-hard," which should be a title of praise, long Of the gallant attempt to ago passed, among cunning hold the pass against anarchy politicians, to a term of re- in 1911, we are reminded by Lord proach. And as we look back Willoughby de Broke's posthumon the history of the last twenty ous work, 'The Passing Years years, we see plainly that it is (London : Constable & Co.) the champions of surrender, It is a book of great value and not the Die-hards, who have interest for many reasons. It been our undoing. There is is written with vigour and a only one way of ensuring the keen sense of style. It paints a respect of friends and the fear picture of life as it was lived of enemies-adherence to prin- in England thirty years ago, as ciple. He who persists in it is not likely ever to be lived doing what he believes to be again. "The object of this right rather than what he book," says the author in his knows to be expedient may Dedication, "is to set down a fail for the moment; he is few impressions and ideas of assured of victory in the end. one who was born in time to Now one of the last chances appreciate the dignity of the that was given to us to assert Victorian era; who tasted the the value of principle was in luxury of the Edwardian period 1911, when the Parliament Bill at just the right time of life was accepted by a cowardly ma- to be able to enjoy it; and who jority of the Peers. Ever since has felt the changes and chances then we have been tumbling that have made history during downhill. We have not only the reign of King George V." satisfied, we have anticipated, And in achieving these obsuch crimes reported for the whole of Great Britain." And Mr Theodore Dreiser has the temerity to assert that "no country has such a peculiar, such a seemingly fierce, determination to make the Ten Commandments work." Thus is practical life commonly divorced from “uplift." Lloyd George's Budget was thrown out, and the House of Lords was bitterly attacked. The class war, which has led to many disasters, was declared by Messrs Lloyd George and Churchill. The people were told that it was not getting what it wanted. The House of Commons knew without telling that a check was being put upon its extravagant desires. The Liberal Party would not admit that the House of Lords had the power to compel the Government either to resign or to dissolve Parliament. So the false cry was raised of the Peers against the People, and the battle was fought to the bitter end. If political strife be anything better than tactics, it must now be acknowledged that the House of Lords was right in throwing out the Budget. It was a bad Budget; it has done infinite harm to the country; and the vexatious clauses relating to the land were justly abolished some years ago. But the Radicals had found a Lord Willoughby came back to Parliament to do his share, and more than his share, in defence of the House to which he belonged. Events moved swiftly. Everybody wanted something, as usual. Mr Redmond wanted Home Rule; Mr Asquith wanted Mr Redmond's support, and this he could not obtain unless he gave him the "guarantees," as they were called, that the King would create as many Peers as were required to ensure Mr Redmond his majority. The King died without giving the "guarantees," and in despair a conference was called of both Parties, which should discuss the question beyond a locked door. Of this artifice, which was an open confession of impotence, Lord Willoughby and his friends profoundly disapproved. "A real quintessential Die-hard," he said, "although he may not say so, never entirely trusts his leaders not to sell the pass behind his back.” The real Die-hards were justified of their distrust on this occasion. The conference failed, it is true, but the cunning or the lassitude of the official Conservative Peers defeated the Die-hards when the hour of crisis arrived. Lord Willoughby threw himself into the struggle with all his energy. He was tireless in organising the Die-hards, and in strengthening the minds of the waverers. Even after the Bill had passed the Commons, the Lords appeared to be resolute in their courage. Lord Y Curzon himself led the Opposi- or less they will, every one of tion-for a moment. Let them, be as sound a Tory as them make their Peers," he I am." said; we will die in the last ditch before we give in.' It was Lord Curzon who thus gave the Die-hards the name by which they are presently known. They fought the destroyers of the Constitution as "ditchers," and before many days were passed Lord Curzon himself was foremost among the "hedgers." The situation would have been comic had it not been a dire tragedy. The Radicals, who had denounced the hereditary Chamber with all the bitterness that was theirs, proposed to add several hundreds of new Peers to increase its shame. Whether they would have added the new Peers or not we do not know. We do know that they had innumerable applications from stalwart Radicals, eager to join those whom Mr Lloyd George had called bloodsuckers and land-robbers. Lord Willoughby was not dismayed at the prospect. 'Won't all these fellows feel uncomfortable and out of it when they come here? a friend said to him. “Not at all,” he answered. "I shall make a point of knowing them all, take them round the House, show them everything, and I am prepared to bet you 1000 to 10 that in six months The matter was not put to the test. The Die-hard movement, of which a good account is contributed to Lord Willoughby's book by another hand, failed. The "ditchers "suffered a quick change, and change, and came forth as "hedgers." Once more the people had got what it thought it wanted, and the unreality of politics was displayed in gaudy colours. It had been put on record that the Peers of England had not fought, tooth and nail, for the Constitution and for their own House. The democratic spirit of surrender had won another battle, and we have gone on surrendering ever since. But it should be remembered to the credit of Lord Willoughby de Broke that he never hung back from the combat, that he spoke to hostile audiences with a force and strength which none of his rivals could surpass, that he marshalled the stalwarts and put fresh heart into the timid, and that it was not his fault nor the fault of the other Diehards if our ancient Constitution was shattered in pieces, or if the proper habit of resistance was abolished for ever. And all to give the people what it wanted! Printed in Great Britain by TOWARDS the end of the war it fell to the lot of the writer to conduct one of the numerous Gilbertian enterprises which took place in odd corners of Persia. It was just at this period that Dunsterforce, that amazing medley of gallant colonials, opera bouffe intelligence officers, amateur diplomatists, and cheery subalterns, was reducing the already involved affairs of North-Western Persia into a final chaos, from which apparently they have never yet succeeded in recovering. The task allotted to the writer was to raise a local force to act as a tactical link between the heterogeneous collection of Dunsterforce and the more prosaic and less dashing legions in Mesopotamia, and to form a flank-guard to part of the endless lines of communication which stretched away northward from the MesoVOL. CCXVI.-NO. MOCCIX. potamian plain to the southern shores of the Caspian Sea. The place selected for headquarters was Sennah, the capital of the Persian province of Kurdistan. This is a very ancient and rather famous town of some 30,000 inhabitants, situated in a cup in the Kurdish hills. No one in Mesopotamia, however, seemed to know much about it, except that it was situated some 120 miles to the west of the main Persian road, and that the badness of the tracks leading to it and the nature of the country made it very difficult to reach from either Kermanshah or Hamadan, the nearest points on the main line of communication from which it could be supported. At the same time, the tribes in the neighbourhood were said to be fierce and truculent, but not badly disposed to the British if properly handled. Z |