Agreement, intended to maintain and develop the policy on which it was
based. It was a great pity that the noble earl should have identified
himself with an agitation that was neither wise nor patriotic.

Lord PORTSMOUTH'S family name is WALLOP; this afternoon he lived up to
it.

At the present moment Lord DERBY is perhaps the most prominent man in
the country next to the Prime MINISTER. Yet he is not a member of the
Government. When to-day he rose from the Opposition benches to defend
his conduct as Director-General of Recruiting and inspirer of the PRIME
MINISTER'S famous pledge to married men, he illustrated the anomaly by
the remark that, while he was doing his best to get that pledge
fulfilled, Lord SELBORNE, who was a member of the Government, had been
telling the farmers that he (Lord DERBY) did not speak with authority.

Later he did a second turn--this time in his capacity as Chairman of the
Joint Air Committee. Quite the most satisfactory part of his reply was
the announcement that Lord MONTAGU himself had consented to become a
member of the Committee. It is, of course, contrary to all the
traditions of the British Government to give a man a job which he
understands already. But in war-time even the most sensational
experiments must not be ruled out.

_Thursday, March 16th._--The House of Commons is so constructed that no
matter how often the party-system is expelled it will always return. In
spite of the Coalition, or perhaps because of it, the old strife of
Whigs and Tories has revived, though the lines of cleavage are quite
different from what they were.

The new Tories are the men who believe that the War is going to be
decided by battles in Flanders and the North Sea, and would sacrifice
everything for victory, even the privilege of abusing the Government.
The new Whigs are the men who consider that the House of Commons is the
decisive arena, and that even the defeat of the Germans would be dearly
purchased at the cost of the individual's right to say and do what he
pleased.

Naturally these latter object to the shortening of the Parliamentary
week, and to-day they took a division on the subject. Into the "No"
Lobby flocked a motley crew--the champions of the single men who don't
want to fight at all, the upholders of the married men who protest
against being called upon to fulfil their engagement until every single
"_embusque_" has been dragged out of his lair, and, paradoxically
enough, the uni