fire it, she will drop exactly as a man drops.

BALSQUITH. But suppose your own daughters--Helen and Georgina.

MITCHENER. My daughters would not dream of disobeying the proclamation.
(As an after thought.) At least Helen wouldnt.

BALSQUITH. But Georgina?

MITCHENER. Georgina would if she knew shed be shot if she didnt. Thats
how the thing would work. Military methods are really the most merciful
in the end. You keep sending these misguided women to Holloway and
killing them slowly and inhumanely by ruining their health; and it does
no good: they go on worse than ever. Shoot a few, promptly and humanely;
and there will be an end at once of all resistance and of all the
suffering that resistance entails.

BALSQUITH. But public opinion would never stand it.

MITCHENER (walking about and laying down the law). Theres no such thing
as public opinion.

BALSQUITH. No such thing as public opinion!!

MITCHENER. Absolutely no such thing as public opinion. There are certain
persons who entertain certain opinions. Well, shoot them down. When you
have shot them down, there are no longer any persons entertaining those
opinions alive: consequently there is no longer any more of the public
opinion you are so much afraid of. Grasp that fact, my dear Balsquith;
and you have grasped the secret of government. Public opinion is mind.
Mind is inseparable from matter. Shoot down the matter and you kill the
mind.

BALSQUITH. But hang it all--

MITCHENER (intolerantly). No I wont hang it all. It's no use coming
to me and talking about public opinion. You have put yourself into the
hands of the army; and you are committed to military methods. And the
basis of all military methods is that when people wont do what they are
told to do, you shoot them down.

BALSQUITH. Oh, yes; it's all jolly fine for you and Old Red. You dont
depend on votes for your places. What do you suppose will happen at the
next election?

MITCHENER. Have no next election. Bring in a Bill at once repealing
all the reform Acts and vesting the Government in a properly trained
magistracy responsible only to a Council of War. It answers perfectly in
India. If anyone objects, shoot him down.

BALSQUITH. But none of the members of my party would be on the Council
of War. Neither should I. Do you expect us to vote for making ourselves
nobodies?

MITCHENER. You'll have to, sooner or later, or the Socialists will make
nobodies of the lot of you by collaring every