ake. These are not the most entertaining chapters in
the book, but if we are really to know Chesterton the events they
cover must be considered most carefully.

As a boy Gilbert Chesterton spoke of politics as absorbing "for every
ardent intellect"; and during these years he was himself deeply
concerned with the politics of England. The ideal Liberalism sketched
in his letter to Hammond during the Boer War [Chapter X] had appeared
to him, if not perfectly realised, at least capable of realisation,
in the existing Liberal Party. The Tory Party was in power and all
its acts, to say nothing of its general ineptitude, appeared to
Liberals as positive arguments for their own party. At this date so
convinced a Tory as Lord Hugh Cecil could describe his own party as
"to mix metaphors, an eviscerated ruin."* Several letters and
postcards from Mr. Belloc announcing his own election as Liberal
member for South Salford show the high hope with which young
Liberalism was viewing the world in 1906:

[* In a letter to Wilfrid Ward.]

(undated)

I have, as you will have seen, pulled it off by 852. It is huge
fun. I am now out against all Vermin: Notably South African Jews. The
Devil is let loose: let all men beware. H. B.

(Written across top of letter)

Tomorrow Monday Meet the Manchester train arriving Euston 6.10 and
oblige your little friend HB _St. Hilary's Day_.

Don't fail to meet that train. Stamps are cheap! HB

I beg you. I implore you. _Meet that 6.10 train_.

HB

Stamps are a drug in the market.
852
Meet that train!
Stamps are _given away_ now in _Salford_.

From 1902, when the general election left the Conservatives still in
power, until 1906 the Liberal party had been, as Chesterton described
it, "in the desert." And the younger members of the party were deeply
concerned with hammering out a positive philosophy which might
inspire a true programme for their own party. A group of them wrote a
book called _England A Nation_ with the sub-title _Papers of A
Patriot's Club_. The Patriot's Club had no real existence, but I
imagine that Lucian Oldershaw who edited the book believed that its
publication might create the club. Belloc was not one of the
contributors, but Hugh Law wrote ably on Ireland, J. L. Hammond on
South Africa, and Conrad Noel, Henry Nevinson and C. F. G. Masterman
on other aspects of the political scene.

The whole book is on a fairly high level bu