prospective subjects that he has probably no desire for their closer acquaintance.

Mr. Bonar Law (to Mr. McKenna). "As one chancellor of the exchequer to another, what do you do when you're seventy million pounds out?"

Sir Leo Chiozza Money is ordinarily a chirpy little person, quite able to take care of himself. But he was obviously depressed by his inability to furnish a plausible reason why two food-ships, having arrived safely in home ports, should have been sent away undischarged, with the result that they were torpedoed and their cargoes lost. The statement that he was "still inquiring" brought no comfort to the House of (Short) Commons. Why doesn't the Shipping Controller organise a Flying Squadron of dock-labourers?

Tuesday, May 8th.—The official reticence regarding the names and exploits of our airmen was the subject of much complaint. Mr. Macpherson declared that it was quite in accordance with the wishes of the R.F.C. themselves. But Sir H. Dalziel was still dissatisfied. He knew of a young lieutenant who had brought down forty enemy machines and been personally congratulated by the Commander-in-Chief, and yet his name was not published. It is obvious that praise even from Sir Douglas Haig is not the same thing as a paragraph in Reynolds' Newspaper.

A request for an increased boot-allowance to the Metropolitan Police met with a dubious reception from Mr. Brace, who explained that it would involve an expenditure of many thousands of pounds. It is rumoured that the Home Office is considering the recruitment of a Bantam Force, with a view to reducing the acreage of leather required.