Business done.—­Budget Resolutions agreed to.

Tuesday.—­Small Holdings Bill through Committee.  Last clause added amid buzz of admiration from a not too full House.

[Illustration:  “In rapt admiration!”]

HAMLEY looked on in rapt admiration.

JESSE COLLINGS rose up and called CHAPLIN blessed.

“Not at all,” said CHAPLIN, blushing; “as my friend TOOLE says from the deck of the Houseboat, anyone could do it.”

“The fact is, TOBY,” CHAPLIN whispered to me a little later, as we sat on the Terrace sharing a bottle of gingerbeer imbibed through a couple of straws, “I’ve really done a clever thing, only those fellows don’t quite see it.  Here we’ve been for a week pegging away at this Bill, bargaining and bickering.  Sometimes I’ve yielded a trifle to the Opposition; sometimes I haven’t.  But it’s pretty much all the same in the end.  The Act will look very well in the Statute Book, and I hope will help us at the General Election.  But as far as practical use goes, I have sometimes laughed when I look round the Committee and see Members seriously discussing the thing.  Just before the Bill was printed, Prince ARTHUR asked me when I proposed the Act should come into operation.  ‘When are you going to have the General Election?’ I asked, by way of reply.  Prince ARTHUR said he couldn’t exactly tell at the moment.  ‘Very well,’ I said; ’let us put it this way.  If you’re going to dissolve at the end of June, the Act may as well come into operation as soon as it receives Royal Assent.  But if you postpone Election over Autumn, better fix date for Act coming into force on the first of January.  ‘What d’you mean?’ asked ARTHUR.  ’I mean just this.  If this Bill’s to help us at the General Election, we mustn’t give time for people to find it out.’  ‘Um!’ said ARTHUR, and he can put a good deal of meaning into the observation.”

Business done.—­Small Holdings Bill in Committee.

[Illustration:  Admiral Jeremiah Field.]

Thursday.—­Admiral JEREMIAH FIELD pacing quarter-deck, uttering lamentations over collapse of the Eastbourne stand against the Salvationists.  Bill amending Eastbourne Improvement Act up for Third Reading.  JEREMIAH had proposed to introduce Clause enabling inhabitants of town to protect themselves against the Sabbath incursions of a mob in red waistcoats and poke bonnets, with drums, trumpets also, and shawms.  Evidently no use; so the Admiral lowered his topsails, pulled taut his lee scuppers, and sheered off.  “We’re living in flabby times,” he complained to sympathetic House.

He heaved one sigh, then he hove-to, and Bill read Third Time.