speaking behind his hand to Parvill. By a happy chance Parvill
caught my eye.
"What do they want?" I asked.
"Eh?"
"What do they want?"
"Say something about general fairness-the other side," prompted
Parvill, flattered but a little surprised by my appeal. I pulled
myself hastily into a more popular strain with a gross eulogy of my
"Chinese labour!" cried the voice again.
"You've given that notice to quit," I answered.
The Market-place roared delight, but whether that delight expressed
hostility to Chinamen or hostility to their practical enslavement no
student of the General Election of 1906 has ever been able to
determine. Certainly one of the most effective posters on our side
displayed a hideous yellow face, just that and nothing more. There
was not even a legend to it. How it impressed the electorate we did
not know, but that it impressed the electorate profoundly there can
be no disputing.
6
Kinghamstead was one of the earliest constituencies fought, and we
came back-it must have been Saturday-triumphant but very tired, to
our house in Radnor Square. In the train we read the first
intimations that the victory of our party was likely to be a
sweeping one.
Then came a period when one was going about receiving and giving
congratulations and watching the other men arrive, very like a boy
who has returned to school with the first batch after the holidays.
The London world reeked with the General Election; it had invaded
the nurseries. All the children of one's friends had got big maps
of England cut up into squares to represent constituencies and were
busy sticking gummed blue labels over the conquered red of Unionism
that had hitherto submerged the country. And there were also orange
labels, if I remember rightly, to represent the new Labour party,
and green for the Irish. I engaged myself to speak at one or two
London meetings, and lunched at the Reform, which was fairly tepid,
and dined and spent one or two tumultuous evenings at the National
Liberal Club, which was in active eruption. The National Liberal
became feverishly congested towards midnight as the results of the
counting came dropping in. A big green-baize screen had been fixed
up at one end of the large smoking-room with the names of the
constituencies that were voting that day, and directly the figures
came to hand, up they went, amidst cheers that at last lost their
energy through sheer repetition, whenever there was record of a
Liberal gain. I don't remember what happened when there was a
Liberal loss; I don't think that any were announced while I was
there.
How packed and noisy the place was, and what a reek of tobacco and
whisky fumes we made! Everybody was excited and talking, making
waves of harsh confused sound that beat upon one's ears, and every
now and then hoarse voices would shout for someone to speak. Our
little set was much in evidence. Both the Cramptons were in, Lewis,
Bunting Harblow. We gave brief addresses attuned to this excitement
and the late hour, amidst much enthusiasm.
Now we can DO things!" I said amidst a rapture of applause. Men I
did not know from Adam held up glasses and nodded to me in solemn
fuddled approval as I came down past them into the crowd again.
Men were betting whether the Unionists would lose more or less than
two hundred seats.
"I wonder just what we shall do with it all," I heard one sceptic
speculating…
After these orgies I would get home very tired and excited, and find
it difficult to get to sleep. I would lie and speculate about what
it was we WERE going to do. One hadn't anticipated quite such a
tremendous accession to power for one's party. Liberalism was
swirling in like a flood…
I found the next few weeks very unsatisfactory and distressing. I
don't clearly remember what it was I had expected; I suppose the
fuss and strain of the General Election had built up a feeling that
my return would in some way put power into my hands, and instead I
found myself a mere undistinguished unit in a vast but rather vague
majority. There were moments when I felt very distinctly that a
majority could be too big a crowd altogether. I had all my work
still before me, I had achieved nothing as yet but opportunity, and
a very crowded opportunity it was at that. Everyone about me was
chatting Parliament and appointments; one breathed distracting and
irritating speculations as to what would be done and who would be
asked to do it. I was chiefly impressed by what was unlikely to be
done and by the absence of any general plan of legislation to hold
us all together. I found the talk about Parliamentary procedure and
etiquette particularly trying. We dined with the elder Cramptons
one evening, and old Sir Edward was lengthily sage about what the
House liked, what it didn't like, what made a good impression and
what a bad one. "A man shouldn't speak more than twice in his first
session, and not at first on too contentious a topic," said Sir
Edward. "No."
"Very much depends on manner. The House hates a lecturer. There's
a sort of airy earnestness-"
He waved his cigar to eke out his words.
"Little peculiarities of costume count for a great deal. I could
name one man who spent three years living down a pair of
spatterdashers. On the other hand-a thing like that-if it catches
the eye of the PUNCH man, for example, may be your making."
He went off into a lengthy speculation of why the House had come to
like an originally unpopular Irishman named Biggar…
The opening of Parliament gave me some peculiar moods. I began to
feel more and more like a branded sheep. We were sworn in in
batches, dozens and scores of fresh men, trying not to look too