_Friday, February 23rd_.--Owing to a variety of causes, we are short of tonnage, and unless we manage to grow more and consume less we shall before very long be within reach of the gaunt finger of Famine. That was the burden of the PRIME MINISTER'S appeal to the Nation. The farmer is to have a guaranteed minimum price for his produce, the agricultural labourer is to be raised to comparative affluence by a minimum wage of 25_s._ a week, and the rest of us are to go without most of our imported luxuries and a good many necessities. So impressed were Members by the gloominess of the prospect that the moment the speech was over they rushed out to secure what they felt might be their last really substantial luncheon, and Mr. DAVID MASON, who had nobly essayed to fill the breach caused by Mr. ASQUITH'S absence, was soon talking to empty benches.
[Illustration: _The Big 'Un._ "MY DEAR FELLOW! IS IT REALLY TRUE THAT YOU HAVE TO JOIN UP?"
_The Little 'Un._ "YES; BUT DON'T LET IT GET ABOUT. YOU SEE, THE IDEA IS TO SPRING IT ON THE GERMANS, AS IT WERE, IN MARCH."]
[Illustration: ACROBAT, HAVING BEEN OFFICIALLY INFORMED THAT HE BELONGS TO ONE OF THE NON-ESSENTIAL PROFESSIONS, DETERMINES NEVERTHELESS TO DEVOTE HIS TALENT TO THE CAUSE OF HIS SUFFERING FELLOW-COUNTRYMEN.]
We all know the man with a grievance and avoid him. But there is another man with a grievance whom I rather like, and this is his story. I must, of course, let him tell it in the first-person-singular, because otherwise what is the use of having a grievance at all? The first-person-singular narrative form is the grievance's compensation. Listen.
"I am an old Oxonian who joined the Royal Naval Division as an ordinary seaman not long after the outbreak of the War, and being perhaps not too physically vigorous and having a certain rhetorical gift, developed at the Union, I was told off, after some months' training, to take part in a recruiting campaign. We pursued the usual tactics. First a trumpeter awakened the neighbourhood, very much as Mr. HAWTREY is aroused from his coma in his delightful new play, and then the people drew round. One by one we mounted whatever rostrum there was--a drinking fountain, say--and spoke our little piece, urging the claims of country.