It is self-evident that Germany intends to take advantage of the absorption of Englishmen in their internecine conflict over the Budget during the coming months to launch German ship after ship of a greatly superior type to anyNaval thing in the British Navy. At the end of SeptemProgress ber she launched her first "Super-Dreadnought," about which there has been as much mystery as our Admiralty made over their short-sighted experiment with the original Dreadnought, an ill-designed, ill-constructed, and ill-armed ship, already superseded. As Mr. Wilson points out in the Daily Mail (September 24), which is anything but an anti-Admiralty organ: "Other Powers, including England, have planned 'SuperDreadnoughts,' but Germany alone has built them." While we were adhering to our original type, Germany speedily improved upon it with her "Nassaus," of which four are now nearing completion; in 1908 she laid down her first "SuperDreadnought," now launched, and has followed this up with five others. The position to-day is that against four German "Nassaus" we are building eight "Dreadnoughts" and slightly improved "Dreadnoughts," of which the last, the Neptune, is now launched. Three more "Neptunes" figure in this year's British naval programme, of which only two have as yet been ordered. Germany, besides her "Nassaus," has six "SuperDreadnoughts" actually in hand, which are believed to be of 20,000 to 22,000 tons, and carry a far more powerful armament than anything we possess. Mr. Wilson tells us, "We have nothing as yet to meet them, and a march has been stolen upon us. Indeed Germany, with four 'Nassaus' and six 'Super-. Dreadnoughts,' has a double squadron which is probably superior in fighting-power to our eleven Dreadnoughts' built, building, or to be laid down this year. Our very small numerical advantage (one ship) is neutralised by the German preponderance in quality." We have also been overtaken and passed in "Invincibles" by Germany's "Super-Invincibles," admitted by Mr. McKenna to be faster and heavier than any British cruiser yet laid down. In other respects we have thrown away our enormous start. The latest German small cruiser, the Mainz, can steam twenty-seven knots, while we are still laying down twenty-five knot cruisers. In destroyer construction we are being rapidly overhauled, none of the British destroyers of

last year's programme being yet launched, whereas German destroyers of the same date are already beginning their trials. "This rapid regression in the British Navy," as Mr. Wilson terms it, is due to the starving of new construction by our Socialistic Cabinet. The Navy League seems to be sleeping quietly in its bed, but the Imperial Maritime League (2 Westminster Palace Gardens, Westminster, S.W.) has published a valuable store-house of information entitled "The Passing of the Great Fleet," and is busily circulating a petition for signature urging the House of Lords to reject the Budget because of its inadequate provision for national defence. We imagine all our readers will desire to sign this petition.

Transforma

tion

THE political situation has immensely improved during the past month, owing to the hardening of opinion among Unionists, for which, if honour may be given where honour is due, A Political we have chiefly to thank the Editor of the Observer, who has literally lifted his Party out of the Slough of Despond by his brilliant and devoted exertions. A month ago the outlook was ominous, as many Unionists, especially journalists, had allowed themselves to be bluffed by the well-organised audacity of the Budget League-whence does it derive its funds? *-into seriously believing that the Budget was so popular that it would be suicidal to resist it. Mr. Garvin, with characteristic courage and resource, set to work to stop the rot and to destroy what he aptly called "the fallacies of funk," which were shattered by the sledge-hammer blows of the Observer and the Daily Telegraph, ably seconded by some of their contemporaries, until at last practically the entire Unionist Press regained its nerve, and tone was restored to the body politic. There has rarely been a more striking political transformation. To-day the funkers are in a contemptible minority. Whereas a month ago the rejection of the Budget by the Lords was only whispered in dark corners by stalwarts, to-day it is generally regarded as inevitable, and is openly proclaimed from the house

A searching inquiry into the source of the funds of the Liberal Party, which is spending money like water at the present time, would probably reveal the suggestive fact that American millionaires deem the maintenance of Free Imports in this country as only less valuable to them than Protection in their own country.

tops. Even the Mandarins are pugnacious. The cogent article we are privileged to publish from the pen of a distinguished peer, instead of being derided as an eccentricity, as would have happened some weeks ago, may be regarded as embodying the views of the great majority of the Lords; and unless there is another attack of "nerves," or Lord Lansdowne loses his head—a gratuitously foolish suggestion in the face of his robust and steadfast speeches -the Upper House will be found acting on our contributor's advice, and the country will secure the opportunity of pronouncing between the policy of Tariff Reform, to which Mr. Balfour has categorically pledged the Unionist Party in his great Birmingham speech, and the Socialism of Jack Cade's Budget. The issues are fully discussed in succeeding pages epitomising the three speeches-Lord Rosebery's at Glasgow, Mr. Asquith's at Bingley Hall, Birmingham, and Mr. Balfour's on the same platform-which were the outstanding events of the past month in home affairs, all of which have contributed in their different ways to "binge up" the House of Lords, if we may apply such a homely expression to such an august assembly.

It is only natural that the Ministerial Press, having almost brought off a magnificent bluff, should be slow in accommodating

The Bluff that Failed

itself to a new situation, and recent articles in the Westminster Gazette, which are nowadays far more entertaining than its semi-official cartoons, piteously appealing from the "wild men" of the Unionist Party to its "responsible leaders," Mr. Balfour and Lord Lansdowne, to summon the Lords to knuckle down to the Plunderbund, have caused unmixed delight to the Opposition, and have materially helped to convince waverers of the wisdom of boldness. The Westminster Gazette has literally "given away the show," because if there were anything serious behind Radical bluff, and the Budget were dangerously popular, Ministerialists could ask for nothing better than its rejection by the "hereditary enemies of the people," whose rashness would afford their opponents a welcome opportunity of paying off old scores and of solving many perplexing problems, to say nothing of the certainty of securing a fresh lease of power in which to develop and complete their predatory policy. The

Radical Party, Budget or no Budget, is only formidable when run away from. It ceases to be formidable when fought. The Peers stand to gain nothing and to lose everything by scuttling. They will lose nothing and may gain everything by firmness. The Radicals came in four years ago on the unpopularity of the Unionist Government, with a limited mandate long since exhausted, as they have likewise exhausted their popularity. No one can seriously pretend that authority was given by the electorate to introduce Socialism, but according to the Socialists this Budget is Socialistic. Indeed, the return of a Free Trade majority was declared to be a buttress against Socialism, described in those days as the inevitable accompaniment of Protection. In any case no possible harm can accrue to the nation by referring such momentous issues to the constituencies, which is all that the Lords propose to do. If Great Britain has become Collectivist overnight, so be it. Let us at any rate know where we are. Radicals have no grievance, as when in Opposition triennial Parliaments form a conspicuous item in their programme, and the present Parliament has already sat for nearly four years.

The

"Deadlock"

AN instructive article in the Times on the fiscal effect of the rejection of the Budget by the Lords shows that the supposed deadlock in that event is chiefly a figment of Ministerial imagination. The vast bulk of revenue is already secured by previous Acts of Parliament, and as Jack Cade and Co. are hardly the men to forego their own salaries, they will pocket their pride and borrow any money that may be needed to pay their way during the brief interval between the action of the Lords and the meeting of the new Parliament. The supposed Deadlock is part of the Radical bluff that failed. Any peers still unconvinced of the wisdom of boldness, who may incline to swallow the Budget in the belief that a year or two hence it will recoil a hundredfold on its authors, would do well to read an offensive and menacing article in the Manchester Guardian (September 23), the organ of Messrs. George and Churchill, written on the assumption of the Lords' subserviency. "If the Lords are obedient, it will still remain for the Liberal Party to see that the House of Lords goes before the country for trial for the revolution that it would have attempted had it dared.

There can be no peace or order in our politics until an Upper House so disloyal and incompetent has been deprived of power to do at least the worst mischief." In other words, the Lords-if the question is to be considered from their point of view rather than from the national point of view-would be no better off by accepting than by rejecting the Budget. In either event they are marked down for destruction, but in the one case humiliation would precede annihilation—with all the fight knocked out of the Unionist Party by the surrender of the Lords, we might expect a repetition of the last General Election; whereas if the Lords rise to the occasion, the democracy, which admires courage above everything, will see them through. There can surely be no hesitation on the part of a self-respecting assembly, which, let us repeat, has nothing to lose by fighting, but everything to fear from unconditional surrender to implacable foes. Note the change of tone in the Radical Press the moment it became obvious that the Lords meant business, from offensive jubilation to keen anxiety. The Daily Chronicle (September 25) issued an abject appeal to Lord St. Aldwyn-to whom curiously enough Radicals always turn in a crisis-"as a fine representative of the old English squirearchy, solid, steady, and wise, who has an instinctive dislike of all innovations in old and honoured forms and a repugnance for violent courses," to force the Budget down the Lords' throats. The Parliamentary correspondent of the Daily News (September 25), himself a member of Parliament, gloomily observed, "No one quite knows how democracy will swing amid the current," tempering a panegyric on Ministers by the candid comment, "If we are face to face with war a severer test" (than speaking) must be applied. What about the generalship? Asquith is being found out in his own Party for the fraud that he is. When at last the Westminster Gazette awoke from its dream it turned from green to blue and emitted a ghastly hypothesis:

Mr.

With the rejection of a Budget by the Lords we suffer not the slight reaction to which all communities are liable, but a return by a leap to the conditions of 300 years ago, when it had still to be decided who possessed the power of the purse in this country. Suppose a Tory Government came back to power [our italics], it would no doubt for a short spell hold the question in abeyance by a policy congenial to the Peers, &c. &c.