ENGLAND'S PREMIER

Greymouth Evening Star, 22 April 1914, Page 3

ENGLAND'S PREMIER

THROUGH AUSTRALIAN EYES. SEEN AT CLOSE QUARTERS. The Londoner s opportunity of hearing • speech by the Prime Minister <>f Croat Iritain is rarer than Australians may imagine (writes the Sydney Telegraph's '.ordon correspondent). It is not here in London as it is with you in Australia. The leading- politicians of the day do not often woo the suffrages of the metropolis*. They are much more concerned with tV ii.ffr.iges of the provincial cities. They re s-> consistently engaged upon those ig towns and those bij populations that ally seldom are they to be heard, hi London outside Parli; ment. The Prine Minister especially. He is not at all the •miably presiding genius or exponent-in-ehief of charities and entertainments your official representatives have someimes to be. On the contrary, nothing hcrt of a national concern lifts from him ihe curtain that separates his great ofhV> from-the public eye. He is road at large, le is constantly paragraphed. But he is arely seen, and rarelv heard. Hence T have no" doubt that the chance of hearng Mr Asquith drew-as;--many people to '■be Mansion House as were attracted thither merely by the object of the meetng he was to address. The occasion had •-. view a memorial commemorative of the hundred years of peat-; between Briain and America. Not only Mr Asquith, 'uit Viscount Brvce, alsi, was to speak. That being so, T was glad to be there, md the more glad 'because, once there. I was able to study the Prime Minister it the close quarters of a few yards of •space. ■ '. , TYPICALLY ENGLISH. A ruddy, open-faced, healthy-looking nan, this Prime. Minister of Great Britain. His longish grey hair makes little nark of age upon him. His untroubled of expression gives little hint hat he is the foremost political figure jf the time. Short of stature, and sturdy of build, he rose into the enthusiasm of applause that greeted him still conveyveying but little suggestion of the powers that must lurk somewheie belmd 'hat bland, if not child-like exterior. And then he began to speak—calmly and deliberately, still untroubled and still urbane.

Of .oratorical "business" not a jot in this serene and measured glow of words. Conversation a little exalted, tlio everyday colloquial of a cultured man a little ?xpanded into balanced phrases, and sometimes a perfectly poised sentence of words that rose in beautiful but still calmly ordered .vtteranee. . A great master of words, this Prime Minister, words seemingly easy, but fitting one by one into every nook and cranny of the thought thev work -upon until the . sentence and the thought are simultaneously and wholly covered. Now and a slight pause—the word comes—it is a wonderful word, the all-expressive word. Emphasis now and again, of course, and power now and again, but always ease and- grace, and always extraordinary lucidity—that is the way of the Prime Minister's speaking. It "van Viscoun', Bryce, nevertheless, who made the speech of the day He, as you know, is a truly wonderful old man. His range of men and thi-igs is enormous. Knowledge bubbles out of him, the wisdom of a wide and richly-laden mind oozes from him in leaping flow. Knowledge of and wisdom concerning America especially. as his speech, from first to last a crisp sparkle of fact and deduction, so aefightfully showed. It was worth while to be in the Mansion House an hour-or two listening to two such speeches, for two such speeches ar?> not often to be heard there, or anywhere.