PARLIAMENTARY PAGEANT.

Timaru Herald, Volume C, Issue 15307, 28 March 1914, Page 11

PARLIAMENTARY PAGEANT.

• ♦ RULES OF THE GAME. QUEEN MARY'S ELOQUENT i; . " ACTION. The London correspondent of the Sydney "Sun" writes under date Feb. 13:— Fierce curiosity fills tlie ininds of the classes about the present of Parliament. In the long history'of the British legislature no reassembling of Lords and Commons has been so boomed. For two years the Unionist party has been battering away at the Liberal Ministry over Home Rule. It has recognised that this session a storming party must attempt to penetrate the |ieach, which the prolonged cannonade to have made in Liberal The olasse's'aid Watching the f|itical panorama witli absorbed conjpn4££Ehe masses are.treatiiig the proceedings as if "they were scenes in a cinema show. The ordinary working man does not commence to bother his head about Ulster. The Irish Question is only the passionate preoccupation of politicians and the classes. _ Every session is ushered in with Old World courtesies., .-and customs. There was something hiiijiOroitsly pathetic: iu an announcement that, "the Marquis of Lansdowne: 'entertained the members of the latc\- Government %at dinner." The foreigner, reading that paragraph, possibly thought? this MihnsUfy had just been:' -displaced. . . Hei: would be surprised to find that seven years have sped since the Unionists were tumbled into the cold shades of Opposition. But it has been the practice for Conservative leaders to mainthe continuity of • Conservative Cabinets in this manner, and the Marquis of Lansdowne is an aristocrat aniongst aristocrats. Subsequently, ! h'e gave an official dinner to the members of the House of Lords, while Mr JBoiiar Law entertained the principal members of the party in the House of Commons. The Prime Minister extended hospitality to his trusty henchmen in the' Liberal party in the Commons, whilst the Earl of Crewe was the host of Liberal nobles in the House of Lords. The Marquis of Lansdowne had the legs of four Dukes, four Marquises, and 15 Earls beneath his mahogany, while the Marquis of Crewe could only muster one other Marquis and four Earls. The Unionists nearly exhaust the Peerage. That the Marquis of Lansdowne should entertain "the late Ministry" discloses that he is still the titular leader of the party, and that that party is very intimate identified with our ancient nobility, a fact which has a very close bearing upon the present political situation.