284 My Hairdresser on the Empire [!909 



deed, he is almost converted to the view that the British Empire will 

 eventually ruin England. ' We get no advantage from it,' he said, 

 ' and it's a lot of bother. The only thing one can say for it is it is 

 justified if it is undertaken in an altruistic spirit for the good of the 

 subject races.' I said, ' Yes, but where do we find the altruism? ' and 

 I repeated to him a story my hairdresser, Middleton, told me yesterday 

 of how a military customer had come into his shop one day when old 

 Lewis, his former master, was alive, and how he had spent ten minutes 

 expounding to them the glories of the Empire, across the counter. 

 ' Old Mr. Lewis stood there all the time saying nothing, and the cus- 

 tomer began to lose patience, " You don't say a word," he exclaimed, 

 " now tell me Lewis, frankly, what your opinion of the Empire really 

 is?" The old man seemed to think awhile and then in his deliberate 

 way replied, " Well sir, you see, I have only been to the Empire twice 

 and I didn't find the entertainment amusing enough to go a third time." 

 He thought, or pretended to think, the talk had been about the Empire 

 theatre. It was a good answer, but we lost our customer, he never 

 came again.' 



" Winston was brilliant as usual, and he inspires brilliancy in those 

 about him. I found myself talking in epigrams and we had a merry 

 rattling hour and a half before he was obliged to go back to his office, 

 with intervals of domestic felicity, his baby being brought in with the 

 coffee. There is no more fortunate man than Winston at home or in 

 his political prosperity. He is quite ready, he says, for Irish Home 

 Rule, and I expect him by degrees to adopt the whole of my programme, 

 including my anti-Socialism. He believes in the acquisition of rail- 

 ways by the nation but is not for nationalizing the land, which, he says, 

 will lead to endless jobbery, the nation being the worst of landlords. 

 All this pleases me. He gave me in return for my Indian book a vol- 

 ume he has just published of his speeches. 



" 30th Nov. — Hyndman writes me a long eulogistic letter about my 

 Indian book, ' India under Ripon,' which has just come out, and asks 

 me to help his candidature at the elections ; this, of course, I cannot do, 

 though he would be personally an acquisition to the House of Commons. 

 He tells me he is sixty-eight (too old to begin). 



"4th Dec. — The Lords have thrown out the Budget by a majority 

 of 260 to 75, and the Commons have passed a resolution by a majority 

 of 250, saying the Lords had no right to do it. The Irish did not 

 vote. So here we have war declared, it is pretended to the knife, but 

 I expect it will end in some compromise ; there is not stuff enough in 

 the country to make a revolution. 



" $th Dec. — Belloc and his wife came to dinner. He looks for a 

 160 majority for the Government, and he expects a great creation of 

 peers, hoping he himself may be one. There was much talk in Belloc's 



