384 Garvin of the "Observer" [1912 



Italians in Tripoli, as pleasing to Irish ideas. It has been a disgraceful 

 betrayal of the cause of liberty, and it will be no more than justice if 

 in aiding our diplomatic jugglery abroad they lose their own chance 

 of freedom at home. Dillon alone of all the Irish members has so far 

 preserved his integrity, but even he has come to regard the retention 

 of Egypt as a necessary part of British interests, and I have been un- 

 able to get him to ask questions involving an attack on Kitchener, who 

 he thinks will be recalled some day, when the revolution at home has 

 been followed by a reaction, to play the part here of military dictator. 



" 26th March. — The Conference with the miners has failed, and 

 anything now may happen, from a general breakdown of trade to a 

 revolution. The trains are ceasing many of them to run and I am 

 going back to Newbuildings, where we can better stand a siege than 

 here. 



" 2jth March. — Lunched at the Duchess of St. Albans', where I 

 found a large party, her son-in-law Lord Richard Cavendish, Lord 

 Grey, young Baird, M.P., who is Bonar Law's private secretary, Garvin, 

 and others — an extreme Tory assemblage, discussing^ their plans, of 

 which Garvin is just now the inventor and chief prophet. Garvin be- 

 gan as an Irish Fenian writer on the ' United Ireland,' but has gravitated 

 to the position he now occupies of ultra anti-Home Rule Editor of the 

 ' Pall Mall Gazette ' and the ' Observer.' He asked me what my view 

 was of the situation. I said, ' I take my views every afternoon from 

 the " Pall Mall Gazette," and every Sunday morning from the " Ob- 



server." 



" They have rushed a Miners' Wages Bill in twenty-four hours 

 through both Houses. 



" 29th March. — Kaiser Wilhelm seems to have stopped the nonsense 

 of Russia's joint action with Italy against Turkey. He met the King 

 of Italy at Venice two days ago and probably told him not to be such 

 an ass. 



"31^ March. — Belloc and Chesterton dined with me, Belloc com- 

 plaining terribly of the fast from liquor he has been maintaining during 

 Lent and to-day is Palm Sunday. ' Ah,' he said, ' if you want to see a 

 really happy man you should come to me on Easter Monday afternoon.' 

 He consoled himself at dinner with a sad lemonade, but talked all the 

 more brilliantly for it. He admits now that he made a mistake about 

 the coal strike in predicting the miners would win. Asquith, he says, 

 has been too astute for them. He amused them by his Miners' Mini- 

 mum Wage Act, over which they lost their time and spent their money, 

 and now he has them in his hands. 



" 6th April. — Newbuildings. Belloc tells me the miners are very 

 angry with their leaders, especially in the north of England, and thinks 



