Review of Retieics, 20J2/06. 



Character Sketches. 



161 



Mr. Morley«.has never been in India. His appoint- 

 ment has raised great expectations amongst the edu- 

 cated natives. It will be a sore disappointment if he 

 should prove but a miner edition of Sir H. Fowler. 



The Education group in the Cabinet is headed 

 by the Minister of Education, Mr. Birrell, who so 

 far as administration is concerned is the darkest of 

 dark horses. He can birrell prettily and wittily on 

 the platform, he wields a graceful pen. But he is 

 apt to lose patience, with illogical Nonconformists 

 who cannot be made to see that what they regard as 

 undenominational religion is as much sectarian teach- 

 ing to the Anglican and the Catholic as the Church 

 Catechism or the Roman Creed. Behind Mr. Bir- 

 rell stands the Member for Wales, Mr. Lloyd- 

 George, who is one of the ablest of the younger 

 Ministers. He is not physically as strong as he 

 ought to be. But he is a wiry Welshman with 

 immense nervous energy. He is eloquent, witty, 

 intrepid, and a thoroughly sound pro-Boer. He 

 stood his baptism of fire during the war, and was in 

 peril oft in Carnarvon, in Birmingham, and in other 

 places. He is the most conspicuous spokesman of 

 the Nonconformists. The third Educationist in the 

 Cabinet is Mr. Haldane, who is concerned, however, 

 much more with secondary and higher education. 

 He is German in his outlook, and he has his own 

 scheme for settling the Irish University question. 

 Sir Henry Fowler represents the Methodists — more 

 or less imperfectly — while the interests of the Catho- 

 lics are in the hands of Lord Ripon. The chief 

 difficulty that confronts the Educationists is, first, 

 the Catholic vote in the Commons, and, secondly, the 

 non -possumus of the Peers in the Upper Chamber. 

 The only logical solution of the religious difficulty, 

 that of confining State education strictly to secular 

 education, leaving the churches free to supply re- 

 ligious teaching, although advocated by Mr. Thomas, 

 the chairman of the Welsh party, is repudiated by 

 Mr. Lloyd-George, and has no chance of being 

 adopted. 



The social reformers in the Cabinet will have to 

 face first the problem of the unemployed ; secondly, 

 the reform of the Licensing Act ; and thirdly, the 

 mass of problems clumped together under the general 

 head of the Condition of the People question. C.-B. 

 himself is the head of this group, with John Burns as 

 his right-hand man. Lord Ripon is also historically 

 identified with it. Lord Carrington comes into it as 

 Minister of Agriculture, while Mr. Herbert Glad- 

 stone as Home Secretary, and the Lord Chancellor, 

 will be specially busy with the legislation to meet the 

 demands of the Trades L T nions. 



I find that I have allocated all the members of the 

 "Cabinet excepting the Earl of Crewe, who was 

 "Viceroy of Ireland under Mr. Morley, and is the 

 son-in-law of Lord Rosebery. He is now, at the 

 age of forty-seven, Lord President of the Council 

 and a Cabinet Minister. Something must be said, 

 fiowever, of the Lord Chancellor, who, as Sir Robert 



Reid, was known to be a stalwart Radical and a 

 thoughtful statesman. He is a champion of Trades 

 Unions, and he has definite ideas of his own as to 

 the future of our Empire, both on land and on sea. 

 He was one of the best of pro-Boers and never trim- 

 med his sails to catch the Jingo breeze. The man 

 who wanted to be Lord Chancellor, in order that he 

 might be Prime Minister de facto, although not de 

 jure, is Mr. Robert Haldane,' the lawyer, the meta- 

 physician and the theologian. He is a kind of Cal- 

 vinistic Jesuit or Jesuitical Calvinist, who has steeped 

 his brains in transcendental philosophy and exercised 

 his wits in backstairs intrigue. No appointment has 

 met with more general approval than Mr. Haldane's 

 nomination as Secretary for War. The office has 

 broken the reputation of Lord Landsdowne, Mr. 

 Brodrick. and Mr. Arnold Forster. It will either 

 make Mr. Haldane or mar him. He stands for that 

 " damned intellect " which has not been the pre-emi- 

 nent characteristic of the British Army. The task 

 of readjusting the British Army to the needs of a 

 pacific Empire is one in which he may win a great 

 reputation. It will at least keep him busy. 



Taken as a whole the Cabinet is a strong Cabinet 

 and a good Cabinet. It is symmetrical, well- 

 balanced, and very representative. It has only one 

 centre, and that is C.-B. If Lord Rosebery had 

 been in it there would have been two centres, which 

 would have been fatal. Two or three former office- 

 holders have been left out. But some disappoint- 

 ments are inevitable. And no one can point to any 

 Liberal outside who would be an improvement if 

 substituted for any of those whom C.-B. has selecteil. 



III. -THE CABINET DISSECTED. 



There are nineteen members in the Cabinet, viz. : — 



Lord Chancellor— Sir Robert Reid. 



First Lord of the Treasury and Prime Minister— Sir H. 

 Campbell-Bannerman. 



Lord President of the Council— The Earl of Crewe. 



Lord Privy Seal— The Marquis of Ripon. 



Home Secretary — Mr. Herbert Gladstone. 



Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs — Sir Edward Grey. 



Secretary for the Colonies— The Earl of Elgin. 



Secretary for War— Mr. Haldane. 



Secretary for India— Mr. John Morley.- 



Chancellor of the Exchequer— Mr. H. H. Asqnith. 



First Lord of the Admiralty— Lord Tweedmouth. 



Secretary for Scotland— Mr. John Sinclair. 



President of the Board of Trade — Mr. Lloyd-George. 



President, of the Local Government Board — Mr. John 

 Burns. 



President of the Board of Agriculture— Earl Carrington. 



President of the Board of Education— Mr. Aueustine Bir- 

 rell, K.C. 



Postmaster-General— Mr. Sydney Buxton. 



Chancellor of the Duchy— Sir Henry Fowler. 



Chief Secretary for Ireland— Mr. Br\ 



Of these, at the time of their appointment, one — 

 Mr. Birrell — was outside Parliament altogether. Of 

 the other eighteen, five sat in the House of Lords and 

 thirteen in the House of Commons. Of the thirteen 

 Ms.P. seven represented Scotch constituencies, and 

 one — John Burns, a native Scot— sat for Battersea. 

 Of the others, one was elected by Welshmen, and the 

 other four represented Northumberland, Leeds. 

 Wolverhampton, and Poplar. Of the Peers, one is 



