t estates when they changed hands.

Demand after demand he showered on the rich and comfortable. The
assembly, expecting surprises, had them in abundance. The Chancellor
drew sheaf after sheaf of notes from the red despatch-box on the table in
front of him and explained with an air of intensive reasonableness the
huge sums he proposed to draw from the property-owners in the country.
New inroads were to be made on the profits of land and liquor.
Coal-mines were to pay royalties. People were to be taxed when they
became rich without any effort on their own part, but by fortunate
accident in the increased value of special localities. There was to be a
complete valuation of every yard of land in the country as the basis for
developments to come.

Although the money to be raised that year by these new proposals would
not much more than cover what was required by immediate necessities, the
taxation was such as to multiply in product as years went on. Finally
the motive behind the revolutionary Budget of Lloyd George came in the
concluding words of his speech. "It is essential that we should make
provision for the defense of our country. But, surely, it is equally
imperative that we should make it a country even better worth defending
for all and by all. And it is that this expenditure is for both these
purposes that alone can justify the Government. I am told that no
Chancellor of the Exchequer has ever been called upon to impose such
heavy taxes in a time of peace. This, Mr. Chairman, is a war Budget. It
is for raising money to wage implacable warfare against poverty and
squalidness. I cannot help hoping and believing that before this
generation has passed away we shall have advanced a great step toward
that good time when poverty and wretchedness, and the human degradation
which always follows in its camp, will be as remote from the people of
this country as the wolves which once infested its forests."

It took a day or so for the full effect of the Budget to be understood.
And then enthusiasm rose in the breasts of Liberals and Labor men, while
the middle and upper classes poured forth outcries and protests. As the
proposals were discussed in detail, feeling arose on both sides, and
Lloyd George was variously described as a genius who was laying the
foundation of a new Britain and a predatory politician out to catch
votes. Throughout the length and breadth of the United Kingdom his name
was on the lips of a