ander NORMAN CRAIG it was anything but sufficient for
our needs when war broke out. It lacked docks, destroyers, submarines,
air-ships--everything, in fact, save Dreadnoughts, which, in the
absence of these accessories, had to belie their name and rush
from one unprotected anchorage to another in fear of the German
mosquito-craft. Only the courage of the officers and men saved us, and
up to the present--that was the tenor of many of the speeches--they
have reaped but a scanty reward.

[Illustration: GENERAL SEELY'S NON-STOP FLIGHT.]

_Thursday, March 13th_.--Ministers left at home to "mind the shop"
would rather like, I fancy, to put up a notice over the Palace of
Westminster, "Closed till after the Peace Conference." Nearly every
problem presented to them depends for its ultimate solution upon the
decisions arrived at in Paris. Lord STUART OF WORTLEY, for example,
put a series of most pressing questions regarding the present
condition and future prospects of Poland; but Lord CURZON in reply
could only shrug his shoulders (at considerable length) and refer him
to the Conference.

The LEADER of the House of Commons labours under similar disabilities,
which are beginning to try even his amiable temper. Until Paris has
spoken he cannot give definite information about the Government's
fiscal policy, the amount of the German indemnity and other pressing
topics, and, as he told some of his persistent questioners this
afternoon, it is no good putting the same question to him every week
and expecting a different answer.

The best news of the day is that there will be an ample supply
of currants for Whitsuntide school-treats, and _Smith minor's_
translation of "_Non cuivis homini contingit adire Corinthum_" as "Not
everyone is lucky enough to find a currant in his war-bun" will no
longer be applicable.

Five years ago General SEELY, then Secretary of State for War, asked
timidly for a single million for aircraft. To-day, as Under-Secretary
for Air, he boldly demanded sixty-six millions, and explained that but
for the Armistice the amount would have been two hundred millions.
And the House, after hearing his glowing account of the wonderful
achievements of our airmen, readily voted the money. A good deal of it
is to go, quite rightly, to relieving the hardships of demobilisation,
which fall with peculiar severity on men whose special training is
not much use to them in civil life. The least we can do when they are
forced t