oily-skinned negro who emerged from a
tunnel he had dug under the store-foundations. Then they bore him
off to the Yao chieftain.

"_Now_ we know where we are," said the Chief. "You've proved your
complaint. We'll have him burnt to death, after lunch, in the market
place. I presume you've brought a lunch-basket?"

"Oh no!" said the horrified propagandists: "We don't want such a
penalty as _that_..."

"Very good" said the Chief, "then we'll behead him..." "No! No!"

"Crucify him?"--"No! No!"--"Peg him down over a Driver Ants' nest?"
"No! No!"

"Then, if you don't want _any_ rational punishment, he shall go
free." And free he went.

In the same way the Chancellor of the Exchequer of those days was so
hard to please over Suffrage measures that none brought forward was
democratic enough, far-reaching and overwhelming enough to secure
his adhesion. He was therefore forced to torpedo the Conciliation
Bill, to snatch away the half-loaf that was better than no bread at
all. He spoke and voted against these tentative measures of feminine
enfranchisement, with tongue in cheek, no doubt, and hand linked in
that of Lulu Grandcourt whose opposition to any vote being given to
woman and whole attitude towards the sex was so bitter that he had
to be reminded by Lord Aloysius Brinsley (who like his brother
Robert was a convinced Suffragist) that after all he, Lulu
Grandcourt, had deigned to be born of a woman, had even--maybe--been
spanked by one.

The Speaker had hinted on the occasion of the second reading of the
Concilition Bill and at a later raising of the same question that
there might arise all sorts of obstacles to wreck the Woman's
Franchise measure in Committee; obstacles that apparently need not
be taken into account as dangerous to any measure affecting male
interests. Therefore many of the M.P.'s timorously voted for the
second reading of the Conciliation Bill in order to stand well with
their Constituencies, yet looked to the Premier to trip it up by
some adroit use of Parliamentary jiu-jitsu. They were not
disappointed in their ideal politician. The Bill after it had passed
its second reading by a large majority was referred to a Committee
of the whole House, which seemingly is fatal to any measure that
seeks to become law.

So the stale summer of 1910 wore itself away in recriminations,
hopings against probability that the newer types of Liberal
statesmen were honest men, keepers of promises, not merely--as