Mr. Ramsay MacDonald will, of course, be treated fairly. He
will have difficulties enough in all con- science without having any fabricated for him. No rational person can envy him his position. He takes office with a strike upon his hands which can hardly be settled satisfactorily to the strikers if he places the hopes he has instilled into Labour in the past below his duty to the community. If, on the other hand, the interests of the community seem to be ignored, there can be but a short and uneasy spell of power for the new Prime Minister. Seldom has a Prime Minister had to tread more tricky and treacherous ground. Strikes inevitably mean more unemployment, not merely during the strike but in the aftermath ; and Mr. MacDonald will be judged chiefly, even by his own friends, by his success or failure in reducing unemployment. He is much more of a mystic than a dogmatist ; but expositions which wander into the lovely fields of transcendentalism, however pleasing and reassuring to the few, can hardly be counted upon to rally the mass.
* .5
