A Spectator's Notebook
ALL Lord Beaverbrook's bellows were in full blast at the week-end—both on jours mivrables, as the French call them, and on the day of rest—fanning up a war-debt lire to scorch Mr. Baldwin with. But it is pretty damp tow . and nothing much has come of it yet, in spite of Mr. Lloyd George's eager co-operation, but smoke. Mr. Wickham Steed's disclosures in the Sunday Times were interesting as a matter of history, and convincing in so far as they went to show that Mr. Baldwin got as good terms as America was ready to give in 1923, but none of it has any relevance at all to the position to-day, and I find most ordinary people increasingly impatient at the assiduous attempts to rake up personal controversies inside the Conservative Party. For (apart from Mr. Lloyd George) there is really nothing more in it than that—except this, that the more Mr. Baldwin is proved a dupe the more the America of 1923 is proved a Shylock, and the moment is hardly propitious for harping on that string. The warn- ings given in the House of Lords debate on Wednesday on the violation of Privy Councillors' oaths of secrecy will no doubt cut off the flow of any but quite irresponsible disclosures.
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