The chief exception that we can find to this topsy-turvy
display of loyalty was Mr. Austen Chamberlain. He had the good taste not to pretend that be was loyally following his leader by hitting him over the head, and the audience seems to have recognized this sincerity and rewarded it by cries of "the future Prime Minister l" Mr. F. B. Smith, who very naturally from his point of view expects to be the chief adviser to " the future Prime Minister," again does not appear to have made much pretence about loyalty to Lord Lansdowne and Mr. Balfour, but preferred to season his speech with allusions to Thermopylae. Mr. Smith is a very clever advocate, and has been useful to his party like many clever advocates before him, but we cannot help thinking that a little cool reflection will convince him that he has made a mistake this time. No doubt, if be has not made a mistake, if his tactics succeed, and if he beats Lord Lansdowne and Mr. Balfour, he will have scored a dazzling success. If he fails to force a creation of peers and to overthrow Mr. Balfour his failure is bound to have a depressing effect on his ambi- tions.
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