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able balloons to be shortly delivered by the Zodiac Company. It is expected all those aerial vessels will be in the hands of the French Government by the end of 1912, when France should possess 11 big dirigibles and 3 small aerial scouting vessels of the Zodiac type. Steerable balloon stations with the necessary sheds and hydrogen manufactories have been created at Verdun, Toul, Epinal, Belfort, Saint Cyr, Meudon, Moisson, Issy les Moulineaux, Rheims, Chalons, and Lamotte - Breuil. Aeroplane sheds also exist at those places and at Vincennes, Douai, Buc, Etampes, and Biskra (Algeria). As stated above, the number of aeroplane stations is to be very greatly augmented in 1912.

pany, and by 2 small steer- dant and the inhabitants peaceful. Between Touggout and Ouargla the wells are less numerous, and the soft sandy plains unpropitious for_the landing of aerial craft. However, the soft sand is often broken by large patches of hard red soil on which an aeroplane could descend in case of need. On the other hand, the long stretch of some 400 miles between Ouargla and Salah is particularly well adapted for aerial communications. That route, followed by caravans, is provided with wells, not separated from one other by a distance of more than 10 or 12 miles. Also, there are along its course several military optical telegraph stations. The desert between Salah and Timbuctoo is more inhospitable. Along the greater portion of the route wells exist, but in the Ouzel region there is no water. Nevertheless, French officers who have travelled there assert there is only one stretch of about 100 miles of erg-that is to say, of hills of moving sand without any water

The military aeroplane station at Biskra is of special importance. It has been created with the object of establishing rapid communications between that that place, which is the terminus of the Algerian railway, and Touggout, Ouargla, Salah,

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other French military stations in the desert. Indeed the project is ultimately to extend those communications across the whole of the Sahara to Timbuctoo. Touggout is only about 130 miles from Biskra, and the distance separating Ouargla from Touggout is a little less. The first stretch is favourable to aviation, as the land is flat and sufficiently hard. Aeroplanes could alight on it and ascend from it without danger. Wells are abun

VOL. CXCI.-NO. MCLV.

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which it would be necessary to cross to reach Timbuctoo. And those same officers declare that by descending eastward to the Niger it might be avoided, but that the length of the aerial voyage would thus be considerably increased.

To establish aerial communications between Algeria and the French military colony of Timbuctoo must take considerable time, on account of the necessary creation of numerous aeroplane stations with their

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stock of gasolene, oil, spare parts, tools, &c., for repairs, and also on account of the equally necessary erection of pyramids of white stones in such regions as do not offer natural landmarks. It is, however, believed that for the greater portion of the route the white stones surrounding the wells will be sufficient indication, and that in others, such as the Ouzel region, the white chalk cliffs will guide the aerial traveller. However that may be, there seems no reason why the attempt of the French military authorities to establish aerial communications between Biskra and the outlying military stations in the desert regions to the south should not prove successful. So far as the atmospheric conditions

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are concerned, most encouraging reports have been sent to the War Ministry by officers stationed in the desert. They show they are much favourable than in France, and that it is always easy to foresee tornadoes two and even three hours before they occur. There is, of course, the danger of the motor being quickly deteriorated by the sand impregnating the air, but means may be invented to prevent it from entering the cylinders. Moreover, it is estimated the atmosphere is free from sand at the altitude of 800 or at most 1000 feet, or less than the height at which cross-country flights are usually made. Perhaps the experience of the Italians in Tripoli will furnish valuable data on that point.

THE INSURANCE BILL AND AFTER.

THE Insurance Bill has passed through both Houses, and Mr Lloyd George's Christmas Box was duly offered to the people at the festive season. The Chancellor's generosity has not yet provoked its recipients to a noisy expression of gratitude. On the contrary, we hear at every turn the unmistakable grumblings of discontent. The many millions whom Mr Lloyd George says he desires to benefit will have none of his benefaction. He offers them at the top of his voice ninepence for fourpence, and they indignantly repudiate the bargain. They are distrustful of him, as the mob at a country fair is distrustful of the orator who, from the security of a cart, promises a certain sixpence in exchange for a copper. Mr Lloyd George, in fact, has graduated in the school of the cheap-jack, and he professes to be amazed at the folly of those who refuse his loud-acclaimed boon. But their reluctance does not deter him. They shall have his refreshing fruit, even if they must be clubbed into taking it.

Nothing that has happened of late years proves the complete unreality of English politics so clearly as the passage of this Insurance Bill. Our politicians are in the habit of boasting that we live under a scientific democracy. We are told hourly that the will of

the people must prevail. Positive assurances are given to us that members of Parliament go to Westminster solely to give effect to the people's wishes. They are delegates, they say, and nothing more. If they are troubled by views of their own, it is their solemn duty to suppress them. Mr Asquith, who speaks always to his brief, and whose opinion, therefore, varies with the opportunity, once declared that the mandate of the House grew feebler as the months passed. At the outset all was clear. The mandate was fresh and vigorous. The will of the people had not had time to change since the General Election. The relation between the delegates and the polling-booth was still sensitive. But as time went on, the Prime Minister explained, the demagogue's hand on the pulse grew less delicate. He could not with certainty diagnose the poor creature's disease, and then the moment had arrived to do nothing more than observe the slow maturing of beneficent measures shelved for a period of two years by the hostile Lords.

This theory never had the smallest touch with the facts of life or politics. The pushing of the Insurance Bill through Parliament without discussion is an open confession that the mandate is

humbug. Even if there were Thus, though the severance between the Parliament and the country is complete, the old phrases are used with tedious constancy, until every man and woman in England should detect the sham that is called representative government.

such a thing as a mandate, the Radical Government would care nothing for it. To accentuate the unreality which we have mentioned, the leaders refer with tiresome iteration to the opinion of the people. Viscount Haldane, unctuous as always, in introducing the Bill to the House of Lords, assured his colleagues that the Bill was acceptable in the country, because it had passed the House of Commons by large majorities. A sanguine folly! Mr Lloyd George, himself bound tight to the mast of self - complacency, has filled the ears of his followers with

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Nor is the cant concerning the people and its will the only sign of unreality. The Bill is sent to the House of Lords for revision at such a time as makes revision impossible. We have long been accustomed to Mr Asquith's cynical indifference. The thing that he says to-day he willingly retracts to-morrow. cares not what promise he wax that they may not violates so long as he may listen to the cry of the siren- push disastrous measures swiftpublic. Was their hearing ly and silently through the unimpeded, they could not help House. But he should have catching the shouts of pro- let rather a longer interval test which are raised on every elapse before he threw conside. There is no class of the tempt openly upon the recommunity which does not vising power of the Upper desire the withdrawal of the Chamber. When six months present Insurance Bill. Emago he cut and slashed the ployers of labour, labourers, Constitution to please Mr Redcity clerks, domestic servants mond, he was kind enough to are united in a desire to escape imply that the House of Lords from an enforced and unwel- might do useful work as & come tyranny. Even Scotland committee of revision. His turns. North Ayrshire will condescension was amiable and have none of it. Hardly within gratifying. And 80 much living memory has an agitation pleased was he with his own met with so quick and sincere benevolence that he once puba response. The whole people licly insisted that the Insurance rises with one accord and de- Bill should be sent to the Upper clares that the Insurance Bill House early enough to receive is not a fair expression of its an adequate discussion. will. And Mr Lloyd George, this Bill is to pass into law in in the attitude of Mr Pecksniff the present year," he said on dispensing favours, murmurs October 25, "or if the benefits obstinately that the people's we all anticipate to flow from will shall and does prevail. it are not to be indefinitely

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postponed, it must go to the House of Lords in time to give that House an opportunity for considering it both in principle and detail." The Bill did not go to the House of Lords in time; the House of Lords is deprived of all opportunity of revision; and Mr Asquith has once more given public proof of the unreality of politics and of his own callous insincerity.

But though the Insurance Bill has been passed by Lords and Commons, it is as far as from successful administration. It is not like a common Act of Parliament. It cannot be enforced by the police and the law officers of the Crown. Its one chance of success lay in the co-operation of the entire community. A Bill which converts the whole medical profession into the servant of the people, and makes every householder a tax-gatherer, can be administered only by the grace of those upon whom it is inflicted. The refusal of the doctors to accept Mr Lloyd George's terms will be sufficient of itself to reduce the Act to a dead-letter. If the citizens of England decline to perform the duties of the Chancellor of the Exchequer, it will require a far larger army than the Territorial force to persuade them. It is idle to introduce the German system of dragooning into a country which has neither Germany's army nor Germany's habit of servile obedience. Mr Lloyd George has been misled, as he is always

misled, by his hopeful ignorance. It was not enough to bring back from a cheap trip to Berlin the newest thing in Insurance Bills. He should have studied also the habits and temper of England, to him a foreign country, of which he knows and has learned nothing. However, he was in a hurry. Mr Redmond refused to give him another day's grace, and there was nothing for it but to pass the Bill as it stood. The real difficulty then will begin with the administration of the Act, and Mr Lloyd George may presently discover that he has not done wisely to exasperate all those upon whose good offices he depends.

Remarkable as the Insurance Bill is, the method of its passing was still more remarkable. The Bill was drafted as it went on. No less than 140 amendments were approved under the guillotine, and the Opposition made the only protest possible to them by leaving the House. Discussion was forbidden them. At any rate, they were not obliged to connive at a sham. Even when the Bill reached the House of Lords, the Government still found more than a hundred amendments necessary. The debate on the third reading was, so far as the Government was concerned, a complete failure. The well reasoned amendment, moved by Mr H. W. Forster, "that, as the Bill has been neither adequately discussed in this House nor fully explained to the country,

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