look into a few lives, a few typical lives and families, and see.




VI


_April 22nd_.

Dear H.

As I begin upon this final letter to you comes the news that the
threatened split in the British Cabinet owing to the proposed introduction
of general military service has been averted, and that at a Secret Session
to be held next Tuesday, April 25th, Ministers will, for the first time,
lay before both Houses of Parliament full and complete information--much
more full and complete at any rate, than has yet been given--of the
"effort" of Great Britain in this world war, what this country is doing in
sea-power, in the provision of Armies, in the lending of money to our
Allies, in our own shipping service to them, and in our supply to them of
munitions, coal, and other war material--including boots and clothing. If,
then, our own British Parliament will be for the first time fully apprised
next Tuesday of what the nation has been doing, it is, perhaps, small
wonder that you on your side of the Atlantic have not rightly understood
the performance of a nation which has, collectively, the same love of
"grousing" as the individual British soldier shows in the trenches.

Let me, however, go back and recapitulate a little.