Self-Government by the People can provide a success of the kind in
that dull season when people as a rule are saving up for Christmas, I
hardly think our Chairman stretched a point last night when he said,
"This evening will leave its mark on the history of England." Indeed,
some inkling of this must have guided us when we met, a few days
before, and agreed to postpone our usual Tuesday evening
Carol-practice in order to give the New Era a fair start. And I am
told this morning that the near approach of the sacred season had a
sensibly pacific influence upon the counsels of our neighbours at
Treneglos. The parishioners there are mostly dairy-farmers, and
party feeling runs high. But while eggs fetch 2d. apiece (as they
do, towards Christmas) there will always be a disposition to give
even the most unmarketable specimens the benefit of any doubt.

We were at first a good deal annoyed on finding that the Act allowed
Troy but eleven Parish Councillors. We have never had less than
sixty-five on our Regatta Committee, and we had believed Local
Self-Government to be at least as important as a Regatta. We argued
this out at some length last night, and the Chairman--Lawyer Thoms--
admitted that we had reason on our side. But his instructions were
definite, and he could not (as he vivaciously put it) fly in the face
of the Queen and two Houses of Parliament. We saw that his regret
was sincere, and so contented ourselves with handing in seventy-two
nomination papers for the eleven places, just to mark our sense of
the iniquity of the thing.

In another matter we worked round the intention of the Act more
successfully. We have never been able to understand why the Liberal
party in the House of Commons should object to Local Self-Government
taking place in public-houses. The objection implies a distrust of