New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1915-06-21
BRITAIN WAKES
TO GRAVE PERIL
In LIFE WASTAGE:
Time Lost in English Fac
tories Means Men Lost in
Trenches, Says Peer.
By G. w. SMALLEY.

London, June 10.-BronIed from the
front to which he returns to-day, Earl
Stanhope told the House of Lords yes
terday, in substance:
"The French hold their trenches by
their wonderful Ism. gunhre. We
hold ours by rihe-fre.
"The French system is expensive in
ammunition; ours is expensive IN
lives"
Never before has the truth been
told so tersely. He added:
Every day wasted at the factories
means more lives lost at the front
And meanwhile the Prime Minister
was telling the House of Commons
that the casualties to the British
Army since the beginning of the wai
now amount to 25S,OOO. He omitted tC
add that $4,000 Of these have befaller
within the last seven weeks.
Lord Stalbridge, also from and for
the front, said the troops were ASK
ing: when will the people at home
send US the guns and shells We need I!
And Lord st. Davids said:
Victory is not yet won or begun
The Cabal in the House.
With this handful of facts in mind,
look at the house OF Commons shu
what it is doing. True, it has passed
the Ministry Of Munitions bill. most
useful and necessary measure. But IN
what spirit and by what concessions
In a spirit which allowed old party
animosities to lift their heads, and
bv concessions which amount almost
to a surrender. The Irish and the
Radicals snarled at the Government
Mr.. Dillon, Mr.. Cultivate, Mr.. Prln-
gle, Mr.. Philip Snowden, the Social
ist. denounced and derided every no
ton Of disciplined effort.
Mr.. Lloyd George is Minister, ou'
he has been discredited; his Manches-
ter proposals are abandoned; he him
self is thrown over by his one-tlmee
Radical friends and, in respect OF
compulsory service, by his present
colleagues. He gets under this new
bill no power which did not exist be-
fore. He has no power of compul'
sion; hardly even a power OF effective
organization except by the consent
and good will OF men who, like the
Liverpool laborers, have shown them,
selves hitherto deaf to every appeal
of patriotism and reason. They
stayed away last weekend from thelI
work exactly as they had stayed away
l.,,A (.anrOa had gone
20 LIVERPOOL to persuade them TO bt
patriots. He talked in vain. and contro
over them he has none.
Prophets of Gloom.
Well may Lord st. Davids say that
victory is not yet won or begun; Wel
may Sir W. Robertson Nicoll, tne
leading journalist of the great Non.
conformist body, say that the neN'
three months of the war Will be eG,
tremely critical for the Allies wen
may Mr.. Lambert, late Civil LORD OF
the Admiralty, say that the ordnance
Department of the War once mas
failed in its duty. Well may the
friends Of the late Ministry lament
the supineness of wasted months
National Service alone can win the
war, and TO the enforcement or Ma
tional Service not step has yet oeeh
taken. There is still great mass sc or
public opinion which is inert. The
patriotism is there. The capacity is
there. But discipline and organization
are still TO seek. And because they
are still to seek the casualties at the
front are 1000 a day, 5000 a day. 20
600 in a week, $4,000 in seven weeks!
The Government Attacked.
The hopes of the country are cen
tired in its Government. which It's
friends call a National Government and
its enemies a Coalition Government.
But whatever you call it, this new Gov
ernment has yet to assert its authority
and TO prove itself more efficient than
the Government which went down in
ruin a fortnight ago. Over Parliament
il has established no control. With the
country it remains an unknown force
When il was formed | called it an eX-
pertinent You do not expect an ex-
pertinent TO succeed or fail in a fort
night, but il might make a beginning
II is attacked; but what Government
is not attacked? The attacks upon il
this week ar, party attacks; or II Nigh,
be truer TO say faction attacks. The
men | named above are not exactly the
men to overthrow Ministry which con
tains pretty much all the available po.
litical talent Of the Kingdom, but they
showed their teeth Mr.. Dillon says
the new Ministry is seeking to Prus,
sianiIe England; and, of course, Ire
land, which to his mind has Away
been Prussianized. Ii is no longer 8
Home Rule Ministry" he cries, and
his friends cry. There is a chorus in