The so-called Ten Minutes' Rule was originally intended for the introduction of comparatively unimportant Bills. This after-noon Mr. SHORTT employed it for the purpose of explaining the provisions of one of the most revolutionary and comprehensive measures ever brought forward in any country. Briefly it is to put under the control of a single Minister of Ways and Communications our railways, our canals, our roads, and also our supply of electricity, hitherto in the hands of hundreds of public companies and local authorities. Only on one point did the Bill meet with opposition. I do not know whether Mr. JOYNSON HICKS claims any connection with Hicks's Hall, which stands in the old road-books as the starting-point of the great highway to the North, but he became almost lyrical in his denunciation of the proposal to put all the roads in the country in charge of a railwayman like Sir ERIC GEDDES. They ought, in his opinion, to be under the care of someone "born on roads" and "trained on roads"--a sort of super-tramp, I suppose. _Thursday, February 27th._--To an appeal for an increase in the pensions of Crimea and Mutiny veterans, to meet the rise in the cost of living, response was made that such an increase would be granted in the case of those not over seventy years of age. It is not thought that the concession will cause a heavy drain on the national resources, few of the veterans having joined up before entering their 'teens. As a retort, "Yah! German!" is, I am told, already considered _vieux jeu_ by the wits of the pavement. But Ulstermen and Nationalists still think it effective to twit one another with having been supplied with rifles from the arsenals of the Bosch. They bandied charges and contradictions so vigorously this afternoon that the SPEAKER had to intervene to put an end to these "nonsensical bickerings." The SECRETARY OP THE TREASURY scouted the suggestion that County cricket-matches should be exempted from the entertainment tax. It is believed that his answer was based solely upon financial considerations, and that he must not be held to have expressed the opinion that first-class cricket, as played by certain counties, _is_, in point of fact, entertaining. * * * * * "German residents in South-west Africa have forwarded the Administrator a petition for transmission to President Wilson, claiming permission to erect a republic union with the Republic of Germany. The petitioners claim that they not only represent a majority of the white inhabitants, but interpret the views of the wishes of the majority of the majority of the ahmbahmbahmbah natives." _New Zealand Paper_. We should like to know more of this remarkable tribe, which, _inter alia_, seems to have evolved a new method of proportional representation. * * * * * THE RED WINE OF THE COUNTRY.