_Wednesday, April 30th._--Mr. AUSTEN CHAMBERLAIN, returning to the Exchequer after an interval of thirteen years, made a much better Budget speech than one would have expected. It was longer, perhaps, than was absolutely necessary. Like the late Mr. GLADSTONE, he has a tendency to digress into financial backwaters instead of sticking to the main Pactolian stream. His excursus upon the impracticability of a levy on capital was really redundant, though it pleased the millionaires and reconciled them to the screwing-up of the death-duties. Still, on the whole, he had a more flattering tale to unfold than most of us had ventured to anticipate, and he told it well, in spite of an occasional confusion in his figures. After all, it must be hard for a Chancellor who left the national expenditure at a hundred and fifty millions and comes back to find it multiplied tenfold not to mistake millions for thousands now and again. [Illustration: _Budget Victims._ "YOU MAY HAVE WON THE WAR, BUT WE'VE GOT TO PAY FOR IT."] On the whole the Committee was well pleased with his performance, partly because the gap between revenue and expenditure turned out to be a mere trifle of two hundred millions instead of twice or thrice that amount; partly because there was, for once, no increase in the income-tax; but chiefly, I think, for the sentimental reason that in recommending a tiny preference for the produce of the Dominions and Dependencies Mr. CHAMBERLAIN was happily combining imperial interests with filial affection. Almost casually the CHANCELLOR announced that the Land Values Duties, the outstanding feature of Mr. LLOYD GEORGE'S famous Budget of 1909, were, with the approval of their author, to be referred to a Select Committee, to see if anything could be made of them. If only Mr. ASQUITH had thought of that device when his brilliant young lieutenant first propounded them! There would have been no quarrel between the two Houses: the Parliament Act would never have been passed, and a Home Rule Act, for which nobody in Ireland has a good word, would not now be reposing on the Statute-Book. In the absence of any EX-CHANCELLOR OF THE EXCHEQUER the task of criticism was left to Mr. ADAMSON, who was mildly aggressive and showed a hankering after a levy on capital, not altogether easy to reconcile with his statement that no responsible Member of the Labour Party desired to repudiate the National Debt. Mr. JESSON, a National Democrat, was more original and stimulating. As a representative of the Musicians' Union he is all for harmony, and foresees the time when Capital and Labour shall unite their forces in one great national orchestra, under the directing baton of the State.