Posterity has unanimously laid the blame upon the Administration of that day, and assuredly the task of whitewashing "The Destroyers" would be no light or pleasant one. But, again, we must remind ourselves that the essence of the British Constitution has granted to us always, for a century past at least, as good a Government as we have deserved. "The Destroyers" may have brought shame and humiliation upon England. Unquestionably, measures and acts of theirs produced those effects. But who and what produced "The Destroyers" as a Government? The only possible answer to that is, in the first place, the British public; in the second place, the British people's selfish apathy and neglect, where national duty and responsibility were concerned, and blindly selfish absorption, in the matter of its own individual interests and pleasures. One hundred and thirty-two men, women, and children killed, and three hundred and twenty-eight wounded; the Treasury buildings and the official residence of the Prime Minister gutted; that was the casualty list of the "Surrender Riot" at Westminster. But the figures do not convey a tithe of the horror, the unforgettable shame and horror, of the people's attack upon the Empire's sanctuary. The essence of the tragedy lay in their demand for immediate and unconditional surrender; the misery of it lay in "The Destroyers'" weak, delayed, terrified response, followed almost immediately by the order to those in charge of the firing parties--an order flung hysterically at last, the very articulation of panic. No one is likely to question Martin's assertion that Friday's tragedy at Westminster must be regarded--"not alone as the immediate cause of Black Saturday's national humiliation, but also as the crucial phase, the pivot upon which the development of the whole disastrous week turned." But the Westminster Riot at least had the saving feature of unpremeditation. It was, upon the one side, the outcry of a wholly undisciplined, hungry, and panic-smitten public; and, upon the other side, the irresponsible, more than half-hysterical action of a group of terrified and incompetent politicians. These men had been swept into great positions, which they were totally unfitted to fill, by a tidal wave of reactionary public feeling, and of the blind selfishness of a decadence born of long freedom from any form of national discipline; of liberties too easily won and but half-understood; of superficial education as to rights, and abysmal ignorance as to duties. But, while fully admitting the soundness of Martin's verdict, for my part I feel that my experiences during that week left me with memories not perhaps more shocking, but certainly more humiliating and disgraceful to England, than the picture burnt into my mind by the Westminster Riot. I will mention two of these.