On August 23 the King hurriedly returned from Balmoral to London and Mr. MacDonald was entrusted with the task of forming a National Government.
On September 10, Mr. Snowden introduced his emergency budget in an atmosphere as dramatic as had occurred in the House of Commons since the war.
Events in the next few weeks moved rapidly. On September 20 the Cabinet decided, after consultation with the Bank of England, to suspend temporarily the Gold Stan-gaw. On October 5 the Cabinet agreed to an immediate genera election zs a united body.
Mr. MacDonald took a particularly vigorous part in the fight and secured a remarkable victory at Seaham Harbour where he had a majority of nearly 6,000 in one of the strongest Labour seats in the country.
But during 1932, the Prime Miniders health gave rise to the gravest fears.
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.