10 FEBRUARY 1950, Page 16

• Election Issues

SIR,—Mr. Harold Nicolson's bewilderment about the electorate's supposed indifference to the world crisis is itself bewildering. Isn't the explanation quite simple ? Elections are about points of disagreement, not of agreement. All parties know that the question which overshadows all others in the world is the Russian question. None of them—small blame to them—know the answer to it. What then is there to quarrel about ? if the earth were to start freezing tomorrow we should all be

frightened out of out wits. But I do not think we should hold an election about it. As to the enthusiasm aroused by Gladstone, I wonder how much of it was due to hatred of the Turk, and how much to hatred of