A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK

T is inevitable, I suppose, that we should all be speculating on I how long the war in Europe will last, and doing that, I hop; with a firm resolve to keep an instinctive optimism in check. We are in a situation in which almost anything is possible. Demoral- isation, in Germany as well as in Italy, may have gone farther than we can see ; there would be nothing surprising in that in view of what the R.A.F. is doing, and will do, nightly. (The Daily Telegraph, by the way, did useful work in reproducing in facsimile on Wednesday the original report in the Westdeutscher Beobachter of August nth, 1939, of Goering's declaration which culminated in the assurance that " we are not going to let the Ruhr be exposed to one single bomb from hostile aircraft.") On -the other hand it is still conceivable that Germany may be able to produce some improved aeroplane or weapon that would strengthen her resistance, or by cutting losses and shortening her defensive perimeter to hold out for many months yet. On these points neutral opinion is in some respects of more value than Allied ; and I, at any rate, read with some interest views collected from representative per- t-onalities in several neutral countries regarding a likely date for the end of the war, published by the Daily Express on Tuesday. I can only summarise them briefly here without indicating the authority behind each particular opinion.

Turkey : (r) Before Christmas, 1944. (2) Before next spring. (3) The end of 1944. - Sweden : (t) The spring of 1944. (2) " We are entering the final stages." Portugal : (t) Before the end of next year ; possibly this year. (2) Next spring. (3) Next month.

Switzerland : (i) Within twelve months. (2) This autumn or winter.

About a year ago an Allied leader to whose views I attach par- ticular weight piedicted that the war would end between next October and next March ; three months ago he added a month and said between November and April. I have not seen him recently, but I imagine he has reverted at least to his earlier dates.

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It was announced in July that facts regarding U-boat warfare would in future be published on the zoth of each month. The . promise has been broken the first time it should have been fulfilled, for. August 12th has been reached without the expected statement. The reason apparently is that Mr. Churchill wants to confer with President Roosevelt before facts or figures are published. It is certainly not that bad news has to be broken gently. There is no doubt at all that when (or if) the full truth is told it will be encouraging almost beyond belief. It will, indeed, probably be considered wise to issue a warning against premature optimism ; a new U-boat campaign is likely, but the crews are not what they were, Allied counter-measures are increasingly effective and new tonnage is being constructed on a scale—the figure for American yards alone in 1943 will approach .20,000,000 tons, and Canada is making a remarkable contribution in 'addition—which make the defeat of the U-boat not merely inevitable but something already accomplished. When the full facts arc known about what the U-boat came near accomplishing in 1944 and 1941 it will be realised that the summer of 1943 has seen what is perhaps the greatest German defeat of all.

I am very glad to see that the Warton Lecture which Mr. George Sampson delivered before the British Academy on " The Century of Divine Songs," or, more explicitly, eighteenth-century hymns, is now obtainable from the Oxford University Press (2s.). When Mr.

Sampson told me he was going to give this lecture (in a conversation to which Mr. Isaac Foot made learned contribution), I said I hoped he would not forget Addison. He replied that he was beginning with Addison, and so he has, with special reference to five of the essayist-politician's best-known hymns ; why congregations should persistently sing No. 490 in the English Hymnal, " The King of love my Shepherd is," with No. 491, Addison's far finer paraphrase, " The Lord my pasture shall prepare," open before their eyes, I have never understood. It is almost fatal to touch such a subject as

this in a paragraph, and I can only mention one other hymn. I

turned naturally to see what Mr. Sampson had to say about Charles Wesley's great " Come, 0 thou Traveller unknown, Whom still I hold, but cannot see."

He -has, in fact, quoted all the fourteen six-line verses in full, and prefaced it with the remark that-" Charles Wesley wrote every one of his innumerable hymns as if he had never written another. Each seems the product of a new religious experience which he must proclaim." That, I believe, is broadly just, though Wesley wrote no fewer than 6,500 hymns—which argues, on a strict interpretation, 6,5oo varieties of religious experience. * * * * The news that Captain Hedley Verity, the well-known Yorkshire bowler, has been posted as missing raises a question that has, very opportunely, been a good deal discussed lately. It may be hoped that Captain Verity, who may be a prisoner and safe, will in due

course return to this country, and to Bramhall Lane and other cricket-grounds. But will it be as Gen‘leman or as Player? Are these old invidious distinctions to be maintained as a gulf which an individual occasionally crosses from one side to the other, but

which for the most part remains impassable? Differences, of course, between a man who gives up all the summer months to cricket and can play in every match and another who plays only when business engagements permit are inevitable. The former must usually be paid a salary, and there is nothing necessarily invidious in the distinction between amateur and professional. But gentleman and player is another story. Is Captain Verity an officer and a gentleman everywhere except on a cricket-pitch? * * * * •

A writer in Wednesday's Times reports that the musk in her greenhouse is regaining its scent—and I have no doubt that her

letter will provoke as much further correspondence as letters report- ing the first cuckoo habitually do. I am no botanist, and it may be that the extraordinary unanimity with which musk-plains through- out the world became suddenly scentless twenty years or so ago has been satisfactorily explained. But I have never seen the ex- planation, nor does there seem to be any reason why the scent should gradually return. * * * * Can anyone trace the familiar but elusive term " ivory tower " to its source? • Everyone knows the phrase, but T find that persons much better versed in literary allusions than I am defeated by this.

But readers of this column rarely disappoint. jANUS.