13 NOVEMBER 1920, Page 11

[To THE EDITOR or THE " SPECTATOR.") wonder that no

one has quoted from Hamlet— "Or that the everlasting had not fix'd His canon 'gainst se/f-slaughter."

(" canon" was formerly written "cannon ")—and from

Cam beline- . . . . "Gainst self-slaughter

There is a prohibition so divine That cravens my weak hand."

Shakespeare evidently thinks (and many people with him) that the prohibition is in the Bible. Is it?

An Arab who did not like his country to be populated by Russian Jews said the other day: "W. have no hope of winning if we fight, but we can all die" (v. "Palestine," in the November Fortnightly). Every forlorn hope is a kind