Briscoe's Dublin
I USED to wonder why Bob Briscoe had never been made a minister in any of de Valera's cabinets: Watching him in the Dail—his nose knocked by a rugby boot into what he describes as 'a per- Manent list to port,' giving his face as he ob- served the Opposition a mildly sardonic look—or listening to his speeches—conversational in man- ner, usually rather prosy—we of the press gallery telt he had more brains and guts than many of his party's front benchers. I read his memoirs, subtitled 'The adventurous autobiography of the Irish rebel who became the first Jewish Lord \layor of Dublin,' hoping to find out; but the hook only serves to increase the mystery, for it shows how close he has been to the heart of the Republican movement, and to his leader. His Iewishness would not have been a bar: on the contrary de Valera, who appointed a Protestant its the first President of Ireland, would have been glad to offer further proof of the national toter- ',ince. Perhaps his business interests prevented him from taking office; a pity, if this was the case, for the country could have done with some of his native shrewdness. This is a pleasantly told story, interesting for its sidelights on the struggle for independence—particularly when he deals with the characters of the men involved in the split over the Treaty of 1921, resulting in the deaths of litany of the best of them, and in some miserable, destructive years for Ireland.
BRIAN INGLIS
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