19 JUNE 1959, Page 24

STRAW FOR SILENCE

SIR,—Your issue of May 8 contains a very evocative letter by Sir John North about Arnold Bennett's death. I was a schoolboy at the time and I remember the occasion well. But I'm almost certain that it was tanbark and not straw which was put over. the road in Baker Street to deaden the sound of traffic. The occasion stuck vividly in my memory because it was the first and indeed the only time I ever saw this done, —Yours faithfully,