22 FEBRUARY 1935, Page 6

The appointment of Dame, Rachel Crowdy to the new Royal

Commission on the Traffic in Arms has a special appropriateness which may not be immediately apparent. Dame Rachel was for twelve years head of the section of the League of Nations Secretariat dealing with the opium traffic, and it has always been maintained that the system created for the control of the traffic in narcotics and dangerous drugs would form an admirable model for an arms traffic control system. But Dame Rachel sailed last week for the United States for a lecture-tour, so that the work of the Commission must either begin without her or be rather seriously delayed.