22 SEPTEMBER 1967, Page 27

Sir Denis Brogan writes : Canon Clarke is. of course,

quite right. I was being ironic. Incidentally, thanks to my odd typing, I appear in the same paragraph to have invented a hitherto unknown French divine, L'Abbe (or le Pere) Grabat. There was a dim ecclesiastic called Garat, but 'grabat' was the name of the stock worn by the French clergy before it was replaced by the 'Roman' collar. Peccati.