I AM SURE that Sir William Holford's plan for the
immediate surroundings of St. Paul's is as good a compromise as can be imagined between the commercial interests which think it a lot of high-falutin arty nonsense anyway and the idealists like the President of the Royal Academy who would like Sir Christopher Wren's original plan for the City to be put into effect immediately. He has, it seems to me, made the best of what is essentially, and inevitably, a bad job, and I hope it goes through. But there is one detail which needs a closer look. It is good news that Temple Bar will be returning to the City, but it would be a pity if it were miserably dwarfed by the great west front of the Cathedral, as it certainly would be if placed where Sir William envisages it. Surely there are two or three sites rather farther away from the massive bulk of St. Paul's where it could be seen to better advantage? I TOO have glanced at the New Yorker; and so it was with no great surprise that 1 found awaiting me last Friday a plea to drink vodka and an invitation to sample Irish coffee (this in honour of St. Patrick's Day). Both potations, as readers of the New Yorker and / or Mr. Ian Fleming must be well aware, have recently swept the United States. Irish coffee, it is pleasant to relate, owes its American popularity not to any high- pressure sales campaign but to the devotion of a traveller who, revived by a draught of it at Shannon Airport, became its ardent propagandist. 'Heat a stemmed glass,' he instructed: `pour in a measure of Irish whiskey; add two spoonfuls of sugar; till up with black coffee; pour in cream on to the back of a spoon so that the cream floats on top of the coffee; and drink—without further stirring.'
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