25 JANUARY 1946, Page 4

The appointment of a King Edward Professor of English Litera-

ture in succession to Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch does not come before it is due, for the Chair has been vacant for some eighteen months. To maintain the standard set by Verrall and Q is a stern demand, and I believe one or two scholars who might have had the Chair if they had wanted it have shrunk from the responsibility. Mr. Basil Willey, of Pembroke, the new professor, is not widely known—he does not appear in Who's Who—but he has done dis- tinguished work. His Seventeenth Century Background is a very notable piece of writing. Incidentally, the new profess& is a Cambridge man ; the other possible candidates were not.