25 OCTOBER 1957, Page 18

KNOCKING THE PALACE

SIR,—While applauding Strix's article on the new fashion of `Knocking the Palace,' may I recall lines of Canning which are so apt to the ludicrous con- troversy opened by Lord Altrincham that I am surprised that they have not been over-quoted by now. It will be remembered that the knockers are often loud in assertions of their Royalism and that they only have the Royal good at heart. Canning wrote:

Give me the avowed, erect, and manly foe; Firm I can meet, perhaps return the blow; But of all plagues, good Heaven, thy wrath can send, Save me, oh save me from the candid friend.