28 JULY 1950, Page 5

Owls seem to infest these notes. A reader has sent

me a picture of two of these birds which forms part of a full-page advertisement inserted by the North Thames Gas Board in the programme at the London Hippodrome. The caption says: "This Folies Bergere Revue To whoo, to whit to whoo ; Has everything—except alas, A brand new cooker worked by gas."

He writes: " As I am both a tax-payer and a gas-consumer, it seeing reasonably certain that I have contributed to the cost of this advertisement. . . . It ought to be beneath the dignity (and the intelligence level) of any public officials to perpetrate this kind of tripe." I agree ; but it comparatively seldom is. * * * *