A SPECTATOR 'S NOTEBOOK

NOT for the first time I seek the assistance of readers of this column in search of a quotation. My first memory of John Burns was of hearing him speak at an open-air meeting at Bournville somewhere in 1904 or 19°5. The gist of the epeech I forget, but its theme was a dictum of Henry Sidgwick's " Things are in the

saddle and they ride mankind." But was it Henry Sidgwick? I am sure Burns said so, but I have failed to trace it. Another quota- tion, this time not by Burns but about Burns, I have traced, and it is worth reproducing. The Member for Battersea was not the first Labour member of the British Cabinet—that distinction was reserved for Arthur Henderson in 1915—but he was the first working man to attain Cabinet rank (as a Liberal). As such he was viewed with a good deal of friendly interest by the reigning sovereign, Edward VII. One of their earliest contacts, at Windsor, is thus described by Viscount Esher :

" John Burns in knee-breeches was quite a revelation. His manner absolutely perfect. No self-consciousness and no bumptiousness. Quite respectful, absolutely frank and quick in the up-take without embarrassment. He showed tact and knowledge and embarked on no topic in which he was likely to get out of his depths. For half an hour after dinner he talked to the Queen [Alexandra] and for another hour to the Princess of Wales."

This corrected a less fortunate first impression. The King had written to the Prime Minister some time earlier expressing some

surprise that the new President of the Local Government Board should have signalised his advent to office by a public speech advocating the abolition of the House of Lords—to which the Prime Minister had just elevated a number of estimable persons.

Mr. Eden has made a singularly good job of his plan for the

reform of the Foreign Office, and it will be surprising if the House of Commons has anything but praise to give to the proposals. One of the points on which attention will fasten is that provision is made for entry into the service of candidates " from any social sphere." That is a demctratic reform for which there has been a consider- able and just demand. At the same time, while there are too many survivals of caste both in the Foreign Office itself and the diplo- matic service, the " old-school-tie " legend is considerably overdone.

Personality counts for at least as much as education, and probably

more. Having definite ideas in my own mind as to who are the two most efficient professional British Ambassadors today, I

looked up their records out of curiosity. One, I find, was educated privately, and served as a private in the last war ; the other was Eton and Balliol. The classic example of entry from " any social sphere " is Mr.'R. G. Howe, now Minister at Addis Ababa, whose father was, I believe, an engine-driver and whose education began at an elementary school, whence he proceeded to Derby School and Cambridge. The career, therefore, is alrehdy open to talents, but such cases as Mr. Howe's are rare ; they will be much less rare if the new scheme goes through. * * * *

Mr. Hartley Withers, I believe, once wrote a book on The Meaning of Money. He will not, I hope, have to re-write it in the light of the decision given by the House of Lords on Monday. For the meaning of money was precisely the question that Mr. Justice Farwell in the first instance, the Court of Appeal in the second and the House of Lords in the third, had to determine. A lady had made certain dispositions in her will, and among other things directed that

" all moneys which I die possessed of shall be shared by my nephews and nieces now living "

—of whom there were, I believe, fourteen. Were they to get simply the £689, representing cash at the bank, and one or two other minor items, or divide between them investments to the value of £32,78a The lower Courts, following an old rule of the eighteenth century, decided with obvious reluctance that the nephews and nieces could have only the actual cash. In a judgement read by the Lord Chan- cellor, who quoted Scripture and Lord Tennyson (he might have cited an interchange between his eponyms Simon Peter and Simon Magus), the House of Lords unanimously decided for a broad— indeed a common-sense—rather than a strictly legalistic interpreta- tion of the vital word, and the fourteen beneficiaries will duly divide the proceeds of the investments, as the testatrix undoubtedly meant them to.

* * * * Not long ago I commented en passant on the Intercollegiate University degrees of D.Sc. and Ph.D. enjoyed by Professor A. M. Low. I should not have referred to the degrees, or to the graduate. again, but for a book that has just reached me. Its title-page runs:

MUSKET TO MACHINE-GUN by PROFESSOR A. M. LOW Associate of the City and Guilds Institute. Member, Institution of Automobile Engineers.

Fellow, Chemical Society. • President and Fellow, Institute of Patentees.

Doctor of Science. Fellow and Chairman, Examining Committee of Institute of Chemist Analysts. Sometime Hon. Asst. Professor of Physics, Royal Artillery College. Formerly attached to Admiralty, Department of Torpedoes and Mining. Officer Commanding Royal Flying Corps Experimental Works. Fellow, Institute of Commerce. Principal, British Institute of Engineering Technology. Fellow, Faculty of Sciences. Vice-President, British Institution of Radio Engineers.

The emotion this inspires is wonder that a writer adorned with so many and so various distinctions should feel it necessary to lay claim to a degree of the character of those conferred by such an institution as the Intercollegiate University—for such, I take it, is

the origin of the " Doctor of Science " embedded in the above list. The other odd thing, while we are on this subject, is Mr. Low's professorship. That, of course, imports tenure of a chair at some recognised university, yet, abnormally lengthy as Mr. Low's entry in Who's Who is, it throws no light on this particular point. The

omission, no t oubt, is inadvertent, but the inadvertence in itself is odd.

* * * *

Sir James Grigg did a good deal to establish himself in the public eye as a human personality by his broadcast of last Sunday. His summary of and commentary on the Libyan and Tripolitanian campaign was a more than ordinarily excellent piece of work, and an admirable delivery further enhanced its effect. I have never heard the Secretary for War make a public speech, but if he has any desire (he quite likely has not) to dispel the suspicions of those sections of the public which look askance at him as a promoted bureaucrat he will do well to come to the microphone again 35 occasion offers—which it is to be hoped it increasingly will.

JANus.