29 NOVEMBER 1946, Page 5

* *

The choice of Mr. J. R. M. Butler as " chief military historian" will give much satisfaction to all who recognise how well adapted Mr. Butler is for so important and responsible an office. A Fellow and former Senior Tutor of Trinity, Cambridge, he is a historian by profession, but served in the Army in two wars and went

through the Paris Peace conference as assistant to Lord Cecil and

with Mr. Philip Noel-Baker as colleague ; the association of butler and baker, as in the Book of Genesis, did not go unnoticed. It is satisfactory that the war histories are to take the form of a broad general survey, not detailed accounts of the achievements of the three separate services. There can be a world of difference between

this kind of thing done indifferently and done well.