less discriminating in what should be its all-round attack on

threats to our civil liberties.—Yours faith-

fully, J. B. PARKER Forest Lodge, Mortimer West, Berks of vision and disappear at the centre of it than when they appear at the centre to move to the extremes. One is less inclined to follow the object in the former case and, in my experience, less likely to develop a headache and subsequently to become sick.

AUSTIN LEE

The Vestry, St. Paul's Church, Covent Garden, WC2

BEDOUIN DOCTOR

SIR,—In his encouraging review of Dr. Herbert Pritzke's Bedouin Doctor, Christopher Sykes says that shortly after, the meeting between the German mercenaries and the ex-Mufti of Jerusalem, when the latter learnt, for the first time, the truth about the Arab leader of the Palestine contingent of the so- called Army of Freedom, one of Pritzke's German comrades was found shot in the back. Mr. Sykes has got it wrong. The man who was shot in the back was Hassan Salarneh, the disgusting Arab OC of the Palestine guerrillas.—Yours faithfully,

R. M. GRAVES

Savile Club, 69 Brooke Street, W1

JOHN VICKERS

SIR,—You are oversimplifying when you say that the general blame for the hanging of Vickers 'must rest upon the members of this Government and its pre- decessor.' Ultimately, the blame rests on the Labour Party. In 1948, when the Criminal Justice Bill came back, mutilated, from the House of Lords, the Labour Government persuaded the Commons that abolition had to be sacrificed on the altar' of what was to become the Criminal Justice Act—in itself an amateurish measure of penal reform whose psycho- logical incompetence prompted Edward Glover in 1950 to propose the introduction of a Criminal • Justice (Amendment) Bill 'at the earliest possible

moment.' •

Instead of the deleted abolition clause, the House was promised a Royal Commission on capital punishment which, in the event, turned out to be the greatest petitio principii in modern political history, in that it was not empowered to deal with abolition. That the report (1949-53) proved valuable against heavy methodological odds is to the credit of the Commission, not the then Government.

Finally, coming to the Vickers case itself. I read in the Manchester Guardian for July 22 that 'on the day following Mr. Silverman's attack on the Attorney-General, an attempt was made to get a promise from Mr. Butler ... to find time for a debate on the censure motion. Mr. Butler refused to find any Government time—and no official spokesman front the Opposition offered any Opposition time either. Nor was- there any general demonstration from back-benchers on either side of the House in support of Mr. Silverman's demand' : in fact, the motion of censure was signed by only sixty-eight Labour members. The present Government have at least this to be said in their favour—that they believe in the uniquely deterrent effect of capital punishment. In the circum- stances, my respect for the Conservative abolitionists Is immeasurably greater than for their Opposition colleagues, with the exception of the abolition leaders --above all, Mr. Silverman.—Yours faithfully,

HANS KELLER

SIR,—May 1, as one of 'the recalcitrant back-to-the- engine minority' which Leslie Adrian mentioned last week, give my reasons for travelling in that attitude?

As a long-suffering traveller by rail, nursing an Intolerant dislike of smokers, other people's children

.confined spaces, dirt and noise, and in addition acing prone to travel-sickness, I have found that the strain on the eyes is less when objects pass into the arc 50 Willow Road, NW 3 BACK-TO-THE-ENGINE

With regard to the 'open coach' which Mr. Adrian advocates. I must agree that for suburban services, up to perhaps fifty miles, they would be admirable, but the thought of travelling for seven, eight or nine hours on the Thames-Clyde Express in such a coach, with children and equally restive adults roaming the passageways between the seats, frankly appals me. And as for the night journey—well! In addition, I suppose one such coach devoted 'to non-smokers would be too large a ratio of seats?

I consider that an improved type of small com- partment coach for a fixed number of people. say six, wits air-conditioning and double-glazed windows to

IN 1952 eight of our young sculp- tors were represented modestly at -the Biennale and their work helped to fix the idea—I am inclined to say superstition—in foreign minds that contemporary British sculpture was of a quite remarkable and rare significance. In 1956 one of the eight, Lynn Chadwick, was chosen to follovt, Moore and Hepworth as the star of our pavilion at Venice. In consequence of the major prize he won there, of the international successses he has subsequently gained, in .view of the fact that he is one of the few sculptors to whom the Arts Council have devoted a large one-man show, he must be judged not in terms of promise but of attainment, as one who is now up in the top league. And the first general impression in the St. James's Square Gallery is most enticing and persuasive; someone in the Arts Council has mounted the show with a skilful and sympathetic hand. The earlier skeletal pieces stand out in picturesque silhouette, the dun colour of the later and larger works is most delightful seen against the off-white walls of their room. But these are only secondary qualities in sculpture and so for that matter, in spite of the habits of the moment, is texture; and the texture of Chadwick's sculpture, whether it be of the metal cunningly rendered or the infilling—in his recent work the iron frame- work is packed with a compound of gypsum and iron filings—is always enjoyable. Those who reckon him such an outstanding• technician are perhaps mistaking technique for touch. His way of using iron and welding tools is simply that of a good metal worker, but he is adept in a particularly English, a Sickert or Ben Nicholson, way at compounding a sensitive, suggestive surface.

prevent condensation the ideal way of travelling by rail, if you have to.—Yours faithfully,

MICHAEL 0. BREWER

43 Meadowpark Drive, Ayr

FIVE MILLION LIRE

SIR,—The weekly magazine Oggi, of Milan, of which I am the London correspondent, has launched a literary competition, with a prize of five million lire, for an unpublished novel, The competition is open to writers of all nationalities and novels in English will not have to be translated.

We would like the news of this competition to be made known to as many writers—professional and potential—as possible, and should be grateful if you could find space for a small item.—Yours faithfully,

A. M. CIRIELLO

13 Wimpole Street, W 1

easy to surround such formal attributes as these works possessed with an aura of significance and value as Robert Melville has done in a, for him, unusually unconvincing and perhaps unconvinced introduction. He writes of the moving parts of these semi-mobile sculptures as 'a nightmarish symbol of the last flicker of nimbleness in a creature which has lost the power to advance or retreat under the compulsion to make Kafka-like preparations against attack.' Formally these are the most successful and lively of Chadwick's works. deriving their quality as they do from his able treatment of the metal, but as images they are too slight and derivative to bear any load of association or meaning.

And what has appeared since suggests that Chadwick is not possessed by any strong or individual imaginative vision. As an inventor of ,forms he is not in the same class as Henry Moore and as an animator of forms he is rather less successful than the other artists who first accom- panied him to Venice. He has lately been absorbed by a form which can reasonably be described as a metal wigwam. It is curious and oersonal t3 him. but it has had to serve too many incompatible purposes. Two of them together have made up a Teddy boy and girl; another harnessed to the branch • of a tree realistically conceived has signified the seasons. Imagery of this nature seems a naive and banal accomplish- ment for an artist of international repute. Equally unsatisfactory are the legs upon which so many of these creatures an -1 creations stand. Granted Melville's point that Chadwick, like some of his contemporaries, is not interested in the head or the extremities, yet their underpinnings are dis- turbingly like those of a certain kind of con- temporary furniture, being completely inexpres- sive and yet without the appropriate anonymity of the rods which Butler sometimes uses as a support for his sculpture. Indeed, Chadwick's work seems to be at the mercy of his method; he is interpreting subjects in terms of technique and letting that technique establish a style, which is exactly the academic approach. The skeleton of iron rods in his recent pieces establishes a sort of Eiffel Tower pattern of triangles or irregular figures. When this skeleton is filled with plastic compound their shapes become either facets or a pattern on the surface of a larger form; they create a quite arbitrary and insignificant struc- ture. One is not convinced, indeed, that this is the operation of a major artist; form, idea and method are not organically unified. Perhaps this is most distinctly shown by the drawings. They

Contemporary Arts

Gypsum and Iron Filings