1 JUNE 1944, Page 14

VIRGIL'S BASKETS SIR,—Owing to the big demand for air-borne baskets

and panniers for war purposes and consequent restrictions in the use of willow rods for domestic baskets, the latter are being made from various substitutes, but obviously not from brambles. With reference to Virgil's suggestion (quoted by a correspondent in The Spectator of the 12th instant), the translators of the line from Georgics Nunc facilis rubes texarur fiscina virga " rendered it—" Now let the pliant basket of bramble twigs be tvoven"; but as the late Professor Thomas Okey of Cambridge pointed out, the word " rubes referred to red twigs or willow rods .(probably the salix purpurea).—Yours faithfully, H. H. BORART. The Worshipful Company of Basketmakers, Guildhall Annexe.