30 JULY 1977, Page 17

Waugh rebuked

Sir: On reading your issue of 16 July, I discovered that one of your contributors was a person called Waugh. I gather that this person is descended from an eminent author of that name, and my impression is that, if it had not been for that lucky accident, Waugh would not have made great headway in journalism.

His effort was a masterpiece of absurdity. He appears to believe that people oVer sixty are second-class citizens, whose only fate is to wait for the grave. This silly man should be told that there are plenty of people over sixty — and over seventy — with ten times his intelligence and twenty times his knowledge. My contempt for bun is boundless. Let him learn to look up to his elders and betters.

B. Douglas-Smith Halifax House, Oxford