31 JANUARY 1947, Page 26

" C. P." died in 1932. The paper inseparably associated

with his name celebrated the centenary of its foundation as a weekly in 1821, and has yet to wait eight years for its centenary as- a daily. The centenary of Scott's own birth fell in 1946, and it is not surprising in present circumstances that the volume commemorating that should not appear till 1947. It is a volume in which the great names that have been long familiar to readers of the Manchester Guardian (or would have been if anonymity had not been so prevalent) scintillate. J. L. Hammond, Scott's biographer, contributes forty-odd pages on Scott the man ; the brilliant chapter by W. P. Crozier, a later editor, on " C.P.' in the office " included in Hammond's book is reproduced in full ' • and Sir William Haley, C. G. Montague and Leonard flobhouse are the writers of other tributes—the two latter, from hands now stilled, presumably reprinted from the Guardian itself. But for most readers what primarily gives the book its value is the seventy pages devoted to articles by Scott himself. The salvage from that notable output, notable particularly in quality, is small, and to get easy access, for example, to the discussion on " journalism " which once appeared in the Political Quarterly is something for which to be grateful to editor and publisher alike. Some reprinted leaders from the Guardian itself are more fugitive but not less welcome.