"OPTIMISM FROM CAIRO" SIR, —Mr. J. L. Hodson, in his article
"Optimism from Cairo," refers to the censor who passed nothing unless it had already appeared in print, but there is one in Cairo who refuses to pass even what has appeared in print, as the following will show. A soldier of my acquaintance in the Middle East read a letter of mine which appeared in The Spectator some little time ago, and in writing to his brother on this side he quoted from the letter. The censor cut out the quotation, though it was per- fectly clear that it was a quotation from The Spectator. My letter con- tained some criticisms of the Government, and it was doubtless one of these the soldier quoted, but as many thousands at home and abroad have access to The Spectator there seemed little pont in cutting a quotation from it out of a soldier's letter. Is the answer to the mystery that in our democratic army a soldier is not on13 not allowed to expre:is any criticism of his own, but not even to quote the public c:nicisms of
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