5 NOVEMBER 1910, Page 15

WALES AND ENGLAND.

[To THE EDITOR OF THY "SPECTATOR."] Srn,—In an editorial note at the foot of a letter in last week's Spectator you suggest by inference that "Welsh attacks on England and her people" are habitual in the Principality, though "no doubt as a rule concealed by the vernacular." Allow me, as one who has some knowledge of platform speeches and newspaper articles in Wales, to say that you are entirely misinformed. An attack on England by Welsh speakers or writers is as rare as snow in midsummer. I have attended scores of meetings in Wales, and have read hundreds of Welsh articles in newspapers and magazines. Never once have I heard or read one single phrase or word that could be construed by the utmost malignity into an attack on England or the English. We Welshmen do not attack England. Why should we ? Even our inability to get Disestablishment does not make us attack England, it only makes us angry with the House of Lords. We are proud of our race and our traditions. We have our historic memories, our own ethos, our own differentia. But believe me, we are not less proud than you are of the British Empire. We rejoice in its freedom, we glory in its greatness, we have given, and shall continue to give, to it of our best in blood and brains. We have the best of feeling towards our English fellow-country- men. But we do sometimes think that English writers, when discussing Imperial topics, lay too much emphasis on the "Anglo-Saxon" stock. Would not the term " Anglo-Celtic " be juster and more historically accurate ? Ours is a British not an English Empire.—I am, Sir, &c., A LONDON WELSHMAN.