A Spectator's Notebook
NOT LONG after Lord Beaverbrook set foot in England the other week a new writer called 'Richard Strong' began to spread himself in the Evening Standard. His content was pleasintly simpliste, his attention to fact far from oppressive, and his style a delightful parody of the typical Daily Express leading article. From this, and from the quaintness of the intention— to give the Prime Minister a few backhanded bangs on the back when all around were beating him up in a more orthodox manner—I deduced that those strange articles must have come almost straight from the dictaphone of Lord Beaverbrook himself. He is, after all, the master of the sudden somersault, and, subject as he is to furious whims, he would think it a tirst-rate stunt to intensify his support of Sir Anthony Eden at the very moment when even the Prime Minister's best friends had to bite their tongues. Having blown two blasts on his tin trumpet, 'Richard Strong' fell silent—with his ear cocked hope- fully, no doubt, for an echo from Downing Street. He was not disappointed, and last Thursday (two days after Lord Beaver- brook had the good fortune to dine with the Prime Minister) 'Richard Strong' tooted for the third time on his trumpet, this time to the tune of 'The Peace Prime Minister.' If Sir Anthony himself was not embarrassed by this performance his remaining , supporters certainly were; for 'Richard Strong' was so maladroit both in praise and defence that a rumour went round that the pseudonym concealed the ferocious visage of that arch-Eden- baiter, Mr. Randolph Churchill. This theory, though super- ficially attractive, is over-subtle. The articles were intended to be taken at their face value. Apparently Lord Beaverbrook's amanuensis in this exercise was Mr. Robert J. Edwards, for- merly Editor of Tribune; and so we haVe the latest chapter in that Beaverbrook-Bevanite saga which has already added so much to the gaiety of the nation. I find it hard to believe, how- evet, that even Sir Anthony can be following it without an occasional shudder.
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