A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
THERE may be some combative persons who have enjoyed this election, but for the vast majority, without question, the end of it all will be received with immense relief. I don't know.that there has been more animosity than at most elections, but the relapse into polemics after five years of genuinely harmonious co-operation has struck most ordinary persons as peculiarly distasteful. Unfortunately one result is a heavy debasement—it is to be hoped only temporary— of journalistic standards. When the Daily Herald proclaims pontifically " We, the Daily Herald, accuse Mr. Churchill of conscious and wanton hypocrisy " it simply makes a welcome contri- bution to the gaiety of nations. But turn to one particular paper and you will be certain of finding Mr. Churchill's tour described in terms of studied denigration ; another, one cannot but suspect, goes as far in the other direction in exaggerating and over-writing. The Daily Herald puts the attendance at the Prime Minister's Waltham- stow meeting at ro,000 ; all Conservative papers, and even the News Chronicle, give him 20,000. Now at last we shall, it is fair to hope, find the stock abuse—" Tory dodges," " Tory tricks," " Tory shame " and their equivalents on the other side—stowed away till next time, and the " big business " and " vested interests " clichés might well go with them. (One candidate attracted attention by becoming a father on the eve of the poll ; that no doubt would have been " Last Minute Tory Dodge " but for the fact that he was an Independent.) Some semblance of sober judgement and breadth of vision may once more be manifest in quarters where their absence has of late been conspicuous. But one or two journal-
• istic reputations will need considerable refurbishing. * * *
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