6 JUNE 1981, Page 20

Sir: I am very sorry to discover that Nina Harvie

(Letters, 30 May) read my article on Swiss xenophobia as a blanket condemnation of that country. In fact I greatly admire Switzerland, and for many of the same reasons that Miss Harvie lists — as I hope my earlier Spectator article of 20 December made obvious. But even the most admirable of nations must have a fault or two, and I remain of the opinion that their treatment of the saisonniers is the Swiss Achilles heel. Geoffrey Sampson

Richmond House, Ingleton, Yorks