7 FEBRUARY 1976, Page 3

Not so

Sir.—Is it not slightly odd for Quentin Crewe to write about: 'The violent English' and then to use as one of his examples Miss Lizzie Borden? That lady it will be recalled, by those with a taste for these things, was found not guilty of murdering her father and stepmother in Fall River, Massachusetts, which if memory serves me right is in the United States. Mr Crewe compounds his error by including 'Brides in the bath' Smith as a Victorian murderer. Smith in fact was brought to book and hanged in the reign of Edward VII.

J. R. Higgins Wembley, Middlesex