It was never really credible that the significance of the dispute on railway enginemen's lodging turns lay entirely on the surface. If it had, then sheer derision might have...

What happens then ? Presumably the treadmill comes round once more and the Foreign Ministers go through all the same questions again. Such a prospect is utterly repellent to all...

The central and essential condition of the New York agreement which led to the meeting of the Council of Foreign Ministers in Paris was the lifting by the Russians of the Berlin...

General Smuts, with his unique history, his innate wisdom and his ripe experience, stands alone among the statesmen of the Commonwealth, and the views he expressed on Tuesday on...

The British Government's plan for the qualified independence of Cyrenaica has had the mixed reception which was expected. There Is no enthusiasm for it in Italy or in Egypt,...

Little has been heard of the conference which has been in session at Lausanne for the past month under the auspices of the United Nations Conciliation Commission and which is...

There comes a point, in these days of growing American partici- pation in world affairs, when the way in which the United States treats its public servants becomes of interest...

T HE annual conference of one of the two great political parties in this country is necessarily important. It is particularly important when it is a conference of the party...

to a project which has been quietly taking shape for something like two years. The essential sentence in the report runs, "The Trustees made a new departure in policy by voting...

baffling. It ran: "SHOP MI5 HUNT PRICE CUTS" I dare say some people were quicker on to it than I was. Some- one I was discussing it wish recalled a Heading less abstruse and...

C OMPARISON between the Labour and Conservative panels of which, apart from the spe t 'cial case of Lord Layton, the British delegation to the European Assembly is to consist is...

future to be a la carte instead of table d'hôte. Hitherto the various examining bodies have charged inclusive fees averaging (for there are slight differences between the...

to launch a national peace campaign. His first war cry should shake Transport House and Downing Street as Hitler's bombs never did: "I am not going to see my grandchildren...

failure to elect the Minister for Commonwealth Relations to a place on its executive will seem temost people surprising. There is no doubt an explanation. Mr. Philip Noel-Baker...

By EDWARD HODGKIN I T seems to have been Professor Breasted who first used the expression "The Fertile Crescent" to describe the populated perimeter of the great Arabian...

By N. PELHAM WRIGHT A YEAR as a "Kreis Resident Officer" in the Control Commission for Germany cannot fail to leave a reasonably clear picture of German life and thought in...

By D. W. BROGAN "Men are we, and must grieve when even the Shade Of that which once was great is pass'd away." I F (as some competent observers think) the day of the great city...

By JUDITH HUBBACK Paris I T has been fashionable for many years among francophile Britons to assume that the standard of education in France is higher than it is north of...

By G. D. MARTINEAU, T HE republication of John Ruskin's Praeterita has been noticed, with some erudite observations, by Mr. Harold Nicolson. This event coincides with a small...

By R. H. CECIL S IR BERNARD SPILSBURY'S 'modest and thoughtful confi- dence in the witness-box inspired such universal respect that it was a shock to hear Mr. Justice Swift...

SUBSCRIPTION RATES Ordinary edition to any address in the World. 52 weeks LI 10s. Od. 26 weeks 15s. Od. Air Mail to any Country in Europe. 52 weeks ,C2 7s. 64. 26 weeks LI...

THE style in which Mr. Phelps produced Macbeth at Sadler's Wells has been imitated in several respects—not completely—by the manager of the Haymarket. An alteration of the...

By SIR MIRZA ISMAIL Current events in China, as elsewhere, have emphasised the dangers that threaten both countries if they refuse to co-operate in the international field. We...

THE AMATEUR SMUGGLER ByANNE KARMINSKI (Girton College Cambs.) Madame L. was justified in her praise. We sat in front of a low symmetrically-gabled Basque inn, and watched the...

By HAROLD NICOLSON I WENT to Grenoble last week to attend the six-hundredth anniversary of the incorporation of the Dauphine in France. I am unaware of the reasons for which...

THE THEATRE ','On Monday Next . . ." By Philip King. (Comedy.) ON Monday next it will be the dubious privilege of the Drossmouth Repertory Company to present for the first time...

THE Henry Wood Concert Society's Elgar Festival has been planned on spacious and ample lines which correspond to the character of the music and indeed alone do it justice. The...

"They Live by Night." (Academy.)—" The Window." (Academy.) —fi Sorrowful Jones." (Canton.) HOLLYWOOD, like the modest arbutus, occasionally puts forth fragrant flowers which,...

EVERY year a certain number of people ask me by letter where exactly and at what hours they can hear the nightingale. The sentiment in favour of the song seems to be stronger in...

cries of protest against the felling of trees. It is, of course, always a melancholy sight when a fine tree falls, when, as Bridges wrote, "a hundred years of pride Crash— " ;...

TT seems appropriate that Mr. Wyndham Lewis should be followed at the Redfern Gallery by Mr. Michael Ayrton, for in their interests, as in their approach to painting, these...

rapidity of increase in certain animals, rabbits, grey squirrels, hedgehogs and even some birds, notably, at the moment, rooks and greater black-backed gulls. Last week a...

of course, the association of colours. Flowers may " swear " ; but the swearing colours, I think, are almost wholly confined to the reds and purples. For some of the oriental...

sm,—may I, an ex-National Service undergraduate, add a little to Dr. Thompson's argument? The evil of the modern system of education, as it affects the university student, lies...

of political weapons, especially when, as in the case of Mr. Bruce Cooper, it leads to distortion of the facts. In opposing the Communist Club at the debate referred to, Mr....

SIR,—By misquoting from a speech I made at the University of Edin- burgh, Mr. Cooper has impugned the sincerity of my support for academic freedom.. I did not condone the...

Si:11,—May I draw attention to what is logically the most important centenary this year ; tge 1,500th anniversary of the traditional date of the coming of Hengest and Horsa—the...

FACTS ABOUT' KONGWA Sn1,—Mr. Lipscomb, in his article, mentions the failure in Tanganyika to make use of advice that was to be had from Kenya for the asking. I have noticed...

SIR,—As a gipsyologist Lavas much impressed by Mr. F. Brittain's account of the funeral in his article The Gipsy Queen in the Spectator of May 27th. It may interest him and your...

Sta,—I am obliged to your correspondent, Mr. James Craigie, for his letter relating to the above matter. My electricity account is tendered by the Merseyside and North Wales...

Sta,—The champions of the present system for determining the date of Easter by reference to the full moon appear to forget that the ecclesiastical full moon is not a natural...

Sta,—While I enjoyed Mr. Townsend's article on Undergraduate Wives and agree with much he says, my experience of the "official" reception has been different. Perhaps it was...

Stn,—My attention has. recently been drawn to the project, which has received some publicity in the Press, for the erection in Basutoland of a separate diocese independent of...

Pickle and Acid THE more one studies the eighteenth century the more convinced one is of the extreme irritability of that age and its appalling relish of scandal, vituperation...

Broken Images. By John Guest. (Longmans. 10s. 6d.) THE best books inspired by such a shattering upheaval as a world war are not necessarily those which achieve the earliest...

Christianity and Fear. By Oscar Pfister. (Allen and TJnwin. 30s.) This massive volume bears the sub-tide "A study in history and in the psychology and hygiene of religion." It...

The Foreign Policy of Soviet Russia Vol. II. 1936-41. By Max Beloff. (Oxford University Press. 21s.) IN completing the second, and much longer, volume of this book, Mr. Beloff...

World Revolution in ,the Cause of Peace. By Lionel Curtis. (Basil Blackwell 7s. 6d.) AMERICAN leaders in 1787—so runs Mr. Curtis's argument—solved North America's fuffdamental...

Great ViWers. By Hester W. Chapman. (Seeker and Warburg. 18s.) ONCE again a distinguished writer of fiction enters the frequently trodden paths of seventeenth-century...

Ireland Revisited. By Charles Graves. (Hutchinson. 16s.) MR. CHARLES GRAVES must be an indefatigable man. Fresh from revisiting the Riviera, he was early last summer driven...

Tuts is an even more ambitious book than its title suggests, for the author has realised that in order to understand contemporary Music— or at least in order to explain it—it is...

[A Book Token for one guinea will be awarded to the sender of the first correct solution of this week's crossword to be opened after noon on Tuesday week, yune 21st. Envelopes...

A , A .113G E ‘si 0 a lt Fz;E.mlo,r,1 1 I 'e C.1111s1 - r 12 0 I ING rss E s s U U M UTIL!I T E C A S H II SOLUTION ON JUNE 24 The winner of Crossword No. 531 is Miss...

English Country Stories. Introduction by Ronald Lewin. (Paul Elek. 12s. 6d.) - Fancy Free. Edited by W. G. Bebtafiagton. (Allen & Unwin. 6s.) THE modern short story at the...

The Essential Mary Webb. Selected with an Introduction by Martin Armstrong. (Cape. 12s. 6d.) WITH the advent - of Mr. Armstrong's anthology it .is time to realise that Mary...

THERE will be a steady flow of travellers from this country to Switzerland in the next few months. Very few of them will include in their limited and varied luggage anything...

By CUSTOS Jr is hard to keep pace with the mental acrobatics of Sir. Stafford Cripps, One week we find him giving industry a pat on the back for its faithful adherence to...