grander days, our distinguished public figures could amuse themselves by draw- ing and redrawing the map of Europe, of Africa, or even of Asia. But in the two decades since Lord...

POLITICAL COMMENTARY AUBERON WAUGH This week has been dominated by yet another instalment of the unhappy soap opera of Mrs Castle's proposed Industrial Relations Bill—with the...

FOREIGN FOCUS CRABRO Save us from our friends. M Couve de Murville used sometimes to suggest, when upbraided by his colleagues for his negative attitude towards British...

AMERICA MURRAY KEMPTON New York—The pattern of Mr Nixon's mind is finally emerging after four months' submersion. It has now been described by Robert Semple. Jr., with the tact...

COMMUNIST SUMMIT TIBOR SZAMUELY 'Observe and hearken: two Romes have fallen; the first was Rome, the second Byzantium. But a third Rome stands. Moscow is the Third Rome, and no...

THE PRESS BILL GRUNDY We may have our eyes fixed on the future but our noses keep fascinatedly sniffing the nostalgia of Normandy twenty-five years ago. Andrew Wilson in the...

and the promise PETER J. SMITH Peter Smith is science correspondent of the SPECTATOR. He has recently returned from a scientific research post in California. The most...

PPE to PPB DAVID HOWELL, MP This morning I have just concluded a breakfast meeting with the cabinet and with the heads of federal agencies and I am asking each of them to...

PERSONAL COLUMN JOCK BRUCE-GARDYNE, MP We should know by now—we have been told often enough—that as a nation we are profoundly resistant to change. It seems to be one of the...

J. W. M. THOMPSON Mr Stewart's pious expression of hope that British tourists will avoid Spain this summer won't achieve very much. Most of them have already made their...

MEDICINE JOHN ROWAN WILSON The success of western European institu- tions over the past few centuries has hypnotised a great many people into imagining that they have some kind...

CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS The water tower on Campden Hill, which formed the central feature in Chesterton's The Napoleon of Notting Hill, is to be pulled down as part of a new...

MOTOR RACING PETER ALLEN The Le Mans 24-hour race takes place this weekend. Sir Peter Allen is chairman of IC!. How do you identify a great sporting event? The Derby, the Cup...

TABLE TALK DENIS BROGAN I must be one of the few people taking an interest in politics, national and. inter- national, not to have read any account of either of the speeches...

BOOKS PATRICK COLLINSON 'Then was the Sacred Bible sought out of the dusty corners where prophane False- hood and Neglect had thrown it.' Thus Milton, consolidating the...

TONY TANNER The temperamental conservative and the temperamental radical often have one strong feeling in common—a contempt for the dominant ethics and prevailing social sys-...

DAVID MARTIN Revolution and Counter-revolution S. M. Lipset (Heinemann 63s) This massive book by Professor Seymour Lipset might easily have been called `Further Studies in...

Politic views M. CAPITANCHIK The Gale of the World Henry Williamson (Macdonald 30s) The French Lieutenant's Woman John Fowles (Jonathan Cape 35s) A Tale of Love, Alas David...

From the 'Spectator.' 12 June /869—The regular average of persons killed in London by horses. or rather their drivers. is four a week, two companies of infantry. say. a year....

50s) Rising son FRANCES DONALDSON Since the publication of the first volume of Randolph Churchill's life of his father, there has been an inclination to see Lady Randolph...

AUBERON WAUGH The Making of a Nation: Biafra Arthur A. Nwankwo and Samuel V. Ifejika (C. Hurst 55s) If Nigerian history, had not moved inex- orably to such a tragic conclusion...

(Andre Deutsch 42s). Roaring bore SHIVA NAIPAUL `Woodford Square roared its approval and the roar was heard in London and Wash- ington. I had crossed the Rubicon. The...

LUDOVIC KENNEDY How about this for history repeating itself? First, an extract from Jellicoe, p 109: 'Striding into Room 40 on the morning of 31 May, [Captain] Jackson...

illuminating and touching portrait of the Master as domestic man—a role which, it emerges from this book, he fulfilled with the rarest tact and grace. Minutely aware of his...

The Counter Reformation A. G. Dickens (Thames and Hudson 35s cloth. 21s paper). Professor A. G. Dickens has contributed a further admirable volume to the Thames and Hudson...

Frewin 35s). Not what the title seems to promise—a demolition of Shaw's claim to be a major playwright. Instead assorted anecdotes and reminis- cences purporting to reveal the...

ARTS HILARY SPURLING If this has been so far a singularly fine season—containing, among other pleasures too numerous to mention. Nicol William- son's Hamlet at the Roundhouse,...

BALLET CLEMENT CRISP Sadler's Wells Theatre is our own interna- tional house in N I; since last I wrote of the exciting Nederlands Dans Theater season there, it has played host...

MUSIC MICHAEL NYMAN As chance would have it last week saw the first performance of Messiaen's 'enormous and spectacular' La Transfiguration in Lisbon (which I missed) while...

Indian reservations PENELOPE HOUSTON The Guru (Academy One, V') The Heart is a Lonely Hunter (Warner, 'A') Run Wild, Run Free (Odeon, Leicester Square, V') The Italian Job...

NICHOLAS DAVENPORT The strange idea is being bruited abroad that the Americans have changed their atti- tude towards international monetary reform and have become more...

LETTERS From Kingsley Amis, Maurice Cowling, the Rev Geoffrey Lawn, Patrick Nealon, Edmund Crispin, D. A. N. Jones, Dr E. J. Mishan, Eldon Griffiths MP, Aryeh H. Samuel, H. P....

be interested to know that the article he attacks was an edited version of a speech delivered at a Conservative educa- tional conference about six weeks ago. It had no relevance...

PORTFOLIO JOHN BULL Brokers Phillips and Drew, in a recent cir- cular, have pinpointed four of the factors which they believe explain this bear market. There has been some...

Sir: In his article, 'A reply to my critics,' (7 June) Mr Ludovic Kennedy has com- municated to me, very successfully, that he is arrogant, much given to half-truths, and...

Sir: Surely the most important point about Mr Heath's visit to America is that it was an outstanding success ('Spectator's note- book,' 30 May). At no time over the last two or...

Sir: The 1968 Labour party conference carried a resolution urging the Government to prevent the sale of arms to Nigeria. But, as Richard West writes (Letters, 30 May), John...

Sir: I intrude into the learned debate be- tween Lord Snow and Dr Shahak (Letters, 16 and 30 May) as an innocent layman. I do not know the facts. I do not know whether or not,...

Sir: May I clear up this 'obverse' business once for all? Taking all the literary gentlemen in turn: (a) 'obverse' does not mean 'reverse'. There- fore Messrs Reid and Ashbrook...

May, 7 June). 'Counterpart' can mean an opposite, but it can also mean a duplicate: 'obverse' can mean a comple- ment but it can also mean an opposite. Apart from the use of...

Sir: Since Leslie Adrian ('Consuming inter- est', 7 June) does not make clear that the experimental consumer advice centre at Croydon was, and its immediate successor will be,...

Sir: Recently you mentioned there had been riots in Berkeley (23 May), but in this you were misinformed: amazingly, there were not riots here. What did occur was a new...

Sir: Your leader (30 May) omits some of the more important long-range reasons for lunar exploration and eventual colonisation. First, any sustained moon colony can provide an...

Sir: It must be rare for Colonel Fleming (30 May) to bewilder his regular readers; but why is it 'lackadaisical' for Mr Cecil King to refer to his brother's regiment in two...

Sir:The SPECTATOR reaches me a week late so I have only now read Sir Denis Brogan's `Table talk' of 23 May. I had not noticed that Saint Cecilia had just missed being demoted by...

Sir: Here we are, one-half century into the totalitarian age, and Mr Roger Franklin (Letters, 23 May) seems to have learned nothing. He still believes that a world war can be...

AFTERTHOUGHT The first in a series of important articles in which the quality of greatness in journalism is examined and analysed by Field-Marshal Lord Gauntmummery of...

COMPETITION The BBC has decided to drop Land of Hope and Glory and Rule, Britannia from the programme on the last night of the Proms this year, because, it is reported, these...

Trevor Grove reports: Readers who felt a trifle bored at the sameness of the fare offered by most festivals in this country were invited to liven the scene up a bit by devising...

Across 1 Name-dropper not quite up to Mrs Leo's stan- dard! (4-6) 6 Barkers' advertisements for wreaths? (4) 10 He shared a common end with several Mes- dames Smith! (5) 11 A...

PHILIDOR Specially contributed by R. W. Searley (Essex). White to play and mate in three moves; solution next week. Solution to no. 442 (Sheppard): B - Kt 6, threat P - Q 4. 1...