not the style When we called, the other week, for just that delegation of senior Republican leaders, led by Senator Goldwater, to the White House, to request the resignation of...

than the absurd excuse for a P r ogramme to combat inflation put forWard by Mr Heath and the Shadow Chance llor, Mr Carr, at last weekend's conference for condidates. Here were...

Racial discrimination in Britain has rather gone out of the headlines, as more immediate problems have faced government and country alike. It should, however, be recorded and...

As we have suggested before, a number of political decisions relating to Britain's North Sea oil deposits, depend on estimates of the value of those deposits. Both the last...

It will be sad indeed if the present dispute between Spain and Morocco over the Spanish Sahara leads to the kind of confrontation which King Hassan of Morocco, in his more...

Sir: [would go further than Mr Seldon in last week's issue of the Spectator: the difficulty about inflation is not so much that hardly anyone knows the truth, rather that we...

Sir: I must apologise for writing to you yet again, but I felt that Mr Clarke's letter (The Spectator, July 27) should not go unanswered in view of his past association with Mr...

From the Hon. Terence Prittie Sir: Having just returned from a tri p abroad, I read Lord Gordon Walker s kind review of my biography of WillY Brandt with interest and gratitud...

Sir: Mr Skelsey's letter (August 3) in response to my article on railway modernisation in fact raises more questions than it answers. Certainly, it prompts me to make some...

The reward would be spectacular ai R r oYs, Shirleys, Tonys, Michaels, et atta inment? a nonymous. be Persuaded to be less self-effacing? man height is possible of rapid gether...

Sir: We should be grateful for the op-• portunity to correct the errors of fact included in Mr Stewart's article (July 13). He states that "credit cards are the natural allies...

Sir: I must confess to being somewhat puzzled by the article by Mrs Mary Whitehouse in your issue of July 27. She has not, to my knowledge, ever been present at an FPA sex...

Sir: Professor Geoffrey Wagner's lamentations (July 27) about the price of claret in the US might arouse more sympathy did he seem to care more about wine. The 1964 vintage was...

How socialist is Labour? Patrick Cosgrave It is hard to tell which arouses greater Tory indignation—Lord Stansgate's open declaration of intent to nationalise everything in...

On leaving the RAF after the war I joined my family firm which sells pictures in St James's Street. One of my first memories there was meeting Lord Ilchester and Sir Henry Hake,...

The champion double-dealer of them all Al Capp The most deeply grieved of all Americans are the 61 per cent who voted for Richard Nixon. The others always felt he was a...

Winning the battle of words Sam Swerling The Tory defeat at the last election has at least given the party time to step aside for the moment. It now has the chance to...

Could it happen here? A Senior Officer Last December an article in these columns by Patrick Cosgrave postulated the possibility of a military coup in this country. While this...

A study in scarlet faces John O'Sullivan "Come in, Watson, you are here no doubt to discuss the curious affair of Mr Dick Taverne and the Liberal Party, At first sight a...

So tricky Dick is bowing out. They say he'd fussed about his pension There can't be really any doubt, Although one sees his apprehension, Although he said he'd never quit, At...

Uneasy alliance Ian Meadows Some weeks ago Turkish Cypriot leader Rauf Denktash told me quite categorically that he would, without reserve, accept any document or agreement...

The merest inquiry in the chop houses, the ale house, aye and in the bawdy houses of England will swiftly evince the truth that Puzzle is a great lover of the vocal art. True...

Inside the drug scene (2) Hustlers, straights and freaks Mervyn Harris Mervyn Harris, author of 'The Dilly Boys', is a South African writer who has spent some years in...

The action brought by the Church Commissioners for England against The Spectator came before the High Court (Queen's Bench Division) on July 30. The following is the Statement...

Pugwash goes public Bernard Dixon An opinion poll conducted in 1965 — just a few years after Britain's nuclear force had been the subject of intense and passionate public...

Hope for the fag Philip Kleinman the safe cigarette will soon be here. Or will it? Readers of last week's newspaper reports of the press conference given by Imperial Tobacco's...

Oasis of prayer Martin Sullivan I have lately been interested to observe the number of young people who are present in St. Paul's' at a week day Evensong at 4pm. This is a...

Spanish garden Denis Wood To many of us the term 'Spanish gardens' implies the enclosed gardens and patios seen chiefly in the hot south of Spain, in Andalusia. These derive...

Edmund Wilson revisited T.S. Matthews It would be an exaggeration to say that Edmund Wilson was the mentor of my youth, but an exaggeration with a modicum of truth. For the...

Richard Luckett on re-emphasising Hardy's greatness "I used once to say that I shouldn't have known he was a great novelist if I hadn't been told. After sufficiently dogged...

George Gale War And Politics Bernard Brodie (Cassell £3.50) The idea of this book, central and simple and borrowed from Clausewitz as we are told, is "that the question of why...

William Sargant Samuel Taylor Coleridge: A Bondage of Opium Molly Lefebure (Gollanz £6.00) Having been born and lived in Highgate for many years, I was always interested in...

Humphry Berkeley John Bull's Nigger Dillibe Onyeama (Leslie Frewin £2.50) "Darling, I simply can't wait to be black," was . my greeting some years ago at a multi-racial party...

Fritz Spiegl The Bodley Head History of Western Music Christopher Headington (Bodley Head (£5.00) Let me say at once that this is a very good book , a near-miracle of...

Set to music Benny Green The other week I was reading Bernard Levin in the Times telling us of the troubles he had been having distinguishing the works of M. Beaumarchais from...

Bookend It is always nice to welcome what is known as a 'sleeper' — a book which, without any particular publicity, makes its way quietly from inauspicious beginnings to become...

Duncan Fallowell on thoroughly modern Polanski Chinatown Director: Roman Polanski. Stars: Jack Nicholson, Faye Dunaway, John Houston. 'X' Empire, Leicester Square (131 minutes)...

Mixed blessings Rodney Elms The English National Opera's first week of activity has certainly not been trouble-free: unofficial indus trial action in the wardrobe depart ment...

Black art Robin Young The Dance Theatre of Harlem is an astonishing company, not only — or even primarily — because it is black, but because it is so young and so good. It was...

Sour Kraut Gill Pyrah Stallerhof, the first of Franz Xaver Kroetz's plays to be translated from the German, is a work of conscious pessimism which receives the unsentimental...

Press accounts of the collapse of baritone Thomas Allen in mid. number at last week's Prom performance of Carl Orrm's Carmina Burana were variously inaccurate: the heat of the...

The economics of envy Nicholas Davenport One thing is clear. By bringing al a wealth tax and a gifts tax Mr Healey is not going to realise his professed aim, which he defined...

Charles R. Stahl Nicholas Davenport, writing in the July 13 issue of The Spectator, was kind enough to draw the attention of his readers to this column which usually appears...