HE rejection of the Belgo-Dutch mediation offer by Herr 1 Hitler may or may not be the prelude to more active nwitary operations. Herr von Ribbentrop's threats are, of course,...

Herr Himmler and his Gestapo are doing everything in their power to convert the bomb outrage in the Munich beer-cellar from tragedy into farce. The allegation, broad- cast...

The arrest of the head of the Arrow Cross Party, Baron Kameny, by the Hungarian Government, and his sentence to seven months' imprisonment, is an event of some import- ance....

An attractive scheme is launched by Mr. J. M. Keynes in the columns of The Times for paying for the war and enabling earners to save some of the money which at present they must...

Germany is working hard at her plans for establishing a " Continental Blockade " against Britain. Though Russia and the Balkans are essential to her ambitious schemes, she would...

Broadsheet No. 154 of P.E.P. (Political and Economic Planning) concerns Planning for European Order and World Order. It wisely distinguishes between the settlement of 3 Peace...

On Tuesday the House of Commons showed itself keenly alive to- the fact that the Mercantile Marine is part of this country's main line of defence and to the necessity of con-...

There is deadlock in the Russo-Finnish negotiations. In their third visit to Moscow the Finnish delegation spent ten days on three hours' conversation, and, unable to comply...

The House of Commons has been of one mind in express- mg its views about the inadequacy of the allowances for the children of men in the fighting forces, and the Government has...

The need of providing accommodation for civil servants and other officials in the provinces was foreseen by the Government long before the outbreak of war, but the hard- ship...

It is regrettable in the extreme that the Criminal Justice Bill, which had its Second Reading in December last year, and has met with general approval so far as its main...

Sir John Simon made prompt response to the Liberal proposal that a Select Committee of the House of Commons should be appointed to examine civil and military expenditure...

In her broadcast to the women of the Empire last Satur- day the Queen, with her quick intuition, touched on just those aspects of women's work which most need emphasis- ing...

T HE war, accordin g to a spokesman of the German Hi g h Command, is about to be g in. It has been about to be g in before, notably when Herr von Ribben- trop's Danzi g speech...

T HE public schools have had to bear their share in the upheaval which has affected all primiry, secondary and higher education, but are now settling down under war-time...

only just beginning. It is distressing that one of the first should be the Cornhill, so admirable a survival of the Victorian days, when the taste for reading what was instruc-...

The Times has drawn to the ;historical importance of Plymouth's celebration of the 5ooth anniversary of the granting of its municipal charter. There are not many British cities...

to the Parliamentaryship of the Ministry of Shipping is that it is a case of the right man being half-way towards the right place. By accident or design the appointment was...

new Neutrality Act in the United States has set up against visits by Americans to this country. Under the Act no American ship may come into British or French waters and no...

who were not well-informed on this—the shortest flying distance from Germany to the coast of Britain, assuming the neutrality of Holland and Belgrum to be respected, is just...

15 German raiding bombers have been shot down by our fighters without the loss of a single machine of ours, while highly gratifying so far as it goes, emphasises pointedly the...

something which concern the censor, and one of them suggests that he and his brethren are wondering whether they will soon be having to submit the drafts of their Sunday...

BY STRATEGICUS I T seems possible that we are on the eve of great events which may put an end to the quiescent period of the war and completely transform the general situation....

By DOROTHY L. SAYERS (being war-time letters and documents of the Wimsey family) Honoria Lucasta, Dowager Duchess of Denver, to her American friend, Cornelia, wife of Mr....

By LORD EUSTACE PERCY W E are all determined not to repeat, in making peace, the mistakes of 1919. But our diagnosis of these mis- takes has hardly gone beyond the confession...

By ERWIN D. CAN HAM Washington, November 6th. A S I write this to catch the invaluable trans-Atlantic air- mail, the House of Representatives has just carried by a substantial...

By HOWARD HAYCRAFT DRESS dispatches from Italy a few weeks ago brought word that detective novels by Agatha Christie and Edgar Wallace had been included in the latest book-ban...

By WILHELM NECKER ripHE Nazis have fired the Reichstag." That was the 1 universal conviction in Germany on the very day after the conflagration. It may be said today that there...

By OSBERT SITWELL O FTEN in the past the slow, robust good humour of my countrymen has angered me, but never again shall I allow myself this mood of irritation, for now I...

By CYNTHIA SAUNDERS T HE K.C. laid his black hat and coat on a red leather chair underneath the trellised window overlooking the High Street, rubbed his hands and said, " A...

By JOHN MeNEILLIE D AFT ADAM sat on the corn-chest rolling cigarettes. It was too dark for him to see what his short fingers were doing, but he rolled cigarettes one after...

under- estimated this sense of mission which is at the root of German national self-assertiveness. " We have," wrote Arndt in 1815, " been placed by God in the centre of Europe....

to understand the Germans, will agree with me that there is a profound duality in the German character. On the one hand there is envy, hatred, malice and all uncharitableness:...

may be true and is certainly most uncomfortable. But if, as you contend, this urge for expansiot is deeply rooted in German tradition, how on earth can we enucleate it except at...

better defined than in Sir Eyre Crowe's famous memorandum of January ist, 1907. That memorandum deserves to be quoted again and again:— " The vague and undefined schemes of...

it is impossible to resist the conclusion that our essential error was to interpret Herr Hitler's ambitions in terms of " nationalism " (which for many of us still has about it...

By HAROLD NICOLSON S IR WALTER LAYTON has been warning us against 10 the danger of epitomising this war under the slogan of "a fight to destroy Hitlerism." He contends that if...

" The Frozen Limits." At the Gaumont. The Frozen Limits seems to this reviewer the funniest English picture yet produced ; more than that, it can bear comparison with the...

MUSIC On Wenlock Edge " LAST Sunday at Sadler's Wells Theatre Vaughan Williams's song-cycle, " On Wenlock Edge," was sung by Mr. John Wright, with the Stratton quartet and Mr....

PRIZES of book tokens for £2 2S. and LI is. are offered for a dissertation (of not more than 35o words) on The English Week-End, as it might be written by a foreign...

It has happened with inexplicable frequency that war-years have proved famous for the best vintages. Are they also famous for autumn coloration? If I may give a personal...

It is appropriate both to the date and to general fitness that the National Trust should have taken up its war-time head- quarters near West Wycombe, the beautiful village that...

Were ever the Barberries more splendid in leaf and berry? A beautiful combination is the white-stemmed Dictyophyllum with the purple-leaved Thunbergi or Prattii. The excep-...

A cursory examination of the food of some particularly plump pheasants proved the unexpected fact that they had been feeding almost exclusively on tomatoes and woody night-...

Books of the Day THE outstanding qualities of Mr. Eliot's thought, as of his prose, are purity, precision, self-discipline, and a grave sense of intellectual responsibility,...

ROTHENSTEIN, as I have before had occasion to say, adds to the roles of painter and professor that of liaison officer for art with the eminent in literature, science, politics...

Can America Stay Neutral ? By A. W. Dulles and H. F. Arm- strong. (Hamish Hamilton. 7s. 6d.) THE Library of American Neutrality and Isolation grows apace. Each turn of the...

Why Britain is at War. By Harold Nicolson. (Penguin Books. 6d.) THIS is an admirable summary of the events and policies immediately preceding the present war. It is vigorously...

AT Wilton, from the usual damp cellar, Lord Herbert has unearthed a great mass of eighteenth-century documents. They belong to the period of the tenth Earl of Pembroke, who was...

Life as Carola. By Joan Grant. (Methuen. los. 6d.) WITHOUT for one moment doubting the sincerity with which Miss Joan Grant recalls the experiences of her previous...

IN Farmer's Creed, his first book, Mr. Porteous began to tell the story of his escape from the prospect of life-imprison- ment in a Manchester cotton warehouse. He told there...

The March of Literature. From Confucius to Modern Times. By Ford Madox Ford. (Allen and Unwin. r6s.) THIS enormous posthumous book of Ford Madox Ford is a kind of literary...

Wall Street Under Oath. By Ferdinand Pecora. (Cresset Press. 8s. 6d.) THE work of the Senate Commission, whose discoveries in Wall Street's practices and ethics are summarised...

THERE can be no historian alive who has contributed so much to so many fields of history, ancient, mediaeval and modern, as Sir Charles Oman, and there are besides his valuable...

Oxford. By Christopher Hobhoust.. (Batsford. 8s. 6d.) OXFORD means almost as many things as there are under- graduates who inhabit it. "One law for the rich, another for the...

Tins book is a collection of ten broadcasts delivered by Mr. Gunther from to America between July gth and September 3rd, 1939. During those immensely critical weeks he had...

English Scholars. By David C. Douglas. (Cape. 15s.) IF it were only the more thrilling claims of love that lead the young, in Yeats's words, to neglect "monuments of unageing...

Flaubert and Madame Bovary. By Francis Steegmuller. (Hale. r25. 6d.) THE cover of this book suggests a popular piece of scandal on the " love life " of one of the great ; but...

Dusty Measure : a Record of Troubled Times. By Colonel Sir Thomas Montgomery-Cuninghame, Bart., D.S.O. (Murray. 125.) IN the opening pages of his entertaining autobiography Sir...

Here Lies : The Collected Stories of Dorothy Parker. (Longmans. 7s. 6d.) HIGH up on any list of notable exports from the United States should be recorded the wisecracks of...

Land, Labour and Diet in Northern Rhodesia. By Dr. A. I. Richards. (Oxford University Press. 3os.) THIS is another of the series of books published for the International...

Journey through Life. By Amedie Ozenfant. (Gollancz. 16s.) So intensely personal a book as M. Ozenfant's presents a certain problem to the reviewer. Here is one individual's...

A Painter's Pilgrimage Through Fifty Years. By A. S. Hartrick, R.W.S. (Cambridge University Press. t5s.) WANDERING through the picture galleries of provincial France, from time...

Tumbledown Dick. By Howard Spring. (Faber. 6s.) Emeralda ! Ahoy ! By Elisabeth Fairholme and Pamela Powell. (Heinemann. 5s.) Locomotive, By Julian Tuwin. (Minerva. 7s. 6d.)...

I Ant unable to place these three novels in order of merit. Each is a sound, respectable piece of work, but none has aroused me to any kind of enthusiasm, pro or contra. Perhaps...

[Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. Signed letters are given a preference over those bearing a pseudonym, and the latter must...

Snt,—I cannot claim to be fully conversant with the whole range of German propaganda, but about one branch of it, at least, I feel that many will agree with your corre- spondent...

Stn,—As neither Mr. Nicolson nor Mr. Fleming brings any charge of cowardice, it is not at all clear why they should describe as " yellow " the odd assortment of political groups...

between the food values of an animal in a wild state and of the same animal in a " domestic " state I cannot say. But rabbit meat has been noted as comparatively worthless by...

Strategicus," in his survey of the possibility of inva- sion, does not touch upon the use of boat-like tanks. During the last War designs were prepared, but the idea does not...

the serious plight of education in London, though it is imposiible to feel that the promise of schools to be opened at an indefi- nite date; and then only for children over II...

Sut, — Mr. E. H. Holthouse, who won first prize in your Competition No. 6, gives " meticulous " as a word " always used in wrong sense as substitute for ' scrupulous," punc-...

Sia,—We have heard much about refugees to this country from all parts of Europe. Huge sums have been collected, generous assistance given in the shape of free quarters, school-...

SIR,—In common with some of your subscribers, I was inclined at one time to discontinue taking The Spectator, but on consideration I came to the conclusion that the fact that...

Sul,—Mr. Gowan's article is most timely. It provides an excellent alternative to the Spens policy of increasing new class divisions and excluding poorer children from...

Snt,—The only defence I have to make against Mr. Bates's remarks about the expression of a point of view in my Country Relics is that he gives an impression of it as an...

By CUSTOS PRICES have been rising this week, but not on the Stock Exchange. In fact, Throgmorton Street is beginning to get exercised about the pace of the rise in wholesale...

of a longish war. If one thing is clear, it is the emergence of Canada as a prosperous and industrialised country. True, there is to be a close watch on profits from armament...

(Continued from page 726) PETROL POOL OPERATIONS A bit at a time the financial black-out is being lifted. This week we must give thanks to the Petroleum Board for as full a...

PROSPERITY IN SOUTH WALES These are better days for industry in South Wales. Tinplate is booming and the coal trade, despite rising costs, is doing well. Investors will...

The Rhodesian Copper producers have now confirmed their arrangement to supply a large proportion of their output to the Government at prices approximating to those ruling...

I do not know what the turnover figures are but I should be surprised if, even allowing for war requirements, they have held up to pre-war levels. It is also pretty clear that...

throw a little more light on this problem. From Mr. Chester Beatty's reviews of the position of Roan Antelope. and Rhodesian Selection Trust we learn that his group are now...

RHOKANA CORPORATION A SATISFACTORY RESULT THE seventeenth annual ordinary general meeting of the Rhokana Corporation, Limited, was held on Wednesday last at Southern House,...

Book Token for one guinea will be given to the sender of the first correct solution of this week's crossword puzzle to be opened. Envelopes should be marked " Crossword Puzzle,"...

The winner of Crossword No. 36 is E. Currey, 3 Beverley Road, Colchester.