That France should have a government which has lasted a full week, and that its head should have twice secured majorities of over a hundred in the Asembly, is matter, not indeed...

T HE seriousness of the statement on defence measures made by Mr. Morrison in the House of Commons on Tuesday can be ignored by no one. On the other hand, it was not made and...

Whether the transference of the talks on Berlin from the German capital back to the Russian makes any practical difference has still to be disclosed. Two clear issues remain to...

The attempt of the Government to justify the convocation of a special session of Parliament this week for the sole purpose of carrying the controversy over the House of Lords a...

The discussions between representatives of the four Foreign Ministers on the future of the Italian colonies in Paris this week did no more—and were generally expected to do no...

The settlement over the distribution of E.R.P. aid which was arrived at last week in Paris will not please everybody, but further delay in reaching a settlement would have...

Viewed in retrospect the Trades Union Congress at Margate must be regarded as reasonably satisfactory from the point of view of the community as a whole, which is the point of...

The changes in salary for student nurses announced on Monday are of much greater importance than the mere addition of (roughly) £30 to the present annual stipends of L70, LSD...

A great deal of sound sense in company reports or speeches at company meetings never reaches the ears ef anyone but a handful of shareholders. There is a great deal to reflect...

-i'LL see you back at school," said a Member of Parliament to I a colleague after playing in a village cricket match last week- end, and the analogy, in this fourth year of this...

T HE war in Hyderabad will not be a long one. Reasonably good roads lead to the heart of the Nizam's dominions, and along these the Indian troops, with their great superiority...

In his British Association address condemning what he described as the totally unscientific convention dictating retirement at the age of 6o or 65 Sir Ernest Rock Carling, the...

A week or two ago I referred to imaginative persons who visualised Lord Kemsley sitting like a bloated spider in his web doing all sorts of things which no respectable Press...

must be reflecting a little about his wisdom in proffering himself (if he did proffer himself ; he may have been invited) as witness before the Royal Commission on the Press to...

I T will be a strange thing if the freedom of the Press has to be defended primarily against the National Union of Journalists, but that body's annual conference last week-end...

he must be a very happy man. He has received from Mr. Henry Cheflew- Henry Chellew, M.A., LL.D., I now observe — a piece of paper (described in a covering letter as a parchment,...

soo leading Communists in countries of the Eastern hemisphere, other than Russia, compiled by a sub-committee of the Committee on Foreign Affairs of the House of Representatives...

By RICHARD HUGHES '' I " RON curtain" is one of the most misleading similes current ; for a curtain has a behind and a before. The simile suigests a kind of optical Great Wall...

By A SPECIAL CORRESPONDENT L AST Sunday the B.B.C., in reporting the death of Mr. Jinnah, quoted the views of their "India and Pakistan" correspondent, obviously from Delhi, to...

By EDWARD TOMKINSON A LMOST since the day its name originated in the fertile brain of the late President Roosevelt, it has been fashionable to predict the imminent dissolution...

By CANON ROGER LLOYD A CHINESE bishop, waiting to go on board ship on his way home after the Lambeth Conference, was uttering his last words of farewell to his English host....

By GUY BOAS F OR long we have been acquainted with all-in wrestling ; recently an announcement appeared of all-in dancing ; now, with the opening this term in Middlesex of a...

By A. TALBOT ROGER'S T HIS century—and in particular the last two decades—has seen unprecedented progress in medical science. But new methods have brought a new complexity to...

By R. II. CECIL C URSING and swearing are to remain criminal. In July the Attorney-General invited Parliament to reconsider the Profane Oaths Act, 1745, which says that "if any...

By HAROLD NICOLSON / F I were asked to define the characteristics which differentiate the average Englishman from men of other breeds, I should place in the forefront of my...

MONSIEUR VINCENT is the story of Vincent de Paul who lived in France in the early seventeenth century and was in love with the poor. Through plagues, wars, civil wars and...

THE THEATRE "Playbill." By Terence Rattigan. (Phenix.) Ma. RarrmaN offers two longish one-act plays, sharply contrasting in mood and method, and this novel formula for an...

other dogs in at least one sense ? The question is suggested by two letters, one from Oxford, one from Chesterfield, which are almost identical in their general sense. Both...

the question of vagrant swarms is my apology for returning to the subject. The question of rights in such swarms is by no means settled as a legal correspondent ' suggested. On...

THE Edinburgh Festival ended on Sunday, with the final concert of the Augusteo Orchestra in the afternoon and the Glasgow Orpheus Choir in the evening. Opinions seem to have...

birds has been qualified by this summer's experience ; swifts were to be seen in many parts of the country towards the end of August. One, for example, was watched in London...

I was introduced this week to a flower, a very lovely and useful flower, that was new to me. It is associated with the name of M. Raoul Martin, though I do not know whether he "...

THE harvest fields have taken on a likeness to those of Victorian and earlier days ; they are crowded, as seldom before, with gleaners, men, women and children, who mean real...

details of a report which most people have not seen is liable to become tedious. It is, indeed, a pity that the U.N. Information Office in London appears to receive such reports...

EUROPE'S REFUGEES SIR, —The editorial note on the refugee .question in The Spectator of September 3rd pointed to a significant contrast between the findings of the World...

SIR,—A study of the 1947 Report of the Commissioners of Prisons (Cmd. 7475) gives some indication of social trends and, despite a few disquieting features, supports the idea...

Sut,—As the "unnamed correspondent" whose letter, quoted by Canon Howard in your issue of July 30th, launched the recent correspondence in your columns on the abduction of Greek...

SIR,—It was recently disclosed by the House of Commons Committee on Public Accounts that large numbers of workers were still being trained for the building industry when it was...

SIR,—Mr. Mark Goulden misunderstands me. I did not complain that his firm's production of General Patton's War As I Knew is was in- sufficiently lavish, but that it was ugly....

interesting and stimulating, and not the least so his article on Eduard Benes. I cannot, however, help regretting that he did not refer to the reason why Czechoslovakia did not...

SIR,—In my letter to you of September 3rd I dealt chiefly with the effect that the egregious advertisement I quoted might have on the recruitment of nurses. I am glad that Mr....

Sta,—While revising the notes made during my sojourn among the primitive Natokoi of the Rio Pilcomayo nearly sixty years ago I am again reminded of the general failure of those...

SIR, —For the information - of David Gimston (Humaner Whaling—The Spectator, July 9th) the following may be of interest. The New Zealand whalers, Perano Brothers, of Tory...

SIR,—I have been reading Janus's comments on the Health Service in The Spectator of September 3rd. May I fell you about it from another point of view ? I am the wife of a...

SIR, —A friendly chance made us recently acquainted with your highly esteemed weekly, which was sent us for a long period for the purpose of our educational work. We must admit,...

SIR, —Since, of course, j'assume Janus did not intend to mislead in his note on Lord Kemsley's evidence to the Press Commission in The Spectator of September 3rd I can only...

revealed to Miss Agnes Fry by those two beneficent goddesses, Parsing and Translation, she is no doubt not interested in such a humdrum process as giving a coherent account of...

SIR, —Though our subscripticn to your maw.* was started only recently we met an acquaintance in the first issue—the "` Spanish Confidence Man." Perhaps you already have received...

from Senor M., dated from Mexico City on August 28th, similar to those received by the three gentlemen whose names begin with the first letter of the alphabet. One wonders on...

Revolution Without Tears The Triple Challenge. By Francis Williams. (Heinemann. 10s. 6d.) Mn. FRANCIS WILLIAMS gives his book the sub-title "The Future of Socialist Britain,"...

FRANZ KAFKA is an example of an author who evolved an unusual method of his own ; who stuck to it for the excellent reason that no other was possible to him, and who now...

The Prose of Edward Thomas. Selected by Roland Gant. (Falcon Press. 10s. 6d.) EDWARD THOMAS has had a curious literary history. The legend that grew up about hint in the...

Raphael. By Oskar Fischel. (Regan Paul. £5 5s.) UNTIL his- death in 1939 the late Dr. Oskar Fischel was regarded as the greatest living authority on Raphael. His volumes on the...

Music in the Baroque Era. From Monteverdi to Bach. By Manfred F. Bukofzer. (Dent. 30s.) THE term "baroque" used to denote a definite period of cultural history, is gradually...

IT is an old commonplace that one reason for the maintenance in America of the principles of Federalism and Separation of Powers has been distrust of government as such. In this...

"Ordinary G i rls " Rising Twenty. By Pearl Jephcott. (Faber and Faber. 8s. 6d.) Rising Twenty is sub-titled "Notes on Some Ordinary Girls." There are 103 of these girls all...

The Arabs : A Short History. By Philip K. Hitti. (Macmillan. 10s. 6d.) PROFESSOR HIM has condensed his monumental History of the Arabs, which was published here in 1938, into a...

[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 September 28th....

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Lamb. (Cassell. 10s. 6d.) "MEMORY is a rum thing," writes Dr. Gosse at the beginning of one of his chapters, and he would be the first to admit that he has written a rum book....

By CUSTOS WHATEVER one may feel about Britain's heavy responsibilities in the plan for sharing Marshall Aid it is welcome news that a plan has been agreed which promises to get...