Thecon title of the glomeration of services, personal and financial which we comprehend under the Welfare State has a long history. It was Elizabeth 1 who introduced the idea of...

Sir: William Waldergrave has produced a good case against electoral reform (October 25), but I do wish he would not invoke the tiresome old argument about whether or not...

From Mrs Winifred Ewing, MP (SNP, Moray and Firth) Sir: I must congratulate Ian Ross on his remarkably perceptive article on the SNP (October 25). As an MP, of some eight years...

Sir: Robert Skidelsky has missed the essence of Paul Addison's new book , The Road to 1945: British Politics and the Second World War, which he reviewed in your October 25...

From Mrs Joyce Mew Sir: The blue eyes of Mr Guinness would seein to be contemplating a world of f antasy not taking a cold hard look at r ealityEurope is not out of the way. And...

From Brigadier Michael Calvert Sir: After General Wingate's second Chindit Operation in 1944 1 had the honour of dining privately more than once with the Viceroy, Field-Marshal...

Sir: Paul Griffin condemns himself by his article on comprehensive education. If a mature male human being is willing to allow fifteenand sixteen-year-olds to behave as those in...

Sir: Mr G. Reichardt is justified (October 25) in taking Lord Hailsham to task for his somewhat loose argument for belief in God. However, your correspondent himself is guilty...

From Mrs M. W. Watkins Sir: May I congratulate you on the very enlightening article (September 27) describing the hospitality enjoyed by British journalists as guests of the...

Sir: Had I attended an Anglican, or for that matter a Church of Scotland, service marred by the amateurish though sincere efforts of a pop group, it would have been self-evident...

Exploring Labour differences Patrick Cosgrave I have said before that I simply do not see that great divide between right and left in the Labour Party which others have...

Was totally mystified by the shock and horror With which many of my most respected friends reacted to Mr Wilson's amiable little bow to the Crown Prince of...

What kind of future under King Juan Carlos? John Organ General Franco, dying slowly in his rural Pardo Palace outside Madrid, refusing to give up power even though wracked by...

The Gre a t Secret, to wit the appointment of a New Editor for the Observer, has so much exercised the minds of the Lobby Fellows here in the Club that scarce a word has been...

The myth and the reality George Hills Generalissimo Franco said on several occasions that he wished to be judged only by God and History. In his lifetime he had the misfortune...

Personal memoir Peter Kemp My only meeting with General Franco was in July 1939. I had just relinquished my subaltern's commission in the Spanish Foreign Legion after three...

Manna from Arabia Peter Hobday The thousand and one knights and assorted VIPs who queued patiently for their turn to shake Crown Prince Fahd's hand in Claridge's ballroom...

The last kidnapping? Rawle Knox Put cold-bloodedly, the Irish government was on a winner to nothing when it decided not to treat with the kidnappers of the Dutch...

The ludicrous oil crusade Ian Davidson The British g overnment has always made it absolutely clear that it re g ards the coordination of its foreign policy with that of other...

Jim Hi gg ins In the years of my extreme youth, following the last war, I joined the Communist Party. In Short order my youthful enthusiasm and i g n orance-induced loyalty...

Last week's reports on experiments at Cambridge in which the eyeballs of kittens have been surgically rotated have re-focused attention on controversial animal experimentation....

Alasdair Macintyre on Russell's flawed biography Mr Clark's biography* of Bertrand Russell is co nstructed on so massive a scale that we are unlikely to have another biography...

Francis King Edith Wharton R. W.S. Lewis (Constable £6.50) The popular view of Edith Wharton, derived largely from Percy Lubbock's brilliant but subtly derogatory biographyof...

R. A. Butler £ T 1 49 h .o e 560) P 1 9 a 3 s 9 t s a Ma ts o r s l d : Po litics m a cmilla a n nd (M This book is much shorter than Harold Macmillan's autobiography and we...

Alan Clark The Eastern Front 1914-1917 Norman Stone (Hodder and Stoughton £5.50) Whether or not the outcome of the Great War was decided on the Eastern Front, what is...

Jeremy Trafford _ Unquiet Soul — A Biography of Charlotte Bronte Margot Peters (Hodder and Stoughton £5.95) "Hunger, rage and rebellion," in Matthew Arnold's view, were the...

Blood and thunder Peter Ackroyd The King's Servant John Gardner (Jonathan Cape £3.95) Stephen Decatur, the Devil and the Endymion Brian Burland (George Allen and Unwin £3.95)...

Sweet dreams Benny Green Ever since Dr Freud started to frighten the life out of everybody, we have become so nervous about the revelations of our subconscious that even the...

It was chivalrous of Messrs Macmillan to take over the Stationers Hall to tiste the seventieth birthday of C. P. Snow — and, since it was a champagne evening, not cheap. With a...

Perpetuating poverty and homelessness Moyra Bremner "Poverty is when you have to save up to buy food each week." This is not a quote from Mayhew or Dickens, but the words of a...

Robert Ashley 'A second mirriage, as Dr Johnsal Observed, is an example of hope tnumphing over experience. But, as we all know, there are many examples of men marrying not just...

The day of the witch doctor John Linklater Ensconced behind a mask of terror and the other paraphernalia of his trade, the witch doctor would as readily agree to point a bone...

Anvils of faith Martin Sullivan "The most important event in human history is the almost simultaneous appearance in the civilised world of higher forms of religion in the...

To Tipperary with digressions Denis Wood From Killiney, where I started one day, you have to go into Dublin as far as Ballsbridge before setting out on the road alongside the...

Cinema Literate pictures Kenneth Robinson Love and Death Director and star: Woody Allen 'A' ABC2 (80 mins) The Romantic Englishwoman Director: Joseph Losey. Stars: Glenda...

Wonderful lover Robin Young If Shakespeare had known that Baryshnikov could dance Romeo like this, he might never have bothered to write the play. It is not often that dancers...

Mood indigo Kenneth Ilurren Too True to be Good by Bernard Shaw (Aldwych) Lies! by Trevor Baxter (Albery) Betzi by William Douglas Home (Theatre Royal, Haymarket) Play by Play...

Cork Street in decline John McEwen If Bryan Organ were not showing at the Redfern and David Inshaw at Waddington, they wouldn't warrant much attention. But the Redfern,...

Another batch of the choicest Jenkinsiana (mark Hugh) are to hand. In an adjournment debate on October 21, the Minister for the Arts held forth on financial assistance from...

Borrowing and market pointers Nicholas Davenport The most sickening press photograph which has appeared for a long time was that of the British Prime Minister bending low to...

It won't be the same without Jim Skinflint The City won't be the same without Jim Slater. He had acquired an almost superhuman reputation he was reckoned to be percipient...

Donald Cowie What is the principalcause of our present economic disaster? It is clearly the institution of the National Debt, a method of deficit financing which has spread...

Charles R. Stahl The myth of gold being a safe oasis against inflation has been conclusively destroyed: from the all-time high fix of $197.50 in London on December 30, 1974,...

Too old at sixty? Bernard Hollowood Lord Ryder says that our boards of directors are too aged, that British industry needs an injection of youth. The elderly, he says, "are...