S INCE these lines have of necessity to go to press while Herr von Ribbentrop is making his statement of Germany's case before the League of Nations Council, nothing but...

Air Force Estimates brought out some difficulties in expansion on the side of personnel. In the Army recruiting is very bad. The men offering are too largely of low quality ;...

year's Navy Estimates (which is £10 millions in round figures) appears all the more formidable because it is not final. It does not provide for the new defence programme...

English authors have combined in a plea for the reform of the law of libel. They certainly - had 'reason for it is time that what- the law treats merely. as a.-private question...

Communist, Inter- national has been silenced by the vigour-with which the U.S.S.R. prosecutes its policy of co-operation with capitalist governments. M. Litvinoff's thundering...

has been reported by Marshal Badoglio on. any Ethiopian front. The general position is that the Italians have made or are making good the line of the Takazze, which with the...

The L.C.C. must be congratulated on passing its new scheme for controlling the height of buildings in London. The county is to be divided into three zones, with three categories...

England recently set up by the Archbishops of Canterbury and York has issued a statement of its policy and plans. Its functions are advisory, and it is to act as a means of...

of indignation on the Opposition benches this week is, oddly enough, margarine. The Labour hack-benches take violent exception to the fact that margarine is supplied to the Air...

well to raise once more the question of insuring against death duties. At present if the owner of an estate worth £100,000 took out a policy for £100,000 to cover it, the only...

hardly been given sufficient attention was that in which Lord Cranborne stated the number of•international agreements which the Government is pledged to uphold if necessary ....

watt certainly a surprise, but it has been more generally welcomed than would appear from the popular Press. Many Government supporters would have preferred Mr. Churchill,...

in conditions of life in- the last twenty years is shown exceptionally clearly-by the mortality tables, based on the mortality figures for 1930, 1931 and 1932, now published by...

in the House of Commons has behaved throughout the international crisis with the greatest- restraint. Its leaders have not pressed for a debate while the delicate negotiations...

for men • and women, passed at a crowded meeting in the Caxton Hall on Tuesday,• expresses a just demand which, so far as it is pressed, cannot reasonably be resisted. Yet...

W HEN the international crisis was dealt with in these columns a week ago the dominating question was whether Herr Hitler's word, after his flagrant violation of the Locarno...

T HE Report of the Ullswater Committee on Broad- casting is as complimentary as the B.B.C. could have wished ; and the Committee's recommenda- tions are intended not to...

W ITH the death of M. Venizelos another of the great figures of the post-War period disappears from the stage. They are going fast—as must inevitably be the case. Venizelos,...

By H. G. WELLS S TEELE is so far forgetful of his own urgency for simplification and lucidity that he nowhere gives a synopsis of this Next Beginning of. his .Which is to syn-...

By SIR STEPHEN TALLENTS A SCHOOLMASTER friend of mine asked me the other day, as one who had suffered many changes of occupation, how he was to defend himself against the army...

By FRANK MELLAND No sensible person would oppose increase in native wealth and welfare and a higher scale of living. No one seriously wishes to keep the Africans in primitive...

war, or war-making, is the malady to be cured our faith takes the form of believing that peace can be kept by the equally simple process of making a sufficient treaty to keep...

By THE RIGHT HON. LORD DESBOROUGH, K.G. T HE inconveniences of a shifting Easter are becoming more realised every year. In 1940 Easter Sunday will be on March 24th, within two...

By J. R. GLORNEY BOLTON The bachelor and Socialist Bishop went to live in Hartlebury Castle, and men soon forgot their misgivings. Lord Salisbury, his patron, was the last of...

By H. E. BATES will. (Mille either. The aconites and snowdrops seem to have nothing to do with spring. They are simply, emblems of a between. period, of an interlude between...

By ERIC WALROND T O the dusky throng silently gathered in the waiting room Leon Cabrol was the arbiter of life and death. He was the Consul's clerk. Clad in a pongee silk suit,...

" THE SPECTATOR," MARCH 19TII, 1836. The pressure of Parliamentary matter is lighter this week than usual, in" consequence of there having been, in technical phrase, " no House...

By ROSE MACAULAY. H OW various and multitudinous are the offences coin- -11 mitted by human kind against the laws that seek to regulate their actions ! In a London police court...

The Cinema " Strike Me Pink." At the London Pavilion—" Crime and Punishment." At the Plaza. THE gag-makers have been very well employed on the latest Harold Lloyd film. The...

STAGE AND SCREEN The Theatre and Malcolm Morley. At the Embassy Theatre, Swiss Cottage—" The Town Talks." At the Vaudeville. THE career of Hans Christian Andersen offers...

Verdi and Shakespeare THE production of Verdi's Falstaff at Sadler's Wells sent me back to Shakespeare's Merry Wives, which I had not seen nor read since Tree played Falstaff...

[Von einem deutschen Korrespondenten] Es ist kaum zu glauben, dass Oskar Kokoschka, dieser ewige Jfingling, nach Liebermanns 'rode der bedeutendstc deutsche Maier, heutc schon...

Fish and Flood The fish in our rivers should have a new lease of life, thanks to the renewal of the water if not to the floods. It is true that the coarse fishermen—with...

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR [Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. The most suitable length is that of one of our News of the Week"...

[To the Editor of TIIE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—The Legislature will be confronted with two special difficulties if it attempts to deal with the present development of football pool...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Some years ago you allowed me to plead in your columns for a re-opening of the so-called settlement of 1925 conceived as it was in...

Snr,—In the interests of accuracy a mis-statement in the paragraph on the Tithe question, in your issue of March 6th, should be corrected. The mis-statement is that " the...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—It now seems unlikely that a European war will be fought on the Rhine • issue. But is such a war the worst conceivable outcome of the...

be left unanswered. It is easy to sneer at the activities of the " social worker type," but it is untrue to say, us does Mr. Craig, that " the working classes are quite able to...

own to amazement at reading in the letter of Mr. Alec Craig, in your last number, that the " working classes " (whoever they may be) " only require a just, adequate, and...

the course of the present campaign in East Africa the chief of the Italian Government has been frequently heard to reiterate that " the war which we have commenced on Abyssinian...

to heart. So far as the grant from the .Jubilee Fund is concerned, my information is that this SUM Illtlst, in accordance with the declared purposes of the Fund, be ear- marked...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] • SIR,-,—Why_not repeal the legislation which makes it a criminal offence to sell cheap milk to poor people ? Section 6 [3] of the...

can be no doubt that though the League of Nations has many enemies, very large numbers of people throughout the world are heartily in favOur of the purposes - for which it was...

close with the Fall of Jerusalem—roughly 120 years. They were the very years in which Gaul began to affect the whole of the Roman world with its new wealth, its military...

SPECTATOR.] SIR,—In a recent-issue of The Spectator Mr. F. O'Hanlon makes an attack on the alleged attitude of the Catholic Press of England to the Italo-Abyssinian War. In...

Stn,--In a world torn by suspicion and fear, where every sign of goodwill and understanding is so sorely needed, " Janus " once again sees lit to add his little contribution...

• SIR,—I am very jealous of the good name of the above Com- mittee and of everything connected with the Olympic Games, which they control, and therefore I hope you will...

By ELIZABETH BOWEN TN an age when novelists hum like factories, keeping up to date with themselves, Mr. E. M. Forster's output has been, in bulk, small. The novels which, with...

1111.asry excellent books have been written upon the Dardanelles Campaign, both from the British and the Turkish sides, some official, some as personal narratives told by...

HEIDEN has already written the best history of the National Socialist movement. He has now written the berg biography of its Fiihrer. It is not a perfect or a final account of...

Anti - Semitism Historically and Critically Examined. - By Hugo Valentin. (Oollatiez. Ns. 6d.), The Yellow Spot. With an Introduction by the Bishop of Durham. (Ciollancz. 8s....

THE title and sub-title of this valuable little book are mis- leading. Mr. Macmillan's main purpose is not to apply the lessons of experience in the West Indies to Africa and...

Genghis Khan. By Ralph Fox. (The Bodley Read. 22. 6d.) " THE pleasure and joy of man," observed the subject of this biography, " lies in treading down the rebel and conquering...

The Optimists' Carnival By J. B. Morton. - (Longruans:" 12s. 6d.) THIS book contains an account of ten outstanding episode4 in the history of the French Revolution, with a...

The Jacobean Drama. By E. M. Ellis-Fernaor. (Methuen. 12s.l6) TUE main theme running through Miss Ellis-Fermor',s book is the difference that existed between the temper of mind...

English Art and English Society. By T. Ashcroft. (Peter Davies. 7s. 6d.) ART-HISTORIANS have long been accustomed, and arc still inclined, to cling suspiciously to their own...

A Pickwick Portrait Gallery. By Various Authors. (Chapman and Hall. • is. W.) • No one could have a better right to celebrate the centenary of Mr. Pickwick than the...

Thirstland Treks. By Carel Birkby. (Faber. I8s.) . • " TIIIRSTLAND " is a fancy name for the region that c'omprises Namaqualand, Bushmanland, the Kalahari Desert, and the...

Four Elements in Literature. By Norman Hurst. (Longmans. 64) -THERE are two ways of intensifying the act of perceptior0 by differentiation and by analogy. Scientific method...

The Death of an - Empire. By loire - Battisa: Ifttitehiiison. "189 Tax reader of this biography of Karl IV, the last trade Hapsburg Emperor, should be forewarned (it will not,...

The Double Quest. By R. J. Cruikshank. (Macmillan. is. 6d.) MR. CRUIKSHANK has experimented with an excellent idea, and if he has not quite brought it off, - he has written' a...

By SEAN O'FAOLAIN The Sound Wagon. By T. S. Stribling. (Gollanez. 8s. 6d.) The Top Landing. By W. Townend. (Chapman and Han. 7s. 6c1.) , Strange Glory. By L. H. Myers....

By George Puttenham Every student of English literature who has been made aware of the shortcomings of Arber's hitherto invaluable re- print will join in congratulating both the...

Mr. Eliot's new collection of essays (Faber and Faber, 6S.). is intended to take the place of For Lancelot Andrewes, which is now out of print. Of the essays which appeared in...

a source of frequent and ardent controversy. Particularly in modern Europe an increasing importance is attached to the early moulding of young opinion. It is agreed that some...

This book (Allen and ljnwin,. 10s. 6d.) is in two parts. The first is the rather depressing .jorirnarof an administrative cadet who suffers from - fever and . iamoved at sh -...

read this book (Gollancz, 6s.), and be made thoroughly uncomfort- able and ashamed by its revelations, then, the courage of Mrs. , Cheaterton's journalistic venture will nothave...

By C. G. Oakes An adequate life of Romilly has long been needed, and While Mr. Oakes has produced a serviceable volume (Allen - and Unwin, 18s.) the need still remains. For it...

Major Becke's history. of the Waterloo campaign was first published in 1914. It was recognised at .once as the most important book on the subject by an English writer. The new...

By William Ross Collier and Edwin Victor Westrate This book (Cassell, 7s. 6d.) has that quality of free innocence with which American adults regard the doings of the bad man...

6d.) in an excellent little series, each of which has been entirely revised and re-set, do that it counts almost as a new book. The first two, Professor C. H. Williams's The...

MANAGER By Ben. L. Reitman Dr. Reitman has been . in and out of prison at least ore hundred times between 1890 and 1915, and during his visits was able to make the...

By Charles Maurice Wiltse Mr. Wiltsc's book (University of North Carolina Press : Oxford University Press, 18s. 6d.) falls into two parts : one which is full, clear and acute,...

the British industry is at last making a determined effort to counter the American invasion. Within the last few months—that is since the motor show—I have taken out on...

Financing Rearmament UNLESS- future events should make it unnecessary to Carry out in full the programme of strengthening the National Defences an the terms of the recently...

(Coiatniyell from page - 5554 T kind should and perhaps must- be resorted to, in which case, however, it will be for the authorities to use every possible precaution in the way...

" ALSBAI.D.” Jr is seldom that the .course of Stock Exchange price move- ments is determined by the interpretation of a single word. Such, however, was the case on Monday of...