O'Casey at Coole Inishfallen Fare Thee WelL Sean O'Casey. (Macmillan. 16s.) THIS farewell to Erin section of Sean O'Casey's reminiscences is set against the squalid Dublin...

Two American Poets Selected Poems. By John Crowe Ransom. (Eyre and Spottiswoode. 9s.) Poems, 1920-1945. By Alan Tate. (Eyre and Spottiswoode. lOs. 6d.) Now that we have...

THE MARTYR KING SIR,-In his otherwise admirable article, The Myth of Charles 1, Mr. Trevor-Roper makes the surprising statement that "in the -romantic Cavalier Montrose that...

A BARBARIC CUSTOM Sm,-Recently Sir Basil Neven-Spence and Mr. Wilson Harris. called the attention of the House to a practice which presents as serious a problem in the...

SIR.-What grounds has Mr. Trevor-Roper for his suggestion that Charles I's interest in religion was purely aesthetic, or for his assertion that the King only turned to...

SIR-Would it not be well if those who, in their passion for satisfying their class hatred, fulminate, with all the assurance of ignorance, against what they call by the...

THE CHANTREY BEQUEST SIR,-For reasons with which I need not trouble you, the Spectator of January 14th has only just come into my hands. Will you allow me to make some rather...

AT WESTMINSTER THE most interesting topics in Parliament this week were not those which were discussed on the floor of either House. With the debate on the Tribunal scheduled...

The Kravchenko Trial What is important about the libel action which Mr. Kravchenko, the author of that remarkable book I Chose Freedom, is bringing against the French Communist...

America's Atomic Advantage The note of confidence in the fifth half-yearly report of the United States Atomic Energy Commission rings true. The Commission is confident that the...

Parliament and Blood Sports The luck of the ballot for Private Members' Bills in the House of Commons has made it certain that both the measures prohibiting what are commonly...

CONTEMPORARY ARTS THE THEATRE The Tragedy of King Richard III. By William Shakespeare. (New.) "PLEASURE and action make the hours seem short," exclaims lago, from whose neck...

Breach of Marriage. By Dan Sutherland. (Duke of York's.) THIS is a play about artificial insemination, and it is not at all bad. An involved but perfectly coherent plot gives...

THE CINEMA "' The Passionate Friends." (Odeon, Marble Arch.)-" Once Upon a Dream." (New Gallery and Tivoli.)-" Silent Dust." (Warner.) MESSRS. David Lean and Ronald Neame have...

IN DARKEST BELFAST By RAWLE KNOX HEATED many degrees above hothouse point, the Enterprise -E.xpress transports you from Dublin to Belfast in exactly twoand-a-quarter hours...

BOOKS OF THE DAY Strindberg Eight Famous Plays. By August Strindberg. (Duckworth. 15s.) The Strange Life of August Strindberg. By Elizabeth Sprigge. (Hamish Hamilton. 15s.)...

B.P.'s Achievement The Left Handshake. By Hilary St. George Saunders. (Coltins. lOs. 6d.) OUR century suffers hideously from regimentation, and there is no more powerful form...

Noise-loving Birds If you look up at twD plane trees (and London is a "plane tale") standing on the Embankment next door to Charing Cross Bridge you will see-as a southern...

Mistletoe Trees A very interesting list of trees, serving as host to that unique parasite the mistletoe, was mnadle by a clergyman-botanist living in the Great Malvern...

In the Garden In Worcester, that most horticultural county, has been published the first number of an admirable quarterly, The Country yournal, Worcester Press, l0s. yearly....

COUNTRY LIFE IT is a pity to see old #4ghts-and obligations-disappear from recognition. Now I am still quite vainly endeavouring to discover who possesses the manorial rights...

THE PRESS TABLE SIR,-Lord Reading's suggestion in Pray Silence ... .! that " frugal editors " send their reporters to public dinners in order to provide them with a free meal...

A Vanishing Game On the subject of the commons, a number of them have become golf links, and in almost every case there have been two associated clubs, one consisting wholly of...

NEWS OF THE WEEK NOT too soon and not too late the British Government has recognised Israel for what it is-a going concern, but not a viable State. De jure recognition must...

Flare-up in Burma The Karens, having lost patience with as well as confidence in the Burmese Government, have resorted to arms, and the various enclaves in which they live are...

No Change in China The interregnum between peace and war drags on, pointlessly, in China. The stubbornness of the Kuomintang leaders, which seemed until the Generalissimo's...

I With stories of murders appearing in the papers at what seems to be the rate of about one a day, the impression is inevitably created that murders are increasing. It would...

* * * * The minor Ministerial changes consequent on the resignation of Mr. Belcher could not well be less exciting. The only one that calls for comment is the shift of Mr. L....

The opportunities of agreeing with the Daily Worker are so rare that I hasten to seize one while I can. " Dunghill journalism " is the description it applies to the two Sunday...

A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK THE heat, is seems, is to be turned on Mr. Bevin. Apart from the snappers and snarlers of the Left, who are always there, the Tories, I see it stated,...

If I am rightly informed, and having regard to the source of my information it is difficult to believe that I am not, the publishers of Mr. Churchill's War Memoirs-Messrs....

*U* * * University intelligence "A new club called the Coffee-potters has started at Downing this term. Its members claim that they make the best cup of coffee in the...

The restoration of Private Members' Bills has resulted in twenty- three such measures being presented and read a first time. They cover a wide variety of subjects, but...

FINANCE AND INVESTMENT By CUSTOS As so often happens when the industrial share market is becalmed, activity has sprung up at opposite ends of the Stock Exchange in gilt-edged...

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR A RACE FOR TIME IN MALAYA SIR,-IUnless the public and the Government realise how desperate is the race for time in Malaya, this year may well see the...

FIELD SPORTS SIR,-The Secretary of the Masters of Foxhounds Association charges me with maccuracy on two counts. First, he says I am wrong in saying that the practice of...

SIR,-In reading anti-sport literature I am always filled with admiration of the faith of its authors. They seem to be like atheists. For believers, it is generally agreed, have...

Wool for Cash There is no reason to grumble at the decision of the President of the Board of Trade to abolish the rationing of clothing made from woven wool cloth. Neither is...

No Queue for Nationalisation Revolution is unthinkable at Transport House. Even evolution is normally regarded with some suspicion. But it can at least be said that the recent...

Malayan Anniversary The Malavan Federation was one year old on February ist, and from a constitutional point of view it has been a year of success, indeed almost of triumph....

Goodbye Miranda The fall of Sefior Miguel Miranda from his high estate as chairman of the Argentine Economic Council was pre-ordained. It had to come as soon as the world...

ART The linear furies and ecstasies of Hans Hartung's abstract doodles at the Hanover Gallery must seem, to anyone who has not tried to wield a crayon for himself, but elegant...

MUSIC THE programme of the Royal Philharmonic Society's concert on January 26th was excellently planned, with a wide variety of date and style and a welcome avoidance of the...

MARGINAL COMMENT By HAROLD NICOLSON ONE of the many advantages of being educated at the University of Oxford is that one acquires, and retains thereafter, an instinctive...

A HOUSING EXAMPLE By ALFRED C. BOSSOM, M.P. A VISITOR to Portugal today can hardly fail to be astonished by the conditions existing in that too little known country. For...

PUBLIC SCHOOL, NEW STYLE By EDWARD HODGKIN THE mansion of Ottershaw Park is most imposing. It is a bulky but elegant building standing at the top of a rise in the Surrey Downs...

NOT WITHOUT DUST By A. A. MILNE Mr. Milne, Editor of the " Granta " in his undergraduate days, Assistant Editor of " Punch " soon after, and writer of numbers of books and...

RUSSIA THE AMBIGUOUS FOUR years ago this week-no longer ago than that-President Roosevelt, Mr. Churchill and Marshal Stalin met at Yalta in the Crimea to settle the future of...

Colonial Future THE NEED FOR FACTS By AUDREY RICHARDS W E are constantly told that our Colonial policy has two goalsW the rapid economic development of backward areas and the...

About Town Morning, Noon, and Night in London. By Sacheverell Sitwell (Macmillan. 12s. 6d.) THE coloured lithographs that Mr. Sitwell has chosen as illustrations for his...

BOOMS IN BOOKS By L. A. G. STRONG WHAT causes a sudden boom in a writer's work ? The question W has a vivid interest for publishers, who like to know whether to reprint a...

Fiction There is No Armour._ By Howard Spring. (Collins. 12s. 6d.) The Snow Pasture. By P. H. Newby. (Jonathan Cape. 9s.) The Scapegoat. By Jocelyn Brooke. (The Bodley...

Fall of the Habsburgs The Habsburg Monarchy, 1809-1918. By A. J. P. Taylor. (New Edition. Hamnish Hamilton. 15s.) MR. TAYLOR is too modest. Having written what is virtually a...

PARTNERSHIP FOR ALL ? By F. C. HOOPER IT is perhaps true to say that every epoch has its characteristic excess, which produces a violent reaction in the succeeding generation,...