S O dangerous has been the latest French crisis that it is still too early to say whether it will end with even the outward appear- ance of a recovery. Having abandoned their...

The fact that Mr. Molotov should have seen fit to suggest that the Foreign Ministers should submit, within two months, proposals for a German peace treaty based on the decisions...

The Second Reading of the Criminal Justice Bill found the House as a whole in agreement on all essentials—a welcome change from the acrimonious controversies which some recent...

In view of the fact that the reduction of capital investment by £2oo,000,000 announced by Sir Stafford Cripps over a month ago was generally regarded as insufficient there can...

The second meeting of the United Nations Commission on Human Rights, which opened at Geneva on Monday, will, it seems, find the same difficulty in achieving agreement as other...

Bad news from India in the last few days has been satisfactorily scarce, but whether conditions there represent an uneasy and evan- escent peace or the transition to a period if...

After a slow, pernickety debate of the kind to which European students of American politics are now accustomed, the United States Senate put on a spurt last Monday and suddenly...

The spirited attack made by Lord Lindsay of Birker, speaking as a Labour peer, in the House of Lords on Tuesday on the passion for centralisation in the different nationalised...

From last Monday motorists may only use their cars if they have been granted a special allowance of petrol, and they may use them only for the specific purposes for which that...

T HE Speaker, happily and safely restored to us from his visit to France, reported briefly but becomingly to the House on Monday. He referred to the applause with which he was...

T HE New Zealand representative in the General Assembly of the United Nations said in the debate which preceded last Saturday's vote in favour of the partition of Palestine that...

so far declared, and a good deal more, was said in last Friday's Forum by two M.P.s and two ex-M.P.s who, considering that the talk was supposed to be unscripted, were...

the world who, by their integrity, public spirit, humanity and unassuming dignity, leave everyone who meets them the better for the contact. They are all too few, and the death...

S 0 there is to be a by-election at Wigan as well as at Camlachie. There is no likelihood of Wigan playing Labour false. The majority is so large that it may possibly be...

that what he wants above all things is publicity, and some of the daily papers which are most opposed to him are very much too ready to give him what he wants. I am not at all...

I cannot say definitely how long it is since Oxford numbered more undergraduates than Cambridge. The tendency in recent years is sufficiently demon- strated by the fact that the...

French National Assembly to be reproduced in the Journal of the House of Commons (an official publication whose very existence is un- familiar to most people) but it was most...

By BRIGADIER DESMOND YOUNG I F the Governments of India and Pakistan are to prosper or even to survive they must find means of working amicably together. This is so obvious to...

By JEAN-PIERRE GIRAUDOUX Paris. A FORTNIGHT ago, while the French Press seemed more con- cerned with Princess Elizabeth's wedding than with the fall of the Government, the...

By F. R. HURLSTONE-JONES T HE terms of the proposals of the Burnham Committee with reference to the salary scales of teachers in primary and secondary schools are, as usual,...

By G. B. THOMAS ROTSKY'S monumental study of Stalin was only two-thirds I completed when he was assassinated in 194o. The work has been finished and translated by Charles...

By DOUGLAS BARRETT T HE Exhibition of Indian Art opened at Burlington House under the auspices of the Royal Academy on November 29th. It is planned on the same scale as the...

By WALTER TAPLIN A NTIQUARIANS must have their fun. They no doubt anticip- ated plenty of it when the Report of the New Forest Com- mittee appeared last week and it was made...

By HAROLD NICOLSON I HAVE often felt that of all languages the English language must be the most difficult to learn. Even as our political institutions and our social manners,...

THE THEATRE Private Enterprise." By St. John Ervine. (St. James's). This is a play about the liberty of the individual, a theme tackled only incidentally by Shakespeare. It...

THE chief musical events of the week have been Slavonic—the complete performance of Smetana's M‘i Vicar under Rafael Kubelik on November 26th and the evening of...

" When the Bough Breaks." (Gaumont, Marble Arch Pavilion).—"I Walk Alone." (Plaza). When the Bough Breaks is about mothers ; about childless women who are natural mothers,...

Larpentz, more pleasingly but less frequently called Leadwort, has excelled itself. The beautiful blue flowers, very slightly empurpled, were flourishing in mid-November, and...

THERE are three large new landscapes among the other paintings by Victor Pasmore at the Redfern. In them the particular yields yet more ground to the general, and, when it seems...

of England vary! In some of the Home Counties during this strange year residents have lamented a total absence of mushrooms. They have passed a year without tasting the most...

of England is now so great—and it continues to increase—that a strange visitor or a new habit in a resident bird has little chance of avoiding detection. The counties differ...

season of blossom next spring. Their grounds of expectation are that fruit-buds for the most part are formed in early autumn, and were more than usually encouraged by the sunny...

Sm,—Your comment upon the London hotel strike is opportune, as is your reminder that this strike was aggravated by the interference of agitators patently inspired by political...

for an international conference of Christians, to discuss political issues. We should like to bring to your notice the Westminster Conference to be held in London in January,...

Sm,—I have read with sympathy and interest the letter of the Reverend W. G. Hargrave Thomas dealing with the need for a world conference of Christians. Another gathering of a...

SHORTAGE OF TEACHERS Sm,—Since January, 1947, the staff of this school has been short of teachers owing to a series of unfilled vacancies. In July, 1947, I reported to the...

Sm,—May I draw your attention to the fact that the title The Future of Europe in your last issue does not correspond with the contents of this excellently written article ? I...

Sts,—Many British people have demonstrated a willingness to offer employment as domestic servants to women from the displaced persons' camps of Germany and Austria. Perhaps...

Sts,—Without wishing to seem ungrateful for the thoughtful and generally favourable review of my book, Germany—Bridge or Battleground, which appeared in your issue of...

Stst,—Janus asks, " What is a parson ? ", and answers rightly, guided by the Oxford Dictionary, that he is a rector. The Cambridge Dictionary— that of Dr. Skeat—throws...

sm,—I must protest against Rawle Knox's misrepresentation of propor- tional representation. In the first place there is no such thing as pro- portional representation in...

SIR,—May I thank Miss Wiskemann for her courteous reply to my letter, and add one further comment ? Mazzinian societies are now lifting their heads once more in Italy, and...

Sta,—During the recent disturbances at Ridley Road wise counsel was offered to Jewish people whose hearts were pierced by a shaft of fear ; they were advised to stay away, for...

Speaking Frankly. By James F. Byrnes. (Heinemann 21s.) MR. BYRNES, during a great part of his life of distinguished public service, was what the Elizabethans called an...

" The Times " Out of Joint THE history of The Times is the history of England—and of much else besides. That fact makes this volume in one aspect remarkable. It spans a...

Hugo Gurgeny. By Mary Brearley. (Cape. 9s. 6d.) " The city of Lisbon, as seen from the deck of a ship entering the harbour, presents a very fair prospect, and on a morning in...

FlAht to Live. By Robert Boothby. (Gollancz. 21s.) ROBERT BOOTHBY, member of Parliament, journalist, broadcaster and lecturer, has written an alive, arresting and provocative...

Samuel Palmer : The Visionary Years. By Geoffrey Grigson. (Kegan Paul. 42s.) " 0 ! BLESSED BIOGRAPHY," Samuel Palmer turned from imagining the amusement of Sir Thomas More and...

Essays of Three Decades. By Thomas Mann. Translated by H. T. Lowe-Porter. (Seeker and Warburg. 21s.) THOMAS MANN speaks of Goethe as representative of those five hundred years...

WHAT is a proper Englishman like ? Well, first of all he is to be found only in England, for abroad he has a sour face, detesting as he does all foreigners, and this sour face...

THE chief problem of the historical novel lies in the dialogue • it is not so much a matter of whether or not to use obsolete and archaic words as of the " run " of the...

ACROSS 1. Too much with us, thought Words- worth. (5.) 4. Ices, Roger, can be turned into these. (9.) 9, 21. The armourer's idea of com- pleteness is three-fold. (4, 5, 3, 6.)...

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By CUSTOS GONE are the days when by a mere waving of the Treasury wand gilt-edged prices could be set on a rising course. In its present mood of depression the market has paid...

Walter Howard Frere, Bishop of Truro. By C. S. Phillips and Others. (Faber and Faber. 16s.1 Walter Howard Frere, Bishop of Truro. By C. S. Phillips and Others. (Faber and Faber....