SIR,-In vour last issue "Janus" is so kind as to refer aipprecialaively to a letter I wrote to the Daily Telegraph, but his final woids tend, I feel, to give a wrong impression...

SIR,-Your outspoken criticism of the B.B.C. fills me with joy. I have often determined to write to Mr. Ogilvie to let him know at least one listener's views of !he war-time...

I THE BRITISH COMMONWEALTH SiR.-Accurate presentation to Americans of the nature of the British Commonwealth is one of the vital needs at this time. It is not furthered by the...

MUSIC AND THE B.B.C. I SIR,-I was delighted to read your remarks on the B.B.C. musical programmes in The Spectator of January 2nd. As a very ordinary person, very fond of...

POST-WAR HOMES SIR,-The importance of a high hand being taken in the designing of labour-saving homes is indeed great, as Mrs. Basneit points out. We must not take for granted...

A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK lI INVALUABLE as the work the Prime Minister has done in the United States and Canada is-his two speeches have been as good as two major victories in...

The vexed question whether the radio is a rival or a rein- I forcement to the daily paper has been answered decisively by the New York Times, which has now been radiating an...

"I hear," writes a correspondent in America, "that Rebecca West has written a book longer than Gone With the Wind." As to that I am not certain, but Miss West's book runs to...

"Red Army's New Advance." Why red? I have been asking I myself. Red, of course, is the colour of revolution, but that must have a reason and an origin. Red, certainly, is the...

The gift of accurate observation is rather sparsely bestowed. I Almost every week letters about Mr. Harold Nicolson's articles are received in this office, and week-in,...

People who care about literature and believe in ideas are still very rightly pressing the Ministry of Supply to release more paper for books. But there is one difficulty, not...

PALESTINE AND THE WAR SIR,-In his informative and interesting article Mr. Swaminathan writes that io,ooo Palestinian Jews are serving with the British army and R.A.F., but it...

COUNTRY LIFE THE years as they pass by are often labelled by naturalists as well as by historians. When the title is taken, as often, from the weather naturalist and historian...

LIQUOR RESTRICTIONS SIR,-Conditions during this and the last war as regards sobriety are not comparable. During the early part of the Great War, drunkenness was widespread and...

CITY COUNCILS AND CO-OPTION SIR,-While " Janus " is quite correct in stating that these and similar bodies cannot co-opt members, he has overlooked the fact that this...

Wooding We are a wasteful people and are trying to cure ourselves as never before in our history; but the efforts have not been generally extended to the saving of wood. In...

RURAL RECONSTRUCTION SIR,-In your review of Sir Daniel Hall's book we read that he advocates purchase by the State of the whole ot the agricultural land of the country. i.e., "...

In the Garden Women's Institutes (which are spending more and more of their energy on intensive horticulture) are doing excellent work, in co-operation with leading seedsmen,...

Silver Trees A very welcome Christmas and New Year's card from South Africa, containing a few pressed flowers and leaves, gives evidence that Capetown, like Westmorland and the...

MARGINAL COMMENT By HAROLD NICOLSON ( RATITUDE is not an international quality, since it is rare G in history to find one nation being grateful to another nation for any...

The Greek people today are dying of starvation. The Germans, when they occupied the country, looted all foodstuffs, and the Italians, who sneaked in behind them, gobbled up...

Most Englishmen would deny that they were ungrateful to Greece, or that they had in any way forgotten the brilliant campaign in Epirus and the first resounding defeats imposed...

The British Government are fully alive to the dangerous situation which has arisen. Already they are allowing 4,ooo tons of foodstuffs to be imported monthly from Turkey, and...

The Germans and the Italians, who control the Greek Pressi and wireless, are able to exploit this situation to the utmost extent. Day in and day out the Greek people are...

NEWS OF THE WEEK IA PART from the fall of Bardia to British troops and of Manila Ato Japanese and the Russian recapture of the Kerch peninsula in the Crimea, the week has...

I President Roosevelt's Message President Roosevelt's inspiring message to Congress testifies to the will of the United States to throw the whole of its vast strength into the...

Petain and the Nazis The Nazis have found nothing to gratify them, but rather the reverse, in Marshal Pitain's New Year broadcast, the text of which has not been published in...

FINANCE AND INVESTMENT I By CUSTOS I EVEN in war-time one can rely on New Year hopefulness as a factor in the stock markets. This week's performance in Throgmorton Street...

Shorter Notice Victory Begins at Home. By G. H. Gretton. (Allen and Unwin. 7s. 6d.) MANY reforms and improvements are needed in our social institutions; and Dr. Gretton's...

A CONCERTED STRATEGY By STRATEGICUS THE news that General Wavell has been appointed to the Tsupreme command of all the sea, land and air forces in the South-West Pacific area...

An Artist Cezanne: Letters. Edited by John Redwald. I - .- .- I (Bruno Cassirer and Faber and Faber. I5s.) READERS of Mr. Huxley's Grey Emmnence-his most recent and most...

The Electoral Register It is no easy problem which has to be solved by the committee appointed by the Home Secretary and the Secretary of State for Scotland to consider the...

Eastern European Understandings General Sikorski, the Polish Prime Minister and Commanderin-Chief, has returned to London from his lengthy tour in Russia and the Middle East...

German Generals and the Nazis A story which the American weekly, Foreign Correspondence, has from a well-informed source on the situation in Germany deserves some attention....

Rubber and Scorched Earth The "scorched earth" policy is one that ought to be applied resolutely when it denies to the enemy something that they are short of and that would be...

Children After Air-Raids It is probable that a good many of the opinions about what used to be called " shell-shock" will have to be revised after the present war ; even...

BOOKS OF THE DAY A Sixteenth Century Astrologer Nostradamus, or the Future Foretold. By James Laver. (Collins. 12S. 6d.) CATHERINE DE MEDICI, a woman far from wanting in...

Russia Against Hitler Russia Fights On. By Maurice Hindus. (Collins. 8s. 6d.) MR. HINDUS is probably the best living interpreter of Soviet Russia to the Anglo-Saxon world....

England and the Sea The Ocean in English History. By J. A. Williamson. (Oxford University Press. ios.) The Merchant Service Today. By Leslie Howe. (Oxford Uni- versity...

English Latinists. - Poems in Latin. By John Sparrow. (Oxford University Press. 6s.) I MR. SPARRow and his publishers must be congratulated on thappearance of this charming...

The Fate of Yugoslavia Balkan Racket. By C. F. Melville. (Jarrolds. 2s. 6d.) I Balkan Racket is what it sounds like: an account of recent Yugoslav politics told in the...

Fiction I English Story. Second Series. Edited by Woodrow and Susan I Wyatt. (Collins. 7s. 6d.) I Boo. - By Peter de Polnay. (Secker and Warburg. 8s.) I Blind Messenger....

WAVELL'S COMMAND By MAJOR-GENERAL SIR F. MAURICE THE appointment of General Sir Archibald Wavell to the supreme command in the South-West Pacific has been received with...

THE ALLIES AND FRANCE N By A FRENCH CORRESPONDENT I W ITH the turning of the tide n Russia, the entry of America W into the war and the tremendous extension of the conflict,...

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR THE PART OF THE DUTCH SIR,-Allow mc in the name of many of my countrymen to thank you for your appreciative references to my country, the Dutch East...

SIR,-Dr. Hayek raises a most important point at the end of his I interesting article "Knowledge of Germany." The absence of any central place where a copy of each important...

INTERPRETING THE FOREIGNER SIR,-Professor Hayek's probing article about the dangers of half- I knowledge of the German character and German ways is most welcome. He would...

SIR,-Mr. F A. Hayek has hit the nail on the head with what he I wrote about the knowledge of Germany in a recent issue. It is incomprehensible how little the British know about...

ART English Art and the Mediterranean (The Warburg Institute) Imperial Institute Buildings.-National Gallery Exhibition. PHOTOGRAPHS of works of art can be dangerous weapons....

THE CINEMA I The Newsreels.-" Sullivan's Travels." At the Plaza. 194I closed and i942 opened with two of the war's best newsreels. Paramount British celebrated the passing of...

UNITY BEYOND WAR -1 HE decisions reached at Washington during last week-end 1give evidence of courageous and imaginative thought. The aniiouncement of the pact of twenty-six...

THE CONTACT BOGEY By OUR MEDICAL CORRESPONDENT 4OR very many years it was an almost universal practice in 1 schools, institutions, works, offices, and the services to il',ist...

TRADE UNIONS IN RUSSIA By LEON KIRIL THE visit to this country of a delegation of Soviet trade-union leaders should arouse some interest in the status and functions of trade...