20 APRIL 1956, page 41

High-grade Adventurer

THIS is no ordinary biography. Its author describes Palavicino as 'a very convenient peg upon which to hang illustrations to a . . . set of themes.' Palavicino's greatest virtue......

King Oil

S YRIAN HARVEST. By Edwyn Hole. (Robert Hale, 18s.) C HRYSLER replaces camel, and the badu dance before the shaikhly s ociety of Kuwait in the secondhand coats of American hotel......

Petty Paces

ROW much courteous consideration is due from readers to authors a nd vice versa? It was Robert Louis Stevenson, I think, who said l hat he was unable to enjoy Shakespeare's As......