Letters to the Editor
The Despised Czeslaw Jesman, Lilian A. Roff,
Frederick Murphy, Mary Moorman
Taste in Subtopia John Irwin Mr Pilots and Accidents Stanley Mayne Problem People J. F Littler Crisis in Medicine Speech Therapist, Carol Whitehead Pell Med Walter Brookes That Pt:Mho] Stuff Francis Schwarzenberger Miser Candle Tyrrell Burgess Judge Not . . . Peter Hadley The Parish Comes Alive Rev. B. W Mason The Montgoffians H. Alan Peacock
THE DESPISED Stn,—In my letter of December 28 I stated that the principal cause of the calamitous state of British interests in Egypt was psychological; that it was the result of British racial conceit, and that in the modern world this frame of mind inevitably spells disaster both political and economic. Surely the proof of the pudding is in its eating; yet another military with- drawal, the expulsion of many thousands of British subjects from Egypt, Aubrey Jones's petrol—what there is of it—at six shillings a gallon.
The reaction to this proposition was mettlesome, boisterous and arresting: I was heaped with abuse both signed and anonymous. It confirmed, alas, the validity of my thesis.
Some of the correspondents pointed out the foul- ness of the Egyptians; in respect to poor Licut. Moorhouse, of courscothey are right, but the dragging in of this tragic business is hardly germane to the problem which is political and psychological. On Egyptian affairs may I be permitted to cite here the unimpeachable authority of the late Viscount Norwich?
'Many of the failures of British statesmanship have been due to the reluctance of Ministers to deal with a problem so long as postponement was possible. Too often have we been forced in the end to accept an unsatisfactory and even a humiliating solution because we have refused at the beginning to agree to a far better one. Too often have we con- ceded grudgingly and too late much more than would have been accepted gladly and gratefully at an earlier date.'
The passage refers to Anglo-Egyptian troubles of a generation ago; in its topical urgency it could be written yesterday or. I fear, tomorrow.
It is an invidious and embarrassing task to bring in personal matters into public correspondence. How- ever, I feel I am forced to do it by the tone of some of my detractors. I will not enter into a verbal slog- ging match with Mr. William F. Pickard. The 'poten- tial equality' of the Egyptians of which I wrote. far from being 'great rubbish,' is the equality of men in the face of God which is the ultimate touchstone of human relations.
Mr. Malcolm Murray-Brown, another of the irate correspondents, hints darkly at my foreign origin and suggests that I benefit. 'at least temporarily,' from the hospitality of this country and that my letter was due 'to impotent rage resulting from some minor social snub.' He is dead right on the first point : I would not dream of disguising the bar sinister of alien birth. I have to disappoint, however. Mr. Murray-Brown on the second score: I have no social snubs, major or minor, to complain about. Seven happy years of commissioned service in the British
Army have given me not only the right to a British passport, which indeed I hold, but also to have my say in the affairs of the country of my adoption, particularly when it is in a grave and self-induced danger. For it is my country today—not that 1 have the slightest desire to forget or lose affection for the land of my origin—in fact, it is far more my country than Mr. Murray-Brown's. For he just happened to be born here while I have chosen it deliberately because of its several attractions, spiritual and mun- dane, and in spite of the climate of the British Isles and the income tax and cooking obtained there, not to mention occasional outbursts of parochialism of some of their inhabitants. And, like the Gilbertian woolsack, 'I won't be sat upon:—Yours faithfully,
CZISLAW ItSMAN
46 Green Street, Park Lane, WI
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