Report of the Competition

THE Editor offered a prize for the best description on a post- card of the thoughts of Sir Oswald Mosley as caricatured by Mr. Max Beerbohm. The competition has provoked a great n ttttt her and a great diversity of suggestions, many of them witty, some of them erudite, and the majority of them frivolous.

It is unfortunate that many competitors (lid not read the wording of this competition very carefully : they have submitted not the suggested thoughts of the victim of Mr. Beerboln's satyric pencil, but the impression which the caricature produced upon them. For instance, several competitors send us the following quotation from Julius Caesar :

" Ile doll, bestride the narrow world Like a Colossus ; and we petty men Walk under his huge legs,"

an apt and possibly accurate description, we admit, but it is improbable that Sir Oswald has time to consider his position in the world in quotations from Shakespeare.

Mr. Bill Douglas's (3 Buckingham Gate, S.W. 1) entry, whimsical though it is, can hardly be considered as representing Sir Oswald's thoughts :

" Musing, MI remark of his small daughtcr, What long legs you have, Daddy !'

The better to carry Inc far, my dear.'

A great many competitors have concentrated upon Sir Oswald's apparent interest in his personal appearance, but we find it hard to believe that his expression of challenge and intense concentration can be due to such a matter as the cut of his trousers, important though that may be.

There is one dominant characteristic which this caricature certainly suggests—his attitude of challenge. For instance, Mrs. H. Gen (Syston Rectory, Mangotslield, near Bristol), who also falls into the error of describing the caricature rather than the thoughts of the subject of the caricature, suggests "Neck or nothing "

as a suitable continent. Those who have gazed upon Mr. Max Beerbohm's caricature of Sir Oswald will understand this description very well.

We have decided to give the prize of two guineas to Miss M.

G. Robinson (Woodside, Eastnor, Ledbury), who has perhaps expressed this attitude of challenge most adequately in the sentence :

"My bite shall be worse than my bark."

Other entries which are amusing for a variety of reasons are Capt. II. Bruce Johnstone's (The Pass, Callender, Perth) •• Though my name is not Curzon

I am a most superior person,"

and MI•s. Moreton Dodd's (Coberley Court, Cheltenham), perhaps a little unkind :

" Let me see—what party shall I join next ? "

Several competitors have seen in this caricature of Sir Oswald Mosley something of the arrogant, aristocratic terrier, and their bias has led them to suggest that the thoughts of this subject can best be explained by the question : ". Who said Rats?"