17 NOVEMBER 1928, Page 21

POINTS FROM LETTERS " A CYCLE OF REVIEWING."

I feel constrained to ask you to correct by a small paragraph in your next issue the paragraph which • is the pivot of my whole article. In it I say :-

" And all the while, I am persuaded that the reader heroic enouth to survey the ground I have travelled would find that. I had gone on telling my tales in the same old way (which happened to be my way), without, as far as I can see, ever modifying my method save as my subject required."

In the article as it appeared the word " save " was dropped out. My article is a small and slight thing, but its whole point. disappears owing to this unfortunate oversight, and I ant sure you will be kind enough to put a small notice in tl e Spectator, giving the sentence as I wrote it. —EDITH WHARtON, Pavillon Colombc, St. Brice-Sous-Fora (S. & 0.).

RUSKIN AND MISS OCTAVIA KILL.

I have read with pleasure the later by Miss M. J. Shaen' in your Centenary number, in which she alludes 'to the con- nexion between Ruskin and Miss Octavia Hill. Miss Shaen does not mention that her father, Mr. William Shaen, bought Freshwater Place from Ruskin and it was managed on lfts Hill's principles by him and by his daughter until quite recently, when she parted with it to a friend. There must be Many who still remember the annual Maypole Festival held there and' attended by the children of a neighbouring court, when twenty or thirty hampers of wild flowers would be sent up from the country. I can testify to the esteem and affection which Miss Octavia Hill felt for Mi. Shaen, and her poignant grief at his death in the early eighties remains a vivid memory.' That his daughter should be the originator of, and mainly responsible for, the beautiful memorial to Miss Octavia Hill, which formed the subject of a recent appeal in your columns; seems most appropriate to ONE WHO KNOWS.

MUNICIPAL ELECTIONS.

In your Notes this week you state that though Labour secured many Municipal seats throughout the country this did not affect the control of any council except Swindon. This is not quite correct. In Leicester Labour by gaining two victories secured twenty-five in all out of forty-eight elected councillors. With this elected majority they have obtained half the quota of aldermen, and assuming that the by-elections show no change, will consequently have a clear majority on the Council as a whole.—F. W. PETRICK LAWRENCE, House of Commons, S.W. 1.

A PORTRAIT OF RmTOUL.

In connexion with the celebration of the Centenary of the Spectator we are enclosing a portrait of R. S. Rintoul which was taken by D. 0. Hill, R.S.A., about the year 1844. The print now sent is from a photogravure plate in our possession, taken direct from the original negative. We should be glad if you would accept this print with our compliments, and we hope you will see your way to hang it in your new board room.—T. & R. ANNAN & SONS, 518 Sauchiehall Street, Glasgow.

[We are very grateful to Messrs. Annan & Sons for their kind gift. The portrait of R. S. Rintoul, the founder of the Spectator, is the best we have seen and we are hanging it up in the Spectator board room.—Ed. Spectator.]