SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
J. W. M. THOMPSON
There begins to be something almost uncanny about the manner in which nothing goes right with our Caribbean adventure. The lesson that good intentions are not enough in these matters has never been more plainly made. It is hard even to laugh at this week's mess-up over the future of the wretched Mr Tony Lee: it is farcical, yes, but shaming too. It's bad enough being confused about the identity of the sup- posed Mafia agents and about whether our intervention was meant to bring down Mr Webster or support him; but to slither into public disagreement over the future of our own man is really a bit too much. The scene is so bleak that I wonder Mr Wilson hasn't thought of dispatching his troublesome Home Secretary to Anguilla to inspect the invading force of Metropolitan peelers. Mr Wilson might enjoy that even if Mr Callaghan didn't.
Governor Gumbs
Some of the press reporting from Anguilla has been very good. Adam Raphael in the Guar- dian this week has had some excellent caustic pieces. I imagine that I was with the majority of readers, though, in having a defective know- ledge of the local history. Some interesting browsing in the available books has reminded me once more of the atrociously blood-stained events which have punctuated the story of European exploitation of the Caribbean islands. Sir Alan Burns's copious history of the British West Indies, for example, warns the reader at the outset of the many episodes of abominable cruelty which have to be taken into account; even so, he considerately segregates many of the worst in remarkably horrible appendices. The chief victims, of course, were the indigenous peoples (largely exterminated) and the imported slaves, but the white colonisers and sailors were scarcely less savage with each other on occasion. My Encyclopaedia Britannica mentions that Anguilla was formerly well wooded but lost most of its trees to char- coal burners. I can't find any explanation of the great local appetite for charcoal, but my guess is that it was needed to make gun- powder. This at least fits the history of violence.
After the abolition of slavery in 1834, several high-minded English travellers produced books examining the spiritual condition of the negroes and their spiritual needs. They breathe a pure air of solemn Victorian philanthropy. I have also enjoyed a rather racier account dated 1825 by one Henry Nelson Coleridge, `late Fellow of King's College, Cambridge.' He reports hearing from the lieutenant-governor of Anguilla the story of a great battle with invading French forces (who sacked the place, rather pointlessly, in 1796). This old man (`affluent in the undoubted possession of two coats and one dimity waistcoat, with regimental buttons attached to them') was named Ben- jamin Gumbs. He was, I suppose, a forebear of the rather mysterious Mr Gumbs who stands behind Mr Ronald Webster today.
Boom time
The Concorde's publicity men owe a lot to the test pilot Brian Trubshaw. His use of that 1940-ish word 'wizard' made the first flight seem almost cosy and nostalgic. Nevertheless, a note of caution has entered the comments since the aircraft left the ground. It has been noted that it showers stinking fumes over a large area when it flies. It has also been noted that its noise, even in these gentle early stages, could well be unacceptable here or in- America. And the cost (is it one million pounds a week? or two millions? we haven't yet been allowed to know) is an uncomfortable topic in a Budget week.
These doubts are a healthy sign. I at least see no merit in the suggestion which is some- times made that to question the Concorde is to be churlish or unappreciative of the skill of its makers. The real point is that this machine will itself very probably pose a question : are we to choose a condition of mindless subservi- ence to technological skill, as if it were a self- justifying factor regardless of other considera- tions, or are we to reject this? Merely because it's so big, noisy, smelly and expensive, the Concorde may jolt people into considering more critically the uses of technology. It will ferry a privileged few across the world quickly, if it ever gets the chance—but at what cost to the huge majority who won't fly in it? That was a memorable picture of the Concorde roaring over the rooftops of Fairford in Gloucester- shire. It gave, said one newspaper exultantly, a glimpse of 'life in the 1970s.' Perhaps it did. But if so a great many people will think it, not wizard, but demonic.
Voice from the past
I'm interested by the ability of language to preserve the details of history. The other day I overheard a small boy say derisively after his friend had been singing. 'You've got a voice like a corncrake.' It occurred to -me that the speaker could never have heard the bird he unkindly alluded to (and whose voice is de- scribed as being `like a grated comb'). Neither, I imagine, could his parents. But until perhaps half a century ago the corncrake's call was as frequently heard in the English countryside as the cuckoo's. 'Where is the schoolboy,' asked the early nineteenth century poet John Clare, 'that has not heard that mysterious noise which comes with the spring in the grass and the green corn?' Nowadays the corncrake does not come here at all, for modern farming has shown no consideration for its nesting habits; and no English schoolboy hears it. I suppose when it was a familiar visitor its harsh voice was regularly invoked in the uncomplimen- tary simile I heard from the small boy; he was passing on a phrase which was a homely com- monplace to his rustic ancestors and which had somehow survived in use in his own family. We were fellow travellers in a crowded London train when I overheard him. I found the tiny link with another England rather pleasing.
First things first
'When Mr Roy Jenkins presents his budget,' observed the Guardian at the weekend, 'he will not only be setting his party on its final pre-election course, but also influencing the direction of the British economy for the 1970s.' What was it Aneurin Bevan used to say about `the language of priorities'?
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