Sir-feat
Sir: Though I am distinctly older than either Andrew Devonshire or Johnnie Buc- cleuch, I cannot recall the self-confessedly snobbish Simon Courtauld (`To Sir or not to Sir', 4 January) ever addressing me as `Sir' during the long years of his deputy-edi- torship of your magazine. I have on a previ- ous occasion in your pages expressed my Uncle Toby-like preference for the great and socially levelling convenience across the Channel of the use of Monsieur and Madame for all from the lowest to the high- est in the land. There is also much to be said for the use of patronymics in the Rus- sian fashion; after Boris Nicolaeovich we could have Dominic Nigelovich and so forth.
As a schoolboy I was rebuked by Winston Churchill for calling him 'Sir'. 'You must only call "Sir" a person by whom you are directly employed or your immediate Ser- vice superior, though you should not of course address your Colonel as "Sir" in the Mess' (a disputed view). 'What, then, should I call you, Sir — I mean ...' I trailed off blushingly. 'You may call me "Mr Churchill" until otherwise instructed.' In 1940 I needed no instruction to switch to calling him 'Prime Minister'. I am sure Simon Courtauld would have shared the excitement of that statuesque pin-up of Hilaire Belloc and Maurice Baring, the late Lady Juliet Duff, when, at Chartwell after the war, 'Monty' said to her, 'Please don't call me Lord Montgomery' and her disap- pointment when, after a pause, he added, "Call me Field-Marshal".'
Alastair Forbes
Beefsteak Club, Irving Street, WCI
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