Conservative Meeting advertised to start at 7 p.m.
At 6.45 when I arrived there was a man on the platform making a minor speech (a continental practice this, where league , football matches are preceded by a reserve fixture).
At 7.04 there was mounting applause that heralded Mr. Heath and his party of nine. Every- one stood up; it seemed the natural thing to do. The applause saw Mr. Heath right on to the platform and once there he waved with each hand, a steward gave a fierce hand signal and someone in the back put on a recording of God Save the Queen that left nothing to the imagination. (As we were all standing up anyway this was quite a good idea.)
At 7.05, just as we were about to sit down again a man in the crowd shouted hip hip; several others called hooray, an exercise which was re- peated twice more. Mr. Heath beamed at this as if hip hip hooray was a magnificently inspired piece of impromptu humour.
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