20 APRIL 1956, Page 35

ART GALLERY DEFENCES

SIR,—The audacious theft of the Morisot from the Tate Gallery will have caused many people to wonder if the paintings on exhibition there are given adequate protection.

Some months ago, a friend and I discovered vigorous chalk scribbling on P. Wilson Steer's Toilet of Venus, which was hung unglazed. We immediately informed an attendant, who found two ten- or eleven-year-old schoolgirls

in an adjacent room, both of whom had chalk on their hands. He left the girls, who promptly left the gallery and, returning with us to the Wilson Steer, he removed the chalk from it by rubbing with his handkerchief after spit- ting liberally on it.

Whether the schoolgirls or the attendant did more harm to the painting is. I think,