21 MARCH 1931, Page 3

Sir. Charles Eliot Those who instinctively associate the intellectual life

with armchairs should study the life of Sir Charles Eliot, who died last Monday at the age of 68. The trav- eller, the scholar, and the administrator have seldom been more strikingly combined. He had a rare capacity for applying the methods of the scholar to the flair of the natural linguist, but his appreciation of the many countries to which his career as a diplomat took him was not confined to their languages. Of his books on the East Turkey in Europe, in particular, published in 1901, draws a picture as comprehensive as it is vivid. He resigned his appointment in Zanzibar on a point of principle in 1904. It was satisfactory that the loss to the world of affairs was a gain to scholarship.

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