25 SEPTEMBER 1909, Page 18

THE AUTHORSHIP OF " INDIA IN 1983." pro THE EDITOR

OF THE " SPiECTATOB.":1, SIR,—With reference to the extracts from "India in 1983" in your issue of the 7th ult., and the concluding paragraph of your remarks, in which you express the hope that the book will be reprinted, may I ask if you were poking fun at the author, or are really not aware that he is Mr. Thomas Hart Davies, Liberal M.P. for North Hackney P The little book, of which I have a copy, has been a wonderfully correct forecast of "progress" in Bengal, and it would be interesting to know why Mr. Davies now refuses permission for another edition to