MR. HAROLD RUSSELL [To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR, —You
and many of your readers will have been shocked by the news of the sudden death of Mr. Harold Russell, and will feel deep sympathy with those who are suffering most intimately thereby. As the son of Lord Arthur Russell and one of the three remarkable daughters of the Vicomte de Peyronnet, he, like his brothers and sisters, inherited a strong individuality and intelligence. Any of that family might be counted on to carry a conversation out of the common- place by an original comment or a remark that showed their curious wit, sometimes caustic but never unkind ; indsoed, he had the kindest heart. He was called to the Bar and since the War was the British Secretary of the Anglo-German Arbitral Tribunal. To get that Tribunal to work smoothly where there was no guiding precedent, and when good will, though present, was shallow-rooted, was a triumph of tact, ability and hard work, to say nothing of linguistic power. (He was a traveller, though he found less opportunity for distant travelling than some of his family.) The confidence that he inspired largely made the Tribunal a success and an unadvertised one. If he had been less successful, we should have heard much more about it. His real pleasure in life, apart from or shared in his happy family life, lay in natural history. He was an astonishingly well-informed naturalist, self-taught through observation. A walk with him on the Surrey Downs was a continuous lesson to anyone who shared his pleasure. In London he was frequently in the parks or Kensington Gardens before dawn, observing the behaviour of birds and other wild life. I know that he used to contribute to your columns on natural history as well as to larger magazines, and I trust that his work will not be lost. Certainly the memory of him as a companion will remain treasured- by many.—I am, Sir, &c.,
AMICUS. AMICUS.
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