29 NOVEMBER 1968, Page 30

Oldest subscriber ?

Sir: This is a letter from an old Welshman who is today (16 November) celebrating his eighty- eighth birthday. He claims to be the oldest subscriber to the SPECTATOR, having started reading it in Chislehurst in 1899, and is very proud of the fact.

I arrived in India on 31 May 1912 and have been here ever since. I left its shores to visit 'the land of my fathers' only once, in 1956. I have just looked at an old photograph of the old Bombay Council taken in 1915, in Lord Willingdon's time, and I am the sole surviving one of the old group.