2 AUGUST 1913, Page 16

BREVITY.

[To THE EDITOR Or THE "SPECTATOR."

Srn,—It would be difficult to find a better model of brevity than a letter addressed by Jeremy Bentham, whose writings

were not always distinguished by this quality, to Sir Samuel Romilly. Romilly had invited him to dinner to meet a common friend or acquaintance named Wilson, of whom Bentham appears to have had a poor opinion. His reply— for which, if he had lived in a later age, he would undoubtedly have used a postcard—was :— "DEAR RonriLLT,—If nothing to say, why meet? If anything,

why Wilson ?—Yours very truly, JEREMY BENTHAM."