England's Purpose. By Dorothy Crisp. (Rich and Cowan. .5s.)
INTO a hotch-potch of half-truths quotations are flung, chopped. up and various, regardless of the general standpoint of those responsible for them: there is Beverley Baxter and Gertrude Bell, Wavell, Werth and the author herself, so that the result is a somewhat indigestible concoction. Miss Crisp's publishers claim that she writes like a "mixture of Britannia and Boadicea," which is possibly true. It is always a pity when the wrong people go for the right things for the wrong reasons. There is a lot to be said for the British Empire accepting a position of responsibility for the future of the world, but not on Empire-day counts : and it is people like Miss Crisp who are the salt of the earth in a crisis and make England what she is. They get her into wars, but they work the hardest to get her out again. Like thousands less articulate, Miss Crisp loyally rushed to conduct evacuees out of London, while heartily disapproving of the Government's policy, and no doubt continues to do the many irksome and boring jobs that in the end make the difference between victory and defeat—Boadicea seconded to the W.V.S.
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