4 APRIL 1992, Page 31

Sir: Mr Arthur Woods (Letters, 21 March) is in threefold

error. It is not 'local legend'

'My God — he's skinned his Oscar.'

but a famous bit of doggerel to which he refers, not the State of Massachusetts but its capital city of Boston (`the home of the bean and the cod') which is in question, and not the family of Lowells (whoever they are) but Lodges which speaks only to Cabots. He is correct on the fourth point of the Cabots speaking only to God.

Robert Brenton Betts

P 0 Box 25490, Washington DC 20007, USA