UNKIND pliort.E were quick to inquire why, if the C ommonwealth
Relations Office is unable to find Men of the right calibre to fill all the available high commissionerships, it should insist on keep- ing the Ambassadorship to the Republic of Ireland in its own pocket—though the Republic is not in the Commonwealth. It is possible to Justify this eccentricity : Ireland is a special case, as her citizens are also (or can become, without formality) British citizens; and it is now not impossible (though it seemed so, until a year or two ago) that Ireland may eventually find her way back, if not into the Commonwealth, at least into some form of external relationship with it, of the kind she enjoyed for a while under Mr. de Valera. But I rather think that the reason the CRO clings to the link is simpler : Dublin happens to be a delightful place for the future Permanent Under-Secretary of the CRO to be sent on a kind Of extended sabbatical, before he takes up his duties at Whitehall. This precedent was estab- lished by Sir Gilbert Laithwaite; and now, on his retirement this week, he has been succeeded by--another former Ambassador to the Republic. Sir Alexander Clutterbuck. At least the Irish have done well out of it; they can consider themselves forninate in the British representatives they have entertained, from Lord Rugby on.
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