A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK
IAM not historian enough to know whether the Home Secretary was right when he observed at Southwold on Tuesday that King George VI was the first English sovereign to land in East Anglia from a rowing-boat since Canute, and probably Sir Samuel would not stake his repu- tation on the accuracy of the statement. There was something almost moving in the simplicity of the King's arrival, the unconventionality of his landing and the acclamations that saluted him, and perhaps the happiest feature of a memorable day was the King's obvious enjoyment of it all —not least, by the way, of the traditional camp game variously known as " tooth and nail," or " foot and mouth," which may be confidently recommended to anyone who wants the maximum of exercise in the minimum of time. The game —twenty a side—is a mixture of rugby, association and net- ball, each goal being a suspended net, and there are no rules, no boundaries, no offside and apparently no fouls. The ball can be kicked or thrown in any direction, players can be tackled high or tackled low, the ball can be netted from behind the goal post as well as in front, and if it is kicked over what would normally be the touch-line the players charge ruthlessly through the spectators and carry on in open country. It is as well, all things considered, that they play in tennis-shoes. * * * * I am glad that Lord Elgin, after three months of the Glasgow Exhibition, declares the promoters satisfied with results so far. The Exhibition has run half its course and roughly six million attendances have been recorded. The remaining three months ought at least to double that number, for Bellahouston is emphatically worth visiting. The lay-out gains enormously—as compared with last year's Paris Exhibition, for example—by the grouping of the pavilions round a grassy hill ; inter alia, the cascades which that geography makes possible are better than anything Paris could show. Scotland has made an admirable job of her own two Scottish pavilions, and the United Kingdom pavilion shows what can be done when money is not stinted, as it was most deplorably on the British Pavilion at Paris ; it sets a standard for British representation at New York next year. One minor but important point. At Paris the restaurants were either scandalously expensive or com- pletely repulsive ; at Glasgow I got an excellent luncheon, quickly and attractively served, at the price of 2S. Moreover the extras for sideshows are not exorbitant. It costs is. to go up the tower and 6d. each for the Highland clachan and the " Victoria Falls." The former is an admirable investment ; the latter may be for anyone who has never seen an eight-foot fall in a Scottish stream.
• * * * The random sampling of half a dozen or more hotels on a drive to and from the north of Scotland confirms my convic- tion that the average British hotel today is quite as good as any reasonable person could ask. But, of course, it is always the one bad case, not the half-dozen good, that sticks in memory ; that, no doubt, gives British hotels as a whole a worse reputation than they deserve. It is fair to say that my particular misfortune was not starred at all, but I had had it recommended to me on the road, and I got there too late in the evening to move on further. It was a thirty- bedroom house, not a wayside inn. For a rather late meal it produced soup (out of a tin but quite good), ham (hard:, edible) and eggs, pears (out of a tin) and cream. A doubt: bedroom was equipped with one small towel for two people, a looking-glass with half the reflecting surface peeling off, hot and cold taps which both ran stone-cold, a tumbler too dirty to use, and a loose floor-board to set the furniture shaking when trodden on. Breakfast, ordered for 8.15 and served at 8.5o by a maid with an apron that had forgotten it was ever white, was set on taBles still sprinkled with last night's crumbs, standing on a floor still sprinkled with last night's matches. That was fortunately a unique experience.
* * * * It is odd, by the way, how many people take the routine road to Scotland when there are so many better ways of getting there. I share the astonishment of the Dean of York that the accomplished lady who periodically informs readers of The Times of the vicissitudes of the Miniver family should have been content to toil slavishly up that devastating thoroughfare, the Great North Road, when there is the empty " woodland way " through the Dukeries available. And, of course, as the Dean says, there is only one entry into Scotland worth thinking about (unless you are bound for Glasgow way)—through Corbridge, over the Cheviots at Carter Bar and down to Jedburgh. But I- don't know that I really want the Dean to beckon all the world that way. Let them stick to Scotch Corner and Gretna Green.
* * * * It is not surprising that a number of relics of varying degrees of interest and antiquity have been found in the river-bed in the course of the Waterloo Bridge operations, for the water beneath the bridges is a safe sepulchre for many unwanted objects, from used razor-blades upwards. Some years ago a retired Home Office official was talking to me of a particularly gruesome murder committed in North London. The murderer had dismembered his victim and hidden the parts all over the metropolis. The police finally collected enough to establish identity—but not the head— and conviction and sentence followed. The official hap- pened to be visiting Pentonville while the condemned man was waiting execution, and he took the opportunity to have a last talk with him, in the course of which he asked him if he would have any objection, now that nothing mattered, to saying what in fact he had done with the head. " Oh, I don't mind telling you at all," was the answer. " I dropped it over Westminster Bridge."
* * * * The situation at Ormskirk, at present represented in Parliament by a member of the National Labour Party, Si: Thomas Rosbotham, is getting complex. For some time it has been understood that Sir Thomas would shortly retire and Commander Stephen King-Hall, who has Parliamentary aspirations, and qualities to justify them, step into his shoes. Now it appears Ormskirk is not safe after all, for the farmers will not have Commander King-Hall because he likes Protection less than they do, and threaten to run a candidate against him, which would make the contest three-cornered and the issue highly doubtful. So Sir Thomas, whose early resignation had been expected, will hold on, and may even stand again at the General Election. But it is a pity that Commander King-Hall should be out of Parliament if be
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