ABYSSINIA AND THE CORONATION
[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Snt,—You may be right in saying that " the surprise expressed 'in Rome that the Emperor of Abyssinia has been asked if he .desires to be represented at the Coronation will be widely shared here." I submit that there would be greater surprise, and even indignation, if the enquiry had not been made.
For many centuries contempt has been cast upon a priest and a Levite who " passed by on the other side." What should -we say of a benevolent traveller who sought out, not the out- raged person, but the robber and took him to the inn—in other words, invited him to a coronation ? People who raise such
questions may be charged by politicians with " blindness to realities." Such a charge will hardly come from anyone who keeps tryst with moral and spiritual realities. Would not the presence of a representative from Italy endanger the sincerity of the religious solemnities in the Abbey ?—Yours truly,
[To an invitation to Haile Seilassie as an individual person there could be no kind of objection. The point of our comment was that since Abyssinia as an independent State has in hard fact been destroyed—a hard fact for which the British Govern- ment must bear its share of responsibility—it is in accordance neither with truth nor with wisdom to pretend that it still exists. To say that by no means implies formal recognition of the Italian occupation.—En. The Spectator.]
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