The lights of Calais
Sir: Alexander Chancellor should come down off his Kentish mountain and make a trip to the Calais he maligns (Notebook, 31 October).
Were he a yachtsman, he would find there a welcome second to none from a town that was English for many centuries. Those warm lights he sees are from the hotels and restaurants on the seafront filled with Brits enjoying themselves at very reasonable prices and, for once, minding their own business instead of everyone else's.
The biggest light of all comes from the great harbour tower, long a welcoming beacon to English ships, and a reminder that our connections with Calais date from the heyday of Burgundy, the trade of the Wool Staple and times when the town streets were named St John's, Rope Walk, Love Lane and others with a familiar ring. Lord Nelson's Lady Hamilton found sanctuary in Calais and she is commemorated there by a plaque on the wall where she lived.
The welcome the British visitor receives today from immigration and customs as well as townsfolk is in refreshing contrast to that of neighbouring Boulogne or, dare I say it, some (happily not all) English ports. One is reminded that our continental friendships are based, not upon some official and pompous EEC bureaucracy, but on a mature history of popular contact and trade with Burgundy and Bordeaux. You should try the vintage sometime, Mr Chancellor!
J. A. Speares Dungloe, Green Lane, Walton-on-the-Naze, Essex
Previous page
