Friday December 10 1965

THE. CHINESE again accused the Russians of play- ing the American game in Vietnam, and Mr. Smith reversed the charges so to speak, accusing Britain of playing the Communist game...

T HE big show,' commented Izvestia just after Mr. Stewart left Moscow, 'will come later, when Bonn and Washington meet.' hvestia is perfectly right. Events in Europe during the...

Farewell to the Steel Industry . ROY II A TTERSLEY, MP Thomas Hardy JOHN HOLLOWAY One year's subscription to the 'Spectator': £315s. (including postage) in the United Kingdom...

Now We Are Married From MURRAY KEMPTON ' T HE National Association of Manufacturers, for generations the symbol of private in- dustry's resistance to the aggressions of...

Rhodesia: the Consensus Cracks rrHERE iS more to a bipartisan policy than I having the Opposition stand idly by while the Government improvises from day to day. There has to be...

Fleet Street Baby-sitter CHARLES CURRAN writes: Editing a newspaper for a Press Lord is,like being married to Henry VIII; a brief blaze of uneasy glory, then a sudden,...

A Quick Election? By ALAN WATKINS A N early general election is now being . ,,.seriously talked about, by ministers and back- benchers alike. Mr. Harold Wilson, it is...

The Chief Effect of Horace King Was keeping Members on a string. He bade a Secretary of State Confine himself to the Debate, And told Front Benchers that they ought To keep...

By J. W. M. THOMPSON `rrHE Government has an open mind on this 1 question,' the public inquiry into the con- tentious proposal to make a third international airport for London...

If you read Soviet Chess by D. J. Richards (O.U.P., 25s.) you will learn much about chess and more about Communism. Study, for example, the telegram sent to Stalin by Botvinnik...

Unlike some journals of opinion in this c ountry we are not compulsively anti-American; over the last twenty years we have, in general. supported American foreign policy, just...

T ALWAYS enjoy the explanations offered by Ithose who direct public opinion polls, when they begin to realise that their results are wildly at variance with the facts of life....

From. SARAH GAINHAM DONN J UST as it is no longer considered possible to discuss national policies without including economics, so it is difficult to discuss foreign policy...

the request of the formidable all-party dele- gation led by Duncan Sandys to Charles Pannell, Minister of Works, for a public inquiry into the development plan for the Whitehall...

his view the criticism of Aubrey Jones that is prevalent today is unfair. I agree. The criticism should be aimed at the Government. The Government made a shrewd choice when it...

By MALCOLM .BRADBURY TN these days of the brain-drain, when the Eng- 'fish university teacher in his academic fastness is tempted by attractive offers to cross the Atlan- tic...

an settlement of an action brought by Mr. I Justice O'Hagan, a judge of the Eastern Cape Division of the Supreme Court of South Africa, against the Spectator Ltd., and Mr. Lain...

The Gobbler Gobbled By HUGH JOHNSON CHAUCER'S Reeve is the chap I admire. It snewed in his hous of meat and drink. I've heard so many people say this year that they're not...

To Grace Any Table By ANDREW ROBERTSON I do not wonder that there are men (no women, yet. I think) called Masters of Wine, for it is a great mystery. Edward Hyams, in his new...

Six,—Mr. R. L. Travers is not strictly correct in saying that since 1814 the only punishment for high treason is hanging. What that Act (54 Geo. III c. 146) lays down is that...

SIR,—This becomes tedious, not to say shrill. Doe , , the Duchess of Hamilton not agree that the Arch- bishop of Canterbury's remarks on the Rhodesian dilemma were in many cases...

From: Sir Linton Andrews, D. H. Cameron, Elkan Allan, D. C. S. Wiltshire, Donald South- gate, John A. Barry, Myron P. Gilmore, E. M. Milne, Anne Fremantle, J. Anthony Clare,...

SIR,--Koestler's version is, of course, long-winded; but so is Brien's. The correct (i.e. most economical and truest to Yiddish speech rhythmsrpunchline is 'Oedipus-Shmoedipus I...

SIR,—Enid Lakeman and her friends should stop misrepresenting the result of the 1951 election. As I wrote in the Annual Register at the time: 'The Liberals polled 1,890:938...

SIR,—There has only now been brought to my atten- tion the review by Mrs. Sylvia Sprigge of the selected letters of Bernard Berenson edited by A. K. McComb in your issue of June...

S1R,—Alan Brien successfully challenges Arthur Koestler's analysis of the joke about the Indian's coded smoke signals to his accomplice in the poker game. Koestler certainly...

Stn,-In a recent Spectator, Lord Gladwyn, 7 beginning his article on de Gaulle with a warning note, quotes from Matherbe's great poem, which begins 'Ta douleur, du Pdrier.' His...

S1R.-May 1 appeal through your 'paper for help for the Polish Air Force Association Benevolent Fund which exists for the same purpose as the Royal Air Force Benevolent Fund....

SLR,-A remarkable letter by Miss Vanessa Red- grave in a recent issue of your paper has just come to my notice. It contains an account of the coming to power of the Brazilian...

SIR,-Attemptin g to find a companion to sit (at 55. 6d. per hour with expenses paid) with an eighty- nine-year-old woman in the geriatric wing of a well- known private mental...

ACROSS 1. Coat of arms (6) 4. Fateful meeting place of a brutal ending (8) 8. How Mafeking was put on the map? (8) 10. 'The crows and choughs that wing the midway air Show - so...

SIR,--The sooner we can impose-and enforce-a 70 m.p.h. speed limit on all public highways the better. High speeds are all right for a fast car driven by a good driver where he...

in Rhodesia to happen at a time inconvenient for the Spectator, and by the inexplicable success of Mr. Gunter in discussions with the bakers' leaders, has used a singularly un-...

SIR,-I should be grateful if any of your readers could provide me with information about the rela- tion-if any-between the age at which a woman marries, and her physical beauty....

SIR,-Brian Crdzier, somewhat out of his depth in reviewing Nkrumah's Neo-Colonialism, begins by stating that `Dr. Nkrumah is known in Ghana as the Redeemer.' The word osagyefo...

29 DOWN.-1 'Cramped. 2 Establish. 3 ra Ruskin. 5 Orbs. 6 Eurasian . 7 Irene. Manatee. 11 Maudlin. 14 Amanita. 17 Pinchbeck. 18 Pot-hater. 19 Exhibit. 21 Wid u eon. 22 Breech,...

The Splits By TERENCE BENDIXSON N EW British embassies are just now at varying stages of construction in Madrid, Stock- holm and Oslo. The credit squeeze has put a stop to Sir...

Living and Partly Living W HAT about Murder in the Cathedral? I was myself out of Britain in the 'thirties, so that the Third Programme's current series* is for me largely an...

Swannee Williams The Glass Menagerie. (Haymarket.)—Hello, Dolly! (Drury Lane.) T WONDER what moved Messrs. Tennent and their collaborators to revive The Glass Menagerie at this...

What a Performance! a() GOBBI'S costive production of Simon T Boccanegra, with himself in the lead, has been caned enough. No stripes shall be added by me. Some of my...

As a reader you may have the Spectator sent to your friends, in any part of the world, as your Christmas or New Year Gift for a year (52 issues) for almost half the normal...

Blood Thick and Thin The Battle of the Bulge. (Casino, 'A' certificate.) — Answer to Violence. (Academy Cinema Club.) MHERE are conventions in routine war films I just as...

By TONY TANNER p is somewhat shaming that this unusually 'thorough and appreciative study of Sterne's work should have been written by a Frenchman.* Shaming, too, that...

A Cupful of Tears : Sixteen Victorian Novel- ettes. Selected by Martin Seymour-Smith. (Wolfe, 25s.) INTRINSIC knowledge of others is the novel's marvellous gift. The...

or Liberal by Definition This is the solid-looking quagmire The bright-green ground that tempts the tread And lets you down into despond. Enough consistence to conform, Enough...

The Pursuit of Certainty. By Shirley Robin Letwin. (C.U.P., 52s. 6d.) THIS well-produced book consists in leisurely studies of four British thinkers: David Hume, Jeremy Bentham,...

Crisis in Europe, 1560-1660. Essays from Past and Present, 1952-1962. Edited by Trevor Aston. (Routledge and Kegan Paul, 40s.) HISTORY, Spinoza wrote, consists not in mocking,...

JOHN BINGHAM and Judson Philips have some- thing in common: they are both aware of the terrors and dangers that lurk under the skin of civilised living, ready to claw down the...

I. Compton-Burnett. By Charles Burkhart. (Gollancz, 30s.) Pastors and Masters. Parents and Children. A Family and • a Fortune. By I. Compton- Burnett. (Gollancz, 18s., 21s. and...

Thomas. By Shelley Mydans. (Collins, 25s.) The Fear. By Thomas Keneally. (Cassell, 25s.) `I COLLECT my tools: sight, smell, touch, taste, hearing, intellect: Thus Nikos...

By PHILIDOR 26o. Specially contributed by R. GUNNING (Whitton, Middlesex) BLACK (6 men) WHITE (5 men) WHITE to play and mate in three moves ; solution next week. Solution to...

By CUSTOS Canadian Bank rates hit the gill-edged market more severely than equity qiaro. Hopes had already been fading of an early reduction in the British Bank rate, but this...

The Dearer Money Fracas By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT klo wonder President Johnson is angry! The NFederal Reserve Board has put up its re- discount rate (the equivalent of Bank rate)...

M - 12: GARFIELD WESTON, chairman of Asso- ciated British Foods, points out in his annual report that the South African and Aus- tralian interests were mainly responsible for...

Boot's R oute By STRIX YEARS ago — perhaps a hundred: perhaps more, perhaps less—a man lived in an isolated cottage be- side the road that passes through our village. He...

By LESLIE ADRIAN JUST what we arc storing up for ourselves when we use unfainiliar chemicals in food, drinks, cosmetics and even glues and pol- ishes that come • in contact...

By ALAN BRIEN I HAVE not been to my Health Club for over a fortnight and already I feel like a deserter—one of those lazy rotters who stayed at home for Agin- court and so...