The group-system in France produces rather a travesty of government than government. There is never a moment (in spite of the unique but uneasy twelve-months administration of...

The fact that the firm speech delivered at Stuttgart on Monday by Mr. McCloy, the American High Commissioner in Germany, came immediately after his return from consultations in...

impression the advent of the hydrogen bomb has made gro s deeper daily, both in the United States and here. The uneasiness is primarily moral, revolt against the iniquity of...

The second interim report of the Organisation for European Economic Co-operation falls into two sections, and it is to be hoped that the two chief political parties in this...

The statement issued by the National Society, the body in the Church of England concerned with educational matters, is wise, moderate and timely. Voluntary schools, of whatever...

The decision, of Britain and the United States to recognise the governments of the three Indo-Chinese States now incorporated in the French Union need not be regarded merely as...

On Monday all units of the Territorial Army received an Army Council Instruction dealing with arrangements for their intake of National Servicemen, which is due to begin in...

T EACHERS and others concerned with education would do well to study the references to education in the three party manifestos. The Labour document devotes five lines to the...

FTER the Labour and Conservative manifestos—rather long after, as things go—comes the Liberal. It is an undeniably interesting document, which raises some far- reaching...

M RS. HELENA NORMANTON, who is a K.C., is scathing about the shortcomings of the women M.P.s. " A great disappointment. They come and they go, but what do they do ? " and so on...

By SIR JAMES GRIGG T HE Labour Party's pamphlet on The Future of Industrial Assurance contains thirteen pages. Ten and a half of them are occupied in abusing, after the best...

ByMARK ARNOLD - FORSTER Hanover, February I N Western Germany at any given time it is always difficult to estimate the real strength of nationalist, as opposed to patriotic,...

By ROBERT WAITHMAN • Washington O N the night after President Truman had announced that the United States Atomic Energy Commission is to proceed with the manufacture of a...

4 continuance of the exchange of letters in which two well-known writers discuss the present plight of the middle classes. D EAR JANE,—The cold in - the head is better, thank...

By H. M. CLOSE 0 N the whole Pakistan has not found in England the publicity that it needs. But of its component parts the North-West Frontier, which has a famous name, probably...

Team Spirit By GILES BULLARD (Balliol College, Oxford) S the auto-rail entered Bourgoin I recognised the spot. The summer before I had stood on that curving road, thumbing a...

readers are urged to place a firm order with their newsagent or to take out a subscription. Newsagents cannot afford to take the risk of carrying stock, as unsold - copies are...

By HAROLD NICOLSON I HAVE had the good fortune this week to obtain a copy of Volume IX of the " Catalogue of Political and Personal Satires " which has just been published...

a workmanlike farce this is ! The contemporary craftsman in this genre too often rides his jokes into the ground ; one funny situation lasts him so long that its humours have...

THEATRE dc Hamlet." By William Shakespeare. (New.) IT is as a man of action that Mr. Michael Redgrave's Hamlet lingers in the mind—a taut, wary, impetuous, dominating figure...

ci Golden Salamander." (Odeon, Marble Arch.) — " That Others May Live." (Cameo-Polytechnic.)—" It's a Great Feeling." (Warner.) BECAUSE much is expected of Mr. Ronald Neame, his...

Walton's new violin sonata was given at Drury Lane on February 5th by Yehudi Menuhin and Louis Kentner. It is in two movements only —one predominantly lyrical with dramatic...

the alleged continuance of the gorse flower is due to the presence of two sorts of gorse that have different flowering dates. They are doubtless justified in giving 'out this...

immure," especially London Town, has expressed wonder at the diminution, here and there the disappearance, of the sparrow. Can it be true that this impudent, friendly,...

I CAME across the other day a singularly Pepysian extract from the Diary concerning St. Valentine's Day, February 14th, 1667; "But I am also this year my wife's Valentine ; and...

A most charming little book of drawings of old Stevenage, now to be smothered, called A Stevenage Picture Book (W. H. Smith and Co. 4s. 6d.), ends with a picture of Six Hills...

Another bird query concerns the refusal of small migrants to emigrate. It is roundly asserted that the blackcap, the nearest rival to the nightingale in song, has been seen this...

Set by Derek Hudson " The child is father of the man." To illustrate this, write a school report, not exceeding 200 words, for any one of the following between the ages of 6 and...

Report by Robert Levens A prize is offered for an open testimonial for employment in one of the following capacities : cook, companion-chauffeuse, curate, head or assistant...

Russia and the Bomb SIR.—When you state that President Truman's decision to make the hydrogen bomb is inevitable, you not only use a word in its wrong sense (for what is...

if Russia alone among the nations possessed a hydrogen bomb ? " Though you may not agree with me, perhaps you will permit one who has studied the Soviet way of life at first...

SIR,—Mr. Harold Nicolson's bewilderment about the electorate's supposed indifference to the world crisis is itself bewildering. Isn't the explanation quite simple ? Elections...

SIR. —I have read with great interest American Impressions , by Sir Evelyn Wrench, in the Spectator of December 23rd. Much, of course, of what Sir Evelyn says is true. Most...

SIR,—Your paragraph on " Roman Catholic Schools " calls for comment. You omit to mention that the Catholic claim is primarily based upon parental right, a right antecedent to...

Sia,—You recently had some correspondence criticising the Post Office. May I add one case which seems to me to condemn utterly the monopoly system which is now called...

SIR.—It may interest your correspondent Mr. Cecil Roberts that in 1916 I was given the same explanation of the origin of the word " snob " as he had from his informant, with the...

Enosis (union of Greece and Cyprus) is no longer seriously considered outside Communist circles. I recently visited Greece for the third time since the war, and during this last...

" Country Rector's Wife " with mingled sympathy and admiration, but cannot see how they invalidate the principle I am maintaining—that the kind of school edtication a child gets...

Sia,—There are many parents with a child at an elementary school who spend thirty shillings a week on amusements and as much again on tobacco. It never occurs to them that, if...

siR,—x.Y.z. is not the only one to suffer from being " self-employed and over 65." My husband was in Holy Orders for 34 years. When he died, after receiving a disability pension...

SIR,—The Passfield Trustees are making arrangements for the writing of a biography of Lord Passfield. They have deposited his papers in the British Library of Political and...

Sitt,—It may be pertinent to point out that during and between' the years 1552 and 1662 the Prayer Book did not postulate or permit any consecra- tion of the bread and wine at...

A MEETING of the friends of National Education was held at Willis's Rooms on Thursday . . . Archdeacon Manning opened with prayer. Mr. G. A. Denison said that "all education...

Human Relations Male and Female. By Margaret Mead. (Gollancz. 18s.) MARGARET MEAD has written a remarkable book. Starting with the basic questions—" How are men and women to...

The Theory and Practice of Communism. By R. N. Carew Hunt. (Bles. 12s. 6d.) The God that Failed. Six Studies in Communism. Edited by Richard Crossrnan. (Harnish Hamilton. r 25....

The English Parliament. By Kenneth Mackenzie. (Pelican Books. ' ts. 6d.) POPULAR interest in Parliament is for various reasons probably keener today than it has ever been. One...

FROM The Essential Samuel Butler to a new book about FitzGerald! One has the agreeable sensation of escaping from the world of the Hydrogen Bomb into the convivial atmosphere of...

Age Cannot Wither : The Story of Duse and D'Annunzio. By Bertita Harding. (Harrah. 12s. 6d.) IT is more than twenty-six years since Eleonora Duse last performed in London, on...

Sir John Mandeville: The Man and His Book. By Malcolm Letts. (The Batchworth Press. is.) LIVE narrative material is not abundant in the literature of the Middle Ages. For the...

Intimate Journals. By Charles Baudelaire. Translated by Christopher Isherwood. Introduction by W. H. Auden. (Methuen. 25s.) IT is strange that a man who, in an age of progress,...

winner of Crossword No. 566 is A. B. Pavey-Smith, Esq., 14 Leeds Road, Harrogate.

DI Book Token for one guinea will be awarded to the sender of the- first correct solution of this week's crossword to be opened after noon on Tuesday week, February 21st....

The Ruthless Innocent. By Patrick Balfour. (Hamish Hamilton. 93. 6d.) The Dukays. By Lajos Zilahy. (Heinemann. 12s. 6d.) IT is difficult to decide just what shape is the right...

DETAILS of new books to be published in the spring and summer are now coming in from the publishers. Collins announce a biography of Maupassant by Francis Steegmuller for March,...

By CUSTOS IN marked and welcome contrast with the stagnation of ordinary Stock Exchange business, activity in new capital issues is being reasonably well maintained under the...