The law of diminishing returns applies to Budgets. Mr Healey's thirteenth Budget since 1974 has a weary air especially for a man who still, after all, cherishes some hope of...

The almost new Denis Healey Ferdinand Mount See you in July . . . that will have to wait until next month's mini-Budget . . . I can never remember whether this is Denis...

A monetarist answer Nicholas Davenport There were no real surprises in the Budget. It was pretty well what we had all expected because no budget in my memory had been so well...

The twenty-eighth Konigswinter Conference was held at Oxford last week. This is an annual Anglo-German get-together to discuss the problems of the day. The political tone is set...

The Jumbo that landed Auberon Waugh In moments of distress, when England seems to have surrendered to split logic, half-think and vulgar simplemindedness, my own thoughts...

Nicholas von Hoffman Washington The President is back from a visit to Venezuela, Brazil, Nigeria and Liberia — formerly known as the Republic of Firestone in honour of the...

Stephen Glover Salisbury Ideology has never been the strong point of Most Rhodesian politicians. In the past they have shown great talent for making and breaking alliances, for...

Paul Martin 'Nkosi Sikelele Afrika' (God Save Africa), sang the swaying midnight crowds eighteen' months ago as a 101-gun salute boomed out across the Transkei hinterland....

Leo Abse Lugola Vecchia Could it be that in some windowless hideout, converted into jail and studio, with whirring cameras directed on to the hapless Moro, a stylish Italian...

Peter Walker 'To judge by the talk there has been, one Would have imagined we were being overrun by a swarming invasion and "ousted" from our island through neglect of...

George Gale In my first day as an undergraduate I was approached by a totally strange`young man declaring himself to be from what he called 'Kick You' and asking me whether I...

HEINRICH MANN Henri Huatre. (Trans E. Sutton, voist and others by. Write Spectator Box No. 819. THE BARBARY COAST by Asbury. Write Spectator Box No. 820. MERVYN PEAKE, any...

Antonia Martin The Cambrian Way is the 260-mile footpath which the Countryside Commission, prompted by a body called the Cambrian Way Committee, proposes to create from Cardiff...

Sir: However much you castigate the national press for their reporting of Princess Margaret's actions, the feeling remains among People who earn their living (and Pay penal...

Y°uof your own pioneer contribution to this c ampaign? Some weeks ago you published what purPorted to be a review, by Mr Alastair Forbes, of Group-Captain Townsend's book. In...

• Sir: Patrick Marnham sees the Arts Council ( Notebook, 1 April) as a little-understood or ganisation due to the 'secretive habits of bs f unctionaries'. In spite of the...

Sir: In his review of John Elsom's book The History of the National Theatre (1 April) Ted Whitehead expressed the hope that the relative level of expenditure on the National...

Sir: It really does not help British people to understand events which they are in any case historically ill-equipped to grasp, when publicists use, as Mr Ainsztein does...

Sir: I refer to Bruce Chatwin's article in your issue of 8 April. The Biblical view of the restoration of Israel to Palestine is not confined to certain Jews. In the nineteenth...

Sir: It is no good the Director of 'Campaign for the North' being cross with me (1 April)' Regional devolution will never be attain . able for the North unless there is a...

Sir: Christine Verity in her article 'Blas phemy and the law' (25 March) states that `. . Mr Kavanagh was shocked' by the poem — James Kirkup's 'The Love that Dares to Speak its...

Sir: In his article in your issue for 1 April 1 take it that when Mr Tony Craig states that 'There is indeed a strong case for freezing rents this year' he was, in the absence...

Sir: Auberon Waugh (1 April) is wrong 10 thinking that the works of Tleomas Hardy went out of copyright in January of this year. For much the same practical reasons that motor...

The last frontier Raymond Carr Red Gold John Hemming (Macmillan £9.95) V, lefts of the Miracle Shelton H. Davis (Cambridge £7.95 and £3.75) Assault on the Amazon Richard...

Robert Skidelsky Politics and Markets: The World's Political-Economic Systems Charles E. Lindblom (Basic Books, New York $15.00) It's always annoying to be told what to think...

Paul Ableman Success Martin Arnis (Jonathan Cape £3.95) Martin Amis's third novel concerns two young men who share a London flat. Gregory is handsome, witty, elegant and...

Benny Green When in this space a few weeks ago I happened to mention in Passing that the best Christmas present I ever received was a book called The Four Schools, by one R. A....

Calm and control Alastair Best '3 . sic new universities — with the somewhat nvid exception of Sussex — are more beton u tui than red brick. This is particularly true s' ,, f...

Myth-mash Ted Whitehead Ten Times Table (Globe) Ralndance (Roundhouse Downstairs) A man comes into the darkened ballroom of the Swan Hotel and calls to a companion outside to...

Sensual plane John McEwen No exhibition could be more welcome, more overdue, than the selection of William Johnstone's recent drawings and the first showing here of the...

Devilish bad John Wells Ihe Devil, probably I hat Obscure Object of Desire (A cademy) I d utifully went to see, before it came off, Robert Bresson's ;nuch-praised Le Diable,...

Dream world Rodney Milnes Juliette (Coliseum) Here is an extraordinary and illuminating coincidence. Kenneth MacMillan used Martinu's 'Fantaisies Symphoniques' for the third...

From above Richard Ingrams William Whitelaw was the man put forward by the Tories to expound their new policy on immigration, and one could see the wisdom of the move. Uncle...

Friendly Ruth Patrick Marnham The way They Manage the milk is inter' esting and becoming more so. As we are frequently reminded, no other 'dairy Indus' try' provides such a...

First kiss Jeffrey Bernard I have aimed too high too often and stepped out of my class on too many occasions not to feel a little sympathetic about the impending nervous...