must be conceded straight away that, n spite of his charm and easy television anner, Prince Philip is not always the t shop-steward-cum-PRO for the mon- rchy. Since only...

Parliament's own contempt A UBERON WAUGH The Government was being extremely cagey all last week about the timing of its orders to perpetuate the abolition of the death...

Showdown on the campus? GEORGE GALE There are not many last-resort sanctions for those who persistently break rules. Generally, however, it may be observed that the sanc-...

Swing away from LBJ CORAL BELL The week of the long knives which the Australian Prime Minister has just survived is a chilly warning to any party leader who shows himself to...

CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS There is much speculation as to which parts of their recently-published book Political Change in Britain are the composition of Dr Butler and which of...

A second chance for everyone MURRAY KEMPTON New York—Mr Nixon may be excused for having proclaimed the Republican success in electing governors of Virginia and New Jersey as...

Pompidou keeps the options open MARC ULLMANN Paris--On Thursday last the French Foreign Minister, M Maurice Schuman, went to The Hague. The purpose of his journey was to clear...

is something wonderfully grotesque in the Japanese mind, with all its genuine force. It appears that whenever the Mikado goes abroad the upper windows of the streets through...

On growing a moustache KENNETH ALLSOP I g rew a moustache a few months ago. It was not the result of deep deliberation. It was not intended as a banner, a protest, a blow...

Monkey business JOHN ROWAN WILSON It was quite a small monkey, of a pretty yellow colour, and apparently almost tame. It used to hang around outside the dining- room of the...

J. W. M. THOMPSON On the latest evidence, the anti-Springbok campaign seems as likely to whip up pro- South African sympathy as to rally opposi- tion to apartheid. That, of...

Pith and wind BILL GRUNDY en the BBC bought The Survivors, it was ounced as an enterprise of great pith and ment. It soon became apparent that it Id be more accurately...

Backward leap LESLIE ADRIAN Once upon a time there was a parliamentary committee appointed to inquire into the operation of the Acts relating to the hall- marking of gold and...

Have you Medicare in England? DENTS BROGAN Washington—I have just emerged from my first experience of an American hospital. One of my liveliest memories is of being asked as I...

NIKOLAUS PEVSNER Pugin's was a picturesque life. Born in 1812, in business for Gothic decoration at eighteen, bankrupt at nineteen, married at nineteen, widower at twenty,...

OLIVER WARNER First Sea Lord: An Authorised Biography of Admiral Lord Fisher Richard Hough (Allen and Unwin 75s) Fisher was an explosion. The whole hog— touts porcus as he used...

PAT BARR The British in the Far East George Wood- cock (Weidenfeld and Nicolson 70s) The China Helpers Jonathan Spence (Bod- ley Head 45s) When Kipling first travelled to the...

Martin SEYMOUR-SMITH Too Quick Despairer David Williams (Hart- Davis 50s) clouch wrote more intelligently and com- prehensively than any of his contempora- ries: he dealt...

cA ROLA OMAN A Regency Elopement Hugh Fa rmar (Michael Joseph 35s) The Life and Times of Colgultoun Grant Jock Haswell (Hamish Hamilton 45s) The bicentenary of the birth of...

CHARLES REID Sir Henry Wood: A Biography Reginald Pound (Cassell 55s) This readable and revealing book begins un-, pretentiously, collating and filling in rather than...

In retreat BARRY COLE Monk Dawson Piers Paul Read Alison 1' 30s) The Hired Man Melvyn Bragg (Seeker Warburg 30s) Equilibrium Tonino Guerra translated Eric Mosbacher (Chatto...

Constantine FITZGIBBON The Year of Liberty Thomas Pakenham (Hodder and Stoughton 63s) The great Irish rebellion of 1798 was, like all Anglo-Irish crises, an affair of immense...

BRYAN ROBERTSON No matter how directly you confront life, with the sharpest and clearest eyesight, it is arguable that a degree of romantic faith is useful for survival,...

Authentic grue HILARY SPURLING The Old Ladies (Westminster) The Lionel Touch (Lyric) On a cold and dismal Christmas eve in windy provincial town three old lad muster for a tea...

Spy's eye PENELOPE HOUSTON Topaz (Odeon, Leicester Square, 'A'). Hitchcock's personal appearance in Topaz takes the form of a spry bit of acceleration out of a wheelchair....

Queer pitch STEPHEN GARDINER We all know what a child's drawing of a house looks like: there is a front door and on either side two identical windows, one above the other. The...

NICHOLAS DAVENPORT One of those foolish things happened in the City last week. When the news came through that the 34- per cent ceiling on dividend in- creases was to be...

JOHN BULL There has been an important development in the property bond business (about which I have written more or less critically on two occasions in these columns). Abbey...

From Peregrine Worsthorne, John Kirkcaldy, L. E. Weid berg. A. D. Parry, J. Brady, Rich- ard Wort, Susan Banks, Benedict Nighting- ale, J. H. K. Lockhart, John Todd, Sheridan...

Sir: As one of those critics who are refusing to review offerings at the Royal Court while it continues to discriminate against Hilary Spurling, I was sorry to find Nigel Lawson...

Sir: The kind of questions that Dr Rhodes Boyson is rightly asking about the quality of education provided by comprehensive schools. particularly for the able minority of their...

: Apropos of Graham Hallett's letter (8 vember), it would be impossible to dis- ve all similarities drawn between every- rig the Bishop of Stepney has said and rything any...

Sir: There is, as Laurence Olivier once noted, no sound quite so hollow as that of an actor defending his work to a critic, and presumably this goes for authors too....

Sir: May I reply briefly—if belatedly—to Mr Brian Crozier's criticisms of my review of his book The Masters of Power (Letters, 25 October)? When I wrote that his 'thesis' was...

Sir: The publicity your journal (1 November) to the Children's Book Sh proved to be misleading. As a parent, and a drama teacher. I te mpted by such phrases as 'a very full...

Sir: John Rowan Wilson (1 November rites of sugar being supposedly harmfu Iris quite certain that it causes tooth dem and there is much more evidence that harms the health...

Tour de force JOHN WELLS Should military exercises be used as a plat- form for political protest? This is the question that is being asked with increasing frequency this week...

No. 579: Ghost wanted A recent advertisement in the Personal Columns of the Times ran as follows : 'onogr urgently required for period of Plymouth '70 Mayflower celebrations....

PHILMOR F. W. Markwick (2nd Prize, Good Cotnpanior 1915). White to play and mate in two moses solution next week. Solution to no. 464 (Shedey): Kt - K5, thr Q-B7 . 1. . . B-B5...

Across 1 Pomaceous thyroid inheritance on the spearside? (5, 5) 6 The award will come in handy (4) 10 Leg and sleeve (5) II Definitely, neither's at home (3, 3, 3) 12 Is the...