United States and France have agreed at Geneva on a plan for control of the arms traffic is something, though several nations whose acceptance of any plan is vital have not yet...

Agreement with France are confidential pending definitive . signature. But it is known that it will end, if adopted, the long series of bickering trade reprisals_ between the...

T HE results of the provincial elections in Ontario and Saskatchewan may be indirectly of Imperial importance. They do . not, of course, affect the com- position of the present...

MUSEUM 1721. Entered as second -class Mail Matter at the New York, N.Y. Poet Office,' Dec. 23rd, 1896. Postal subscription 308. per annum, to any part of the world. Postage on...

the crime statistics for 1932 (published this week) is the continued fall in the convictions for drunkenness. In the five-year period 1925-29 they averaged 68,491 a year ; in...

which Mr. Lloyd George elaborates some remarks he made recently about the power of the British Empire to impose peace on the world, will be read . with considerable interest. It...

the RepOrt of the -Joint Select Committee on India will be delayed until October are very disquieting. That would mean that the Government of India Bill would not be presented...

Mr. R. D. Holt, the well- known ship-owner, makes a number of suggestions as to how Great Britain could pay her debt to the United States in kind. Assuming that we gave -the...

made history in the United States as no one of its 72 predecessors did went their several ways from Washington on Tuesday, having in fifteen months passed legislation which will...

disorders at the Fascist meeting in Olympia. The honours were carried off by Mr. T. J. O'Connor, because he made full allowance for the feelings aroused by the growing practice...

ownership of any undiscovered supplies of petroleum in this country is unanswerable. Oil is no respecter of landlords' boundaries. &prospector who .sinks a well in one man's...

in the House of Commons are improving in quality. After the old-style dog-fight on the Report of the Committee of Privileges there came last Tuesday a really brilliant...

to searching and wholesome criticism in its passage through Com-. mittee. At one time the Government threatened to drop the Bill owing to a defeat on the question of post-....

on a Labour amendment to the Finance Bill. Mr. George Hall suavely suggested that if the special duties on Irish goods were abolished, peace with the Irish Free State would...

of opinion behind him when he again urged the other day that, instead of ultimately putting all hospitals on the rates and taxes, it is wiser to combine voluntary and municipal...

T HE world, after riveting its attention on the Hitler- Mussolini conversations at Venice, and learning nothing of them, has decided that they were simply conversations between...

"T WO ideas," said a shrewd and moderate observer the other day, " have come to dominate the peoples of every civilized country—first, an intense desire for increased wealth and...

basis is a not unimportant question. To those who think so the report of Air France, the concern into which the five separate French aviation companies were fused two years ago...

would do the National Government more good than the creation of a virile youth movement. The Junior Imperial League does not fill the bill, for it is as much a party...

friends sent to gaol. M. Valdemaras, the bullet-headed little Dictator of Lithuania, was never exactly a friend of mine, but he was at least an entertaining acquaintance. (Not...

favourite of rumour for succession to Dean Inge at St. Paul's, and as he is little over fifty there is a good prospect of his keeping his office as long as its present holder,...

T HE idea that the closing speeches of full-dress debates in the House of Commons might occasionally be broadcast is being freely canvassed among Members of Parliament. There is...

By PHILIP JORDAN T HAT the shadow of democratic government which has been granted to Ceylon is more displeasing to back-bench politicians at Westminster and to irrespon-: sible...

By LORD EUSTACE PERCY [The final article in this Aries, by Sir Arnold Wilson, M.P., will appear next week.] THE English candidate at the second Open Examination for the League...

By OSWALD GARRISON VILLARD T HERE has just been published in New York a re- markable poll of no fewer than 20,870 clergymen who were asked to state their views on war and...

By C. E. M. JOAD R AMBLERS are now a recognized community. The Prime Minister sent them a message in connexion with Ramblers' Sunday this week. They know what they want and...

, In a recent issue of THE SPECTATOR attention was drawn (in "A Spectator's Notebook ") to a speech by Mr. Lloyd George, in which the former Prime Minister declared that only...

By GILBERT MURRAY I T is no wonder that many people should consider the Agamemnon absolutely the greatest play ever written by man, but it is rather a mystery why it should so...

By E. L. WOODWARD A BOUT eleven o'clock on spring and summer mornings the through carriage from Edinburgh to Manches- ter is uncoupled from the Scots express at Symington...

A Letter from Cambridge [To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sni, — Only the most notable events could have made us remember the term just ended as anything other than the term in...

" THE SPECTATOR," JUNE 21sT, 1834. Mrs. Horne, the old lady who had been nearly three quarters of a century in the service of the Warwick family, and who died about a week...

"Meeting at Night." By Margery Sharp. At the Globe Meeting at Night is an addition to that swollen and catholic class; the plays which are almost a success. It is charac-...

" Black Magic." At the Polytechnic Theatre SEVERAL travellers have written recently about the island of Bali, in the Dutch East Indies. It has been described as an earthly...

inclined to bewail his lot ought to see this film—or almost any film about newspaper life in America. When the opening scene reveals one of those huge untidy rooms, full of...

TN the musical life of England nothing has played a more important part than the musical festivals in the provinces. They represent the native way of music-making, beside which...

FRIDAY, JUNE 22nd N. W.R. N. N.R. N. 111.12.- N. N. 10.45 • A Traveller in Setirch of Music : Philip Thornton. Tunes from Northern India .. .. N. 12.0o, 13.30, 16.3o and...

garden of one of our greatest gardeners. He showed me of course, very many rarities and wonders ; including a houseful of plants growing from seed brought. back from " the roof...

Drought versus Drying The weather and the season are not altogether kind to those who are making a special effort to popularize the use of drying plants for English crops of hay...

Probably the biggest and most enterprising dryingexperiment in the world is now going on in Norfolk on the biggest farm in Britain. This is not so much concerned with drying...

A Cuckoo Year That too ingenious naturalist who argues that the cuckoo is a mule-hybrid, not truly either male or female, will perhaps claim the evidence of this year as...

me that in- ventors have been not less busy on the Continent, where the drying of crops grows steadily more popular ; and some cf the best authorities have come down on the side...

rollers, wet weather, vermin and birds of prey (including rooks). Squirrels, occasionally the brown as well as the grey, . are perhaps more apt to ravage the nests that are well...

The one melancholy side of hay-making in fine weather is the loss it inflicts on ground-nesting birds ; but happily this year, at any rate, in my neighbourhood, the broods were...

fashions ; and our florists both obey and make the popular taste, very much like the fanciers of dogs. Now the sweet pea, that queen of annuals, i always in fashion ; but the...

Sra,—In your leading article on the subject " Should Black • Shirts be banned ? "—in many ways a fair statement of point-of-view—I was surprised to find much of that very...

SIR,—As a " royalist "—that is to say one of many millions of Englishmen who are equally opposed to a Fascist or a Communist regime, mid who regard the constitutional mon-...

[Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. The most suita5le length is that of one of our " News of the Week " paragraphs. Signed...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR. ] SIR,—In your issue of June 15th Sir James Douglas suggests that no Animal Welfare Bill should be treated as satisfactory for discussion in...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR ; I would not venture for a moment to cast any doubt on the good faith of your correspondent, Mr. H. H. Charnock, who, as a member of a...

an important point about -Animal Welfare legislation. The Statute in question—the Protection of Animals Act, 1934 (the " Anti-Rodeo " Act) was originally a useful Bill, but it...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Many will regret that The Spectator (hitherto a source of " sweetness and light " on the tithe problem) erroneously regards the dead Bill...

[To the Editor of TILE SPECTATOR.] Sin,—May I venture a comment on Mr. E. M. Forster's article on " Our Greatest Benefactor " ? Historically his reference to Simpson as...

have I come across error regarding Sir James Young Simpson, who was the first doctor to use chloroform in obstetrics. An Irish doctor, actually in a special paper on...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sin,—It is highly gratifying to read the account given by Sir John Harris of two missionaries and a layman effecting the settlement of a...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—The resolution just passed by the Congress of the Women's Co-operative Guild, calling upon the Government to legalize abortion, is in...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] SIR,—May I comment on Mr. J. H. Flaxman's letter in your issue of June 15th ? I have just returned from two months' extensive tour through...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR.] Sin,—I have read with interest Mr. Jenkins' statement of the state of affairs in the Far East. Am I to presume that if his neighbour had...

Ix the Committee Room of the Naval Affairs Committee of Congress not many years ago, I was shown by Mr. Britten, the chairman, some noble pictures of American battleships...

SIR ARNOLD WILSON has done what every Member of Parliament should do, by walking through his Division and talking to everyone he met. He is blessed with an unusually retentive...

Egypt Since Cromer. Vol. II. By Lord Lloyd. (Macmillan. 21s.) This extremely readable book, fluently and pleasantly written, with generosity free of grudge, will, of course,...

A History of National Socialism. By Konrad Heiden. (Methuen. 18s.) Wrrnour doubt this book, which is a combination of two German books published in 1932 and 1934, is the most...

The Complete Works of St. John of the Cross. Translated from the critical edition of P. Silverio do S. Teresa, C.D., and edited by Professor E. Allison Peers. Vol. I. (Burns...

OP the many useful distinetiohs which Mr. Roberts makes in the course of his book, those which concern the different varieties of literary critic, and their respective...

TILE original edition of A la Recherche du Temps Perdu, as undertaken by Grasset in 1913, was to consist of three volumes, Du Ciiti de Chez Swann, Le COW de Guermantes and Lc...

15s.) Tins is no ordinary book. In it there is travel, adventure, hardship and poetry. Its author is a young Dane who took part in the Krebs expedition to Mongolia in 1923 which...

Life and Work in England. By Mrs. H. A. L. Fisher. (Arnold. 3s.) CHILDREN'S books, like their diet, seem to be improving a good deal. If we on our gross and casual food...

By WILLIAM PLOMER 7s. t3d.) THE publishers of Duel enclose among its pages one of those postcards on which a list is given of various kinds of books together with an invitation...

Male or female—and it is still difficult to avoid the obvious quotation about the greater deadliness of the female species—the dreaming driver can he marked down before he or...

Germany's External Debts THE threatened default by Germany on her external loans, and especially upon what are known as the " Dawes " and " Young ' Loans, is a matter of con-...

Not the least interesting feature in recent company reports has been the improvement disclosed in the financial results from some of the iron and steel undertakings. Thus,. for...

The Directors of Callender's Cable Company can be con- gratulated upon the latest report, for although the Gross Profit shows a small decrease compared with the previous year,...

GUEST, KEEN'S RESULTS. Yet another industrial concern to show good results for the past year can be cited in the case of Guest, Keen and Nettle- folds, Limited. For the year...

it is satisfactory to note that the interim statement of accounts of Barclays Bank (Dominion, Colonial and Overseas) gives an indication of broadening trade, for the figures of...

Although the Report of the General Electric Company for the past year shows that the Profit for the year was 2971,481 against £1,012,739 for the previous year, the Dividend...

NEW CAPITAL ACTIVITY.' . - DEALINGS in the Stock - Markets during the month of June have been of a more restricted character than had been anticipated. Apart from South African...