A society for the abolition of all inter- national sport would have a strong case to argue. There is precious little evidence, at least in recent years, that sporting events...

The old polls act PETER PATERSON Who is the most significant person in British politics this week? Who makes Westminster tremble, disrupts question time in the House of...

White hopes ANTHONY DELIUS The South African elections gave the Prime Minister, Mr Vorster, rather more than he wanted, and surplus is often more difficult to handle than...

Mr Nixon in trouble MURRAY KEMPTON New York — If the President reads the public mood aright, he is at the moment surrounded by politicians whose careers are even more...

From the 'Spectator,' 30 April /870—The De- ceased Wife's Sister came up for her annual discussion on Wednesday, the main feature of the debate being Sir Roundell Palmer's...

Decline and fall DAVID HOWELL What is to be done with the Board of Trade? For something must be done before long. It surely cannot go on the way it is, a con- tradictory...

CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS The Speaker has ruled that the Earl of Durham (renounced) may continue to use the courtesy title of Lord Lambton outside the Palace of Westminster, but...

Where the weakness lies R. A. CLINE Political agitations and disorderly demonstrations are 'nothing new in the history of English social and political conflict. Over a century...

J. W. M. THOMPSON The Bishop of Stepney, who sees this country with fresh eyes after his many years in Africa, made an interesting remark the other day. He suggested that...

More means different J. L. HERKLESS My own educational background is a varied one. I attended school and university in America until I was twenty-two. I then came to Britain...

An open letter BILL GRUNDY Dear Mr Young, I wouldn't presume to try and tell you any- thing about television were it not for the fact that you have yourself admitted that you...

The case against cannabis LORD O'HAGAN Mr W. H. Brereton's book The Truth about Opium was savagely reviewed in the SPECTA- TOR because it maintained that most people who took...

To cut or not JOIIN ROWAN WILSON Some interesting facts about surgery have just been brought to light by Dr John P. Bunker, an anaesthetist writing in the New England Journal...

The skin game RAWLE KNOX Last week I listened to a Conservative MP telling his local association members that one of the objects of the next government, to be formed by their...

The abuse of television GEORGE GALE The leftish and trendy bias of television I have always taken for granted, a phenome- non not to be surprised at, something that goes...

WES MAGEE We laid out the shape with rope then peeled off the turf as if skinning an orange and dug like navvies until solid limestone poked its raw bones into sunlight for the...

J. H. PLUMB For generations now the philosophers of the Enlightenment have suffered in public esteem because of the disrepute into which they fell during the nineteenth...

BRYAN WILSON ■ • antral Symbols: Explorations in Cosmology %lary Douglas (Barrie and Rockliff 45s) Comparative anthropology is at once the most exciting and frustrating of...

DENNIS J. DUNCANSON British Policy in China, 1895-1902 L. K. Young (out. 70s) China: The Roots of Madness Theodore H. White (Bac 35s) The Transformation of the Chinese Earth...

Heads you win PETER PARLEY Heads Edward Stewart (Andre Deutsch 30s) Blow the House Down John Blackburn (Cape 25s) Skin Man Martin Tarmey (Barrie and Jenkins 25s) The Devil...

Elizabeth WISKEMANN Betrayal From Within James Barros (Yale UP 90s) This is an indictment of Joseph Avenol, the French Secretary-General of the League of Nations from 1933 to...

HILARY SPURLING Bertolt Brecht: Collected Plays Vol I 1918- 1923 edited by John Willett and Ralph Man- heim (Methuen 60s) Bertolt Brecht: His Life, His Art and His Times...

DAVID KNOWLES The Viking Achievement P. G. Foote and D. M. Wilson (Sidgwick and Jackson 65s) This book, unlike some of its predecessors in the series 'Great Civilisations', is...

Another country GILLIAN WIDDICOMBE One of London's saddest concerts in a long while was the 'Composer's Choice' pro- gramme of music by Peter Racine Fricker at the Purcell...

The revolutionary conga line PENELOPE HOUSTON In The Confrontation (Academy One, 'A)y Miklos Jancs6 has set dialectic to the tempo of a swaying revolutionary conga line; and...

Golden oldies BRYAN ROBERTSON It is easy to write informatively about R. B. Kitaj, the American artist, to be fairly entertaining about him and his exploits, and totally...

Amazon in diamonds HILARY SPURLING Carol Charming with Her Ten Stout-hearted Men (Drury Lane) The Government Inspector (Cinoherni Klub at the Aldwych) Henry IV Part...

NICHOLAS DAVENPORT The sudden collapse of the gilt-edged market—it has now virtually lost a six months' rise—suggests that something has gone radically wrong and I suspect that...

E.M.B. Each year R. Jenkins with his fluent pen Removes large numbers from the fiscal net Until B. Castle's promises unmet Ensure next springtime they must leave again.

• JOHN BULL Some of the larger unit trust groups in Lon- don have been rubbing their hands with pleasure at the difficulties of Investors Over- seas Services (los), the Geneva...

From Anthony C. Cowdy, J. R. L. Curling- ham, W. A. Miller, D. G. Leslie, Miles Hud- son, Peter Conder, Alan Smith, Cohn Welch, T. C. Skertngton-Lodge, Richard Cobb, P. H. Can...

Sir: In your issue of 25 April Mr Quintin Hogg in his article on Ulster stated that 'the treaty represents a compromise desired by, literally, no one'. Surely the situation is...

Sir: As one who has had a vc in the family, I feel it wholly deplorable that the Queen should have been put in the posit;on of awarding two vcs to Australians fighting in the...

Sir: Mr Bill Grundy (25 April) accuses the Daily Telegraph of dropping circulation 'to today's figure of 1.390.000'. It is in fact Mr Grundy who has dropped 20,000 or more, not...

Sir: Yvonne Brock in her letter to you (18 April) says—'What matters in broadcasting is not whether programmes are left, right or centre or "clean" or "dirty"; these are wholly...

Sir: It is tempting to pursue Gillian Wid- dicombe's metaphor of `the. grazing cham- pion' a little further. When champion bulls are grazing, heifers in neighbouring fields tend...

Sir: The spelling `Liege' was changed to 'Liege' by act of the Prince Regent of Belgium, Prince Charles, in 1945 or 1946. 1 remember seeing the Act published in Le Moniteur...

Sir: Mr Heath's policy for the environment (11 April) is admirable in its intent to reduce noise and industrial filth and in its affirma- tion of protection from erosion of...

Wooster sauce JOHN WELLS Spring had come late to Westminster that year, but now that it had sprung it had sprung with a vengeance. Golden daffodils fluttered and danced by the...

No. 603: Garden parties Set by Molly Fitton: In a recent SPECTATOR article, David Walder tells of 'an energetic canvassing lady of my acquaintance who is capable of looking at...

Across 1 Church militant on Salisbury Plain? (10) 6 Dog-end movements deviously indicate booty (4) 10 Nautical courses include basic brassware (5) 11 The buttercup grows on...

PHILIDOR Touw Hian Bwee (4th Prize, BCF, 1967). White to play and mate in two moves; solution next week. Solution to No. 488 (Thomson-3R4/7Q/ Bb2p1 Rp/ 1N1P3r / 7p / 1PBkp3 /...