SIR,-Very many people will agree with all that the Bishop of London - wrote about Village Schools in The Spectator of January 25th. I should like to emphasise that not only is...

" NUREMBERG JUSTICE)" SiR,-Your correspondent, Mr H. T. Cozens-Hardy, seems to me to' be in error in complaining of the tenor of the article by Wilson Harris on Nuremberg...

VILLAGE SCHOOLS Sm,-The correspondence and article in your recent issues do not, I think, bring out one of the disadvantages of the small school-viz., the great difficulty the...

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR THE FIFTH FREEDOM SIR,-There is a fifth freedom, already on the horizon, which will gain added importance during the next few years. The new freedom of...

U.N.O. AND. THE BALTIC STATES SiR,-GComing myself from a country which was a faithful member of many international organisations, particularly of the League of Nations, I would...

Sweet Winter An old question has been put to me several times of late: How comes it that the chief winter-flowering plants are very sweet-scented? Viburnum fragrans, daphne,...

Nesting Boxes Government departments are not as a rule sympathetic naturalists. One of them, for example, has encouraged the practice of setting the abominable gin-trap in the...

In My Garden From the neighbourhood of the best fruit-growing district in England comes a plea for much more frequent winter-spraying than I suggested. An expert fruit-grower...

V.D. AND THE ASSOCIATION SIR,-My attention has just been drawn to a statement in your issue of December 28th, I945. It should be pointed out that the belief of the Association...

Dangerous Birds A young naturalist, writing to me from the Gold Coast (where he has found a new mosquito), tells of near shaves from collision with birds. His pilot, having...

FAMILY ARCHIVES SIR,-Readers of Mr. Vulliamy's review of "Nunwell Symphony" may be interested to know that the advice on the subject of drink and foreign travel, quoted by Mr....

PAPER FOR BOOKS SIR,-Your statement " the hard fact is that we lack dollars to buy paper with " confuses two quite distinct things-namely, newsprint, which involves dollars,...

COUNTRY LIFE THE coming of the close season-which, oddly enough, is a day later than the law intended-means rather more than it meani 'a few years ago. Virtually it meant in...

The Times very happily gives its obituary notice of Sir Herbert Baker the heading "An Imperial Architect." There could be no better description. Sir Herbert was one of a great...

A neutral friend well placed to follow the trend of opinion in Germany gives me a depressing picture of the general frame of mind. Even what may be termed from an international...

G. K. Chesterton once told of an amiable lady who, on reading the title of Browning's poem Pacchiarotto and How He Worked in Distemper, supposed it to treat of a dog of that...

A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK THE question of the forthcoming official Life of Lloyd George is still provoking a good deal of discussion. The work, it will be remembered, has been...

Appointment to the Embassy at Moscow represents a duty to be discharged rather than an honour to be sought, and when it is a case of following so outstanding a representative...

A letter which reaches me from an Englishman who has long lived in the United States contains what I think is some sound and pertinent counsel. " I wish," says the writer, " we...

The death of Col. G. D. Turner, of which I learn with great regret, recalls the sensational prison mutiny at Dartnoor in I932. Col. Turner was then a Prison Commissioner, one...

A fifty years' editorship is not, I think, unique, but it is near enough to it to make the retirement of Mr. A. W. Kiddy from the editorial chair of the Bankers' Magazine after...

Prospect for France M. Gouin's Governrenrt won its first, if minor, success last week when its arbitrator, M. Louis Saillant, achieved a settlement of the Paris printers'...

THE THREAT TO U.N.O. THE United Nations can never work unless the nations that comprise it are united. That, of course, is a commonplace, but the events of the past few days...

On the Road in China China Cycle. By Richard P. Dobson. (Macmdlan. 12s. 6d.) To celebrate their centenary in I943 the publishers announced a series of awards for manuscripts...

A Major Poet Deaths and Entrances. By Dylan Thomas. (Dent. 3s. 6d.) IT is my long-held opinion that any useful criticism of new poetry can only be of the nature of...

MARGINAL COMMENT By HAROLD NICOLSON I RECALL that when in the old days foreigners used to discuss the comparative virtues of the European nations, they were apt to define...

" THE POLES IN ITALY " SIR,-May I make observations on a few among many inexactitudes in Miss Elizabeth Wiskemann's article on Poles in Italy in your issue of February ist?...

" THE FUTURE OF COAL" SIR,-In your interesting article you suggest that the Coal Industry Nationalisation Bill is not precise as regards the revenue of the National Coal Board...

CAN WE AFFORD IT? SIR,-We are planning an insurance scheme which will cost, we are told, f452,0oo,ooO in I948. This sum is about three times the amount of the total State...

SARAWAK AND BRITAIN SIR,-I note your bland Editorial remark on Sarawak that " it is obvious " it "must be brought under the ultimate control of the Colonial Office " (together...

" 100 YEARS OF ANAESTHETICS" SIR,-Reading your interesting article on -the great strides that have been made in using anaesthetics in childbirth has encouraged me to make a...

COAL MINES AND THE HUMANITIES SIR,-The interesting article on " Miners and Mineowners " by Viscount Castlereagh in your issue of February ist makes the point that for twenty...

National Insurance - The comprehensive Bill introduced in the House of Commons by Mr. Griffiths on Wednesday applies the principle of national insurance in a new sense. Rightly...

Houses and Costs On Tuesday, Mr. Bevan introduced two Bills to provide new and increased rates of subsidies for houses built by local authorities; they also include additional...

Hope for China The truce which was arranged three weeks ago between the Chinese National Government and the Communists has developed into an agreement which may provide the...

Germany's Industry The date has already passed by which the occupying Powers in Germany were to have agreed on the amount of industrial equipment to be made available for...

NATIONALISED INDUSTRY By GEOFFREY COOPER, M.P. W ILL public ownership succeed where private enterprise has W failed in the coal, iron and steel, road and rail and air...

PROSPECTS IN SPAIN By SALVADOR DE MADARIAGA THE continued existence of a Fascist State in Europe nearly a whole year after the Fuhrerdammerung is an anomaly which puzzles...

SIR,-Everyone realises that, owing to the war,- we are a much poorer nation than we were before. We are told, and quite rightly, too, that unless we work as never before we...

PUBLIC OPINION ABOUT HUNTING SIR,-I should like to know the evidence on which my old friend and former colleague, Beach Thomas, bases his claim that " the country in general...

LAWS AND THE PEOPLE SIR,-What your correspondents say about bureaucratic decisions in the correspondence entitled " Laws and the People " is very true; and yet a recently...

PROFESSOR BODKIN REPLIES S1R,-Mr. Michael Ayrton, in his review of my book, The Approach to Painting, attributes to me statements that I have never made and opinions that I...

THE BEST BIOGRAPHIES SiR,-In placing the first three in the Biography Stakes, does not Janus overlook a runner-Carlyle's 7ohn Sterling? I have more than once heard the little...

THE POINT ABOUT THE CLASSICS SiR,-As an old man, I should like to record my thankfulness for the circumstances which gave me a classical education. For sixty years I have been...

Birds and Scientists How to Study Birds. By Stuart Smith. (Collins. 8s. 6d.) THE development of what amounts to a public movement towards an interest in birds and a demand...

Fiction Corporal Tune._ By L. A. G. Strong. (Methuen. 6s.)_ The Key of the Chest. _By Neil M. Gunn. (Faber and Faber. 8s. 6d.) Ship to Shore. By William McFee. (Faber and...

THE CINEMA "The Last Chance." At the Empire, Leicester Square. AFTER many weary weeks here at last is a film that is about real and living human beings. It is also a film with...

MUSIC Hindemith and Mozart MR. NOEL MEWTON-WOOD repeated his remarkable performance of Hindemith's "Ludus Tonalis " at the Morley College Concert in the Friends' House on...

ART John Constable, R.A. At the Victoria and Albert Museum. THERE is something novel and curious about the way in which the Director of the V. and A. persists in exhibiting...

Crofting Agriculture. By F. Fraser Darling. (Oliver and Boyd. 6s.) IN this book Dr. Fraser Darling has supplied the crofters of the Islands and the West Highlands with a...

Shorter Notices A Theatre for Everybody: The Story of the Old Vic and Sadler's Wells. By Edward J. Dent. (Boardman and Co. 12s. 6d.) - THIs charmingly produced book, richly...

BRITAIN'S BRIGHTEST HOUR By WILLIAM E. RAPPARD Geneva. EVERYONE remembers General Smuts's atom-bomb-like speech delivered at a time when the outcome of hostilities was...

MORE FOOD TROUBLES THE jolt which the country received from the Minister of Food's statement on Tuesday was sharp and painful. In the House of Commons the reaction was one of...

FINANCE AND i NVESTMENT B1 (tUS1TOS THE City is much too interested in its freedom to have any liking for the Government's plans for investment control. However wisely control...

BOOKS OF THE DAY Victorian Hero Livingstone's Last Journey. By Sir Reginald Coupland. (Collins. 12s. Cd.) PROFESSOR COUPLAND is one of the most distinguished of living...

Peace by Stages Patterns of Peacemaking. By David Thomson, E. Meyer and A. Briggs. (Kegan Paul. 21s.) THE main teaching of this valuable and timely book is implied in its...

SEQUEL TO A.B.C.A. By PAUL WRONG THE recent announcement that a civilian Bureau of Current Affairs is to be established, with the same aims as those pursued by A.B.C.A. within...

THE TYROL REVISITED By SIR GEORGE FRANCKENSTEIN W*ILL there be justice for the South Tyrol? How many have W anxiously put that question to me in Austria, among them some of...