26 AUGUST 1960, page 21

Men Of Letters

T he Goncourt Brothers. By Andre Billy. Trans- lated by Margaret Shaw. (Deutsch, 30s.) WHAT real men of letters they were! ' writes M. Billy perhaps with a shade of irony. 'No......

Siege Of Fort Sumter

PRESIDENT BUCHANAN lingered on in the White House towards the end of 1860, a Baldwinesque figure, inert, undignified, hopeful that by pre- varication he would delay the......