Table talk
Sir: Could Sir Denis Brogan concentrate his 'Table talk' a little? He has to his credit fine works on important subjects and much dis- tinguished service as a roving unofficial am- bassador. But is it fair that your readers should suffer a medley of remarks (27 Sep- tember): on French liners (`I have nothing against the "France", an admirable and ad- mirably run ship'); on the evolution of the American Customs and American travel CI also decided to fly to Washington although I am told that there is now a real train running to that city)? This is certainly talk, but if we are at table I'm afraid we are getting only vin de table.
What is 'Table talk'? Unless it means merely conversation (with other people than oneself), it can, I suggest, only mean a great man's random droppings to a spellbound captive audience: the recorded sayings of Luther or Dr Johnson or Oscar Wilde. Hit- ler's hectic outpourings to his lieutenants is another case. of gripping Tischgesprach. These supreme monologuists . . . one could, of course, add Churchill and de Gaulle . . . had however quite exceptional powers. The rest of us surely do best to write calmly about something in particular. The late Sir Harold Nicolson did this to perfection in the SPECTATOR; and I think that Mr. J. W. M. Thompson does the same today.
Charles Janson Uppat, Brora, Sutherland Sir: Sir Denis Brogan suggests (6 Septem- ber) that Dr Paisley might refer to 'Sunday' as 'the Sabbath'.
In fact, he goes one better and calls it 'Lord's day', as advertisements of his church services—in a local paper—show.
The expression is in common use among evangelists no doubt because 'Sunday', if not papist, has a pagan sound to it. I have never been quite clear who owns the other six days in the week.
It is odd that those who refer to the 'Lord's day' often make use of the abbrevia- tion `DV'. I have always supposed that this stood for `De Volent', the gods being in the plural. This of course would not appeal to those who shy at 'Sunday'.
C. L. Emmerson The Lecke, Limavady, Co. Derry, N. Ireland
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