Though not all the three thousand guests said to have
been invited to the reception at the Italian Embassy on Wednesday actually appeared there, enough came to create formidable traffic jams all round Grosvenor Square and all round the Embassy's magnificent suite of rooms. The hospitality of Count and Countess Grandi no doubt had its relation to the recent détente in relations between London and Rome, and their guests tended to scan one another with a politically appraising eye. There were those who felt and expressed unfeigned satisfaction that the opening of a new chapter was thus symbolised ; there were others who looked slightly doubtful about the propriety of attending, and duly relieved when they saw that other people, in whoin similar doubts might be presumed, were there too. But the desire to salute Count Grandi, who has in these last two years discharged singularly difficult tasks as well as any man could, was, I think, universal. * * * *
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