29 NOVEMBER 1940, Page 5

Someone has written to The Times suggesting that this is

a fit moment to recall Charles Dickens' toast " Gentlemen, I give you America and England, and may there never be any- thing between us but the Atlantic." But is it? Had the toast no hidden barb? Coming from the author of Martin Chuzzlewit it might well, perhaps best, imply, " Thank God, there is always three thousand miles of ocean between us." Whether any evidence on the point exists I don't know.

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