7 OCTOBER 1978, Page 16

'The great fear'

Sir: Mr Worsthorne's review (23 September) of David Caute's The Great Fear is, I am sure, just. In one detail I suspect he is wrong. Surely the title does not refer to Robert Conquest's magistral The Great Terror, but to the still inexplicable 'great fear' that preceded and accompanied the revolution of 1789?

Donald G. MacRae London School of Economics, Houghton Street, London WC2