None of the hopeful forecasts of conversations on Persian oil on the basis of the latest Anglo-American proposals has shown the slightest sign of being fulfilled. Dr. Moussadek...

T HE latest of the frequent phases in which the countries of Western Europe concentrate on their mutual relation- ships and organisation is already beginning. The meeting of thc...

There is no longer any doubt that changes in the status of the Saar are on the, way. Following quickly on M. Schuman's proposal to " Europeanise " the Saarland have come reports...

There is a great deal of food for thought in the address on religious broadcasts given to the Modern Churchmen's Union Conference on Tuesday by the Rev. Francis House, Director...

The universal copyright convention, signed at Geneva on Saturday by the delegates sent by forty-three States to the con- ference arranged after long preparation by U.N.E.S.C.O.,...

It might have been thought that if the engineers were going to listen to reason on the subject of their claim for an increase of £2 a week they would have listened to it...

IN EGYPT G ENERAL NEGUIB, according to a British resident in Cairo, is " a good man, a good man in every way." All the evidence confirms that estimate. The revolu- tionary...

on something he does not begin to understand. Trying to find a stick to beat the United Nations with, he resurrects the now half-forgotten story of the bombardment of the Greek...

I should not care to determine, or in which of the two, if there be any difference, Governor Adlai Stevenson so largely abounds. Of the selection I have seen on the whole I like...

a little of the damage must be here repaired. By noting that P. B. H. May has now displaced his captain, David Sheppard, at the head of the batting averages I hope to divert...

corres- pondent in the Observer last Sunday which seems to deserve some attention. Giving news of a meeting of the Cominform recently held in Prague to consider future policy,'...

birth falls on the date this issue of the Spectator bears, was, for all his long tenure of the Premiership, little known to the nation as a man. He was essentially the...

terms, and I know that Harold Nicolson, in spite of the brilliant success of his " George V," will never die happy till he has seen " doryphore " (what it means, and why,...

By VISCOUNT SAMUEL T WENTY or thirty years after a great man has died is the time when he passes gradually from the recollection of contemporaries into the hands of history....

By OLIVER STEWART C RITICISMS have followed in the wake of John Derry's crash at Farnborough. Demonstrations of supersonic flight, it is suggested, should not be given near...

By CHRISTOPHER SYKES I N September of 1852 Greville was at Doncaster for the St. Leger meeting when he heard that the Duke of Welling- ton was dead. He relates that at first...

By J. P. W. MALLALIEU, M.P. Y EARS ago, I knew the cricket averages by heart—or at least the first twenty. It used to be a terrible shock to me when the final averages were...

By LUCILIO Ci HE age of old elephants is terribly old," as a poet of Punch observed some years ago, and much the same thing might be said about heraldry, if not about exist-...

Crawley By BRIAN WIDLAKE (Clare College, Cambridge). cc 11 I'M goin' up to 'Arry's for a shave." Such a remark from veterans of hoe and plough bespoke logic and wisdom, and...

By HAROLD NICOLSON A L WAYS whenI get the chance I listen on Friday even- ings to Mr. Alistair Cooke's " Letter from America." I still find it impressive to hear a man talking...

Meet Me Tonight. (Odeon, Marble Arch.)-24 Hours of a Woman's Life. (Empire.) FOLLOWING on the successful conversion of Mr. Somerset Maugham's stories into film salads we now...

FUTURE historians of musical taste in this country will no doubt find an explanation of the vogue which Carl Nielsen's music enjoyed "at the turn of the century." It is true...

THEATRE Don Juan in Hell. By Bernard Shaw. . (Arts.) THE third act of Man and Superman was Shaw's attempt at " a new Book of Genesis for the Bible of the Evolutionists," his...

Magazine Post) Id.

exercises to the full the same sort of innocent emotional blackmail as may be found in the serials which trip along sweetly in some family weeklies. It is, that is to say, rich...

is a virtuoso performance of an even -higher order, but it com- pares unfavourably in my opinion with Emlyn Williams's earlier appearance in the character of Charles Dickens....

Sylvia. (Covent Garden.)—Reflection. (Sadler's Wells.) THE three-act ballet of Sylvia, with its well-known music by Delibes, was originally produced at the Theatre de l'Opera,...

THE exhibition of Railroadiana (an unattractive word, but it was in use in 1838), which is on view at the National Book League, 7 Albemarle Street, W.1, until November, is...

Report by D. R. Peddy "It was 1752, the age of Dr. Johnson . . . the full-bottomed wig was fast disappearing . . . and Thomas Whitewash had just started manufacturing lemonade...

Set by Marghanita Laski Since literary fashion will eventually praise many best-sellers which at present it denigrates, competitors are invited to offer 150 words from their...

the Modern Church- men's Union does not set out to contribute to the " still Catholic thought and practice of the Established Church," but to the main- tenance of Christian...

Snt,—Mr. Wilson Harris's review of Closing the Ring is most interest- ing, but in saying Mr. Churchill saw "active service in three continents," he does him a little lessahan...

favour marriage after divorce quote Sir John Stoddard's opinion of the Reformatio Legum Ecclesiasticarum (in which one of my predecessors Dr. ;lowland Taylor had a hand)...

Mr. Arnold, the Westminster Magistrate, was occupied for many hours on Tuesday in hearing the charges against the Poitevins and Mr. Simpson, of cruelty to horses which were...

divorce on Matthew v, 32, read no further in the Sermon on the Mount ? The next verse condemns all those who, unlike Quakers and Free- thinkers, take an oath in a court of law...

Snt,—Shongweni • is not " on the fringe of Zululand "; it is between Pietermaritzburg and Durban. " Kaffir " is no: onger used in polite speech or writing. It is resented by...

Marriage, Society and the Church Sm,—Prof. Sykes argues that because Christians have departed from the code of Christ at two points there is no reason why they should not do so...

far in the discussion is that nowadays it is notorious that the " innocent " party to a divorce is often in fact the partner who has desired the dis- solution of the marriage,...

SIR,—When my brother and I were small boys, in the 90's, 'we were given an " Orchestrianette," a hand-operated mechanical organ. Its tone was like that of portable harmoniums,...

SIR,—Sir Norman Birkett's review of the new edition of George Fox's Journal is very interesting, like all his writings. But if he will look at the brass tablet on a wall inside...

SIR,—With regard to rabbit snares mentioned in the Spectator of August 22nd, the R.S.P.C.A. recommends the " Sawyer Trap " as the best humane device hitherto invented for...

SIR,—Your contributor Ian Niall is not, I think, correct in his note on compost in the Spectator of August 22nd. By suitable management of a compost heap a temperature of some...

SIR,—I wonder whether the enclosed sonnet will serve to express the feelings of a good many of your readers on the Fear of Death. It was composed twenty-five years ago while I...

decrease in Church atten- dance one reason given is the quality of the sermons and their failure to meet the spiritual needs of today. This criticism may be just or unjust. In...

SIR,—In your issue of August 29th and under the heading of " The Case of Herr Krupp" you state that "confiscation of private property in Germany has never been part of the...

does not Mr. Cyril Ray give his Oxford a false perspective ? He writes as if Spooner belonged to an earlier generation than A. L. Smith. But A. L. was already dead when Spooner...

shop that sells bits of brass that people are pleased to call horse brast. These days it hardly matters that ninety-nine per cent. of the stuff never saw a saddler's shop, let...

They are harvesting in the potato field now. The adjoining stubble is fawn. The oats are off the far hill, the bit of wheat safely under cover, and the potatoes are beginning to...

very steepest part of the hill, I was surprised. The driver poked his head out of the cab and offered me a lift. I was enjoying myself. The lift hardly mattered, for the day was...

that are dragging in the soil. It is a good thing to feed the plants with liquid manure suitably diluted. Leeks develop well in the next month or two and are worth

AWAY ahead of me the moorland road twisted and turned, rose and jell, between banks of heather and ling and a dozen trees of rowan. The thin branches of the rowan were so laden...

A Hero and History Lord Chatham : A War Minister in the Making. By 0. A. Sherrard. (Bodley Head. 25s.) WHAT a magnet has Chatham been for the assayers, or what a blazing light...

Fanny Brawne. By Joanna Richardson. (Thames and Hudson. 15s.) WHEN the son of Fanny Brawne, who became Mrs. Louis Lindon, was &Sired to sanction some publications concerning...

new book on the Lyceum Theatre; Peter Fleming reviews "Golden Earth" by Norman Lewis; Andrew Young writes on "A Book of Flowers" compiled by Edith Sitwell; and Michael Sadleir...

Problems of Nationalised Industry. Edited by William A. Robson. (Allen and Unwin. 25s.) Problems of Nationalised Industry. Edited by William A. Robson. (Allen and Unwin. 25s.)...

Miss CARSON McCuLLEas is one of those good American writers about the South who seem to be writers of genius the first time you read them if you have never read any of the...

The Fairy Caravan. By Beatrix Potter. (Warne. 10s. 6d.) A NEW Beatrix Potter in the year 1052—even one written over twenty years ago and " never meant for print "—is an un-...

Report on Southern Africa. By Basil Davidson. (Cape. 16s.) AFTER twenty gloomy pages Mr. Davidson pronounces that "a study of South Africa need not be a study in despair," but...

AT the sensitive age when Mr. Evelyn Waugh was learning to play cricket, he must have heard that the staff of Messrs. Chapman and Hall with the fatherly participation of their...

Portrait of England : News from Somewhere. By Laurence -Thomp- son. (Gollancz. 10s. 6d.) Tills is the age of Mass Observation ; of the common man. Writers need no longer go to...

Daniel Defoe. By Francis Watson. (Long- mans. 10s. 6d.) How Defoe ever found time to write, seeing all that he did, or how he found a moment in which to do anything, seeing what...

this country and published in the United States. In the meantime Blake has been accepted in his entirety, yet probably remains unread except as a lyricist. But even here he...

THE SPECTATOR readers are urged to place a firm order with their newsagent or to take out a subscription. Newsagents cannot afford to take the risk of carry- ing stock, as...

several ways. It is outstanding academically ; it is associated with a notable girls' school and a number of flourishing grammar schools, and it has remained a day-school...

ballad " has grown elusive of definition. Technically speaking, because it is sung to music, the sentimental " ballad" of the Palm Court has more claim to the name than Scott's...

Stimulus Amoris by Walter Hilton. (Faber. 18s.) THERE is no doubt a small but growing public to whom the reading of the mystics brings satisfactions that they do not derive from...

called Farming and Fisheries (O.U.P. 30s.), is in every way as excellent as its predecessors. One—an adult as well as a child one—could hardly fail to find pleasure and profit...

By CUSTOS Arita their late summer recovery markets appear to have entered an autumn phase of consolidation. Although there is no evidence of any real anxiety to sell, buying has...

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[A Book Token for one guinea will be awarded to the sender of the first correct solution opened after noon on Tuesday week, September 23rd, addressed Crossword, 99 Dower Street,...