W HETHER by virtue of his uninhibited talent for clowning in public, or his conversational persuasiveness in private, Mr. Mikoyan seems to have done a remarkable softening-up...

fogged. And the weather forecasters got it wrong right down the line. Shivering, the country could work up little enthu- siasm for the new (if that is the word) Soviet proposals...

FRIDAY, JANUARY 16, 1959

Travel Number which will include : LESLIE ADRIAN on 'Flying a Car Abroad' and travel articles by PETER MAYNE, BRIAN INGLIS. HAROLD CHAMPION and others Also KARL MILLER on...

By SARAH W HAT Western German organisation con- tinues to protect the neo-Nazis, the anti- Semites and the surviving members of the Nazi Party? When a second model citizen...

T HE first spark which lit the fuse which exploded into a massacre in Leopoldville was the cancellation of a Sunday meeting called by the nationalist organisation Abako. A...

In The Margin If you ask a leading Labour man, even off the record, whether he thinks the party is going to . win the next election, he will tell you that he thinks it is....

By WALTER SCHWARZ Tel Aviv W HILE some Afro-Asians were in Accra last month discussing unify, and others were in Cairo discussing economics, yet others were in Israel learning...

men and women, they aban- doned charges against sixty-five of them after the year-long preliminary inquiry. Then in Octo- ber the prosecution threw in its hand by abandoning the...

INGLIS By BRIAN CliSi011iS officers are stationed at US ports of entry for your protection. You'll find them courteous, quiet and efficient . . . interested in clearing you and...

By CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS M R. GRAHAM GREENE, in a letter to The Times on January 3, complained of the ignorance of the British Foreign Office about events in Cuba, which had...

By A. D. C. PETERSON* N OTHING baffles educational delegations from other countries so much as the inability of the English to answer plain questions about what goes on in...

Our Way Of Death By ALAN BRIEN I KNEW a New York policeman e once who had a new cure for juvenile delinquency. He had tried and rejected all the usual prescriptions—reading the...

It will be resumed next week.

JANUARY 18, 1834 THE galleries in St. Paul's Cathedral were illuminated on Sunday evening for the first time with gas. The effect was brilliant and imposing. A handsome drapery...

An Adult Goes West By ISABEL QUIGLY The Big Country, (Odeon, Leicester Square.) — The Young Have No Time. (Cameo-Poly.) — Auntie Mame. (Warner.) The Big Country (director :...

Where Do We Go From Here? By A. V. COTON FIFTY years ago this spring the .Russian Ballet of Diaghilev appeared in Paris. It touched Jo off a renaissance that had never before...

Professional Amateurs By DAVID CAIRNS PROMISING noises floated into the crush bar at Covent Garden last week during the press con- ference on the Annual Report. The Magic Flute...

Permanent Penguins By LESLIE ADRIAN PENGUIN'S Christmas carton scheme, Which I mentioned in this column when discussing presents, resulted in ,more Pen- guins being sold in...

Anger in the Family By MILES HOWARD My first reaction to this would be that the turns might upset some adults, but are unlikely to upset a child, unless he were pretty...

fly STRIX 'I'm awfully sorry,' I said, 'I can't manage "Friday. I've got to go to a meeting that afternoon:, `Oh?' said the friend who had rung me up. 'Too bad. Better luck next...

SIR.—Pharos has dealt with two advantages of com- mittal proceedings before magistrates, namely to determine whether there is sufficient evidence to put an accused on trial and...

SIR,—Further to Ian Gilmour's recent article on the Middle East, may I ask you to examine the two following propositions? Proposition A Nasser = Suez Fiasco; Suez Fiasco =...

SIR,—The Spectator rightly from time to time casti- gates those journals and writers whose output might be termed pornographic. During the past few weeks many of your readers...

evade the question, as he does in his letter of January 9, written with that courtesy and charm for which he is well known. To recapitulate. Mr. Weir has asserted that there...

Livin g Amon g Asians David Morris Committal Proceedin g s 'Prima Facie' The Church of En g land and Divorce Rev. Dr. Paul A. Welsby Middle East Mytholo g y Stafford Campbell...

especially as I appear to be one of the few persons Within the trade that has not read it. More surprising, too, since I spend most weekends at Tunbridge Wells! What, however,...

Lolita's becoming the best-seller of all time .might be to get Mr. Ronald Searle to illustrate it?

Imaginary Conversations with the Muses of the Bayswater Road, may I tell Mr. David Cairns a Cautionary Tale? Once upon a time the 'top people' of one of London's most...

SlR, - -The correspondence on 'Spanning the Great Divide' has certainly touched some widely separated Points. One or two of the latest remark's seem to call for comments from...

in prison for demonstrating against nuclear weapons at Swaff- ham on December 20. . She was taken to prison. last Friday by the local police, after refusing to sign the...

BY D. W. BROGAN W iTH the Soviet penetration of outer space and Mr. Mikoyan getting into orbit in the United States, these two excellent books* are exceptionally topical. They...

THERE was no dearth of painless reading matter When the first Spectator appeared; yet it did not attempt to conceal from its readers that its object Was to civilise them....

The Twentieth Maine. By John J. Pullen. (Eyre and Spottiswoode, 30s.) THE progress in the American Civil War of a volunteer regiment called the Twentieth Maine has been made...

WHAT a pity that the whole debate about nuclear weapons has not been conducted on as sane and sensible a level as that of this book. Starting from the premise that every living...

The Private Sea. By Peter Mayne. (Murray, 18s.) PETER MAYNE'S island of Poros lies some three hours' sailing south of the Pirmus. When you arrive there you disembark under the...

Warsaw in Chains. By Stefan Korbonski. (Allen and Vnwin, 30s.) STEFAN KORBONSKI was an important actor in two Polish tragedies. He was one of the organisers . of the secret Home...

7 visit they wouldn't do this. My copy of Rape of Fair Country contained a small shriekin g eaflet enshrinin g the enthusiasms of Jack Jones, Wyn Thomas, Emlyn Williams and...

Composers on Music: An Anthology of Coin- posers' Writings. Edited by Sam Morgen- stern. ( Faber. 32s. 6d.) tr is a truism that writing about music is a difficult art since it...

(Heinemann, 12s. 6d.) The author, quoted on the wrapper, says, 'I'm not even a writer' (and he can say that again), 'just a plot- builder.' As constructional aids, he employs...

mallet, in a country-house maze, with overtones from Greek mythology. Very contrived confection, all too reminiscent of Raymond Chandler's dismissal of the English school of...

contrived, badly written suspense thriller of a man who disappears in Tangier, and how his brother and young woman cut through the web of deceit to find him. Hideously...

By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT When the resources of a country are being over- strained a budget deficit can, of course, add fuel to an inflation, but when there is an economic slack...

The Stone Roses. By Sarah Gainham. (Eyre and Spottiswoode, 13s. 6d.) Miss Gainham knows Central Europe, and can write. Her latest thriller • is set in Prague, as the Communists...

Stoughton, 12s. 6d.) Learned about sailing, and evocative about the Brittany coast. Mrs. Bell writes with a sedate charm, and has woven a neat little story—of a man appealed to...

13s. 6d.) Relentlessly facetious goings-on about the liquidation of Millie Peas- willow, with noises off from such assorted charac- ters as the Reverend Theophilus Pogge, Sir...

6d.) One of those old-fashioned and highly artificial closed-circle mysteries: of the nine passengers in the ocean liner one is a mur- derer who goes in for bizarre killings,...

Sexy pop-singer, in slinky black satin, ventilates the nasty little man who made her famous, with her sexy little pearl-handled pistol. Highly unlikely anouement, but...

T HE ELY BREWERY, since its last accounts to August 31, 1957, has made various capital changes: it has increased its authorised capital to £2,298,000, has made a bonus scrip...

By CUSTOS W IDESPREAD investment buying has restored the upward trend of prices on the Stock Exchange. One of the powerful factors in the next few weeks will be the...

10 People. 12 Stink. 13 Spoon- bill. 14 Perambulator. 18 EntertaIncrs v 21 Recollect. 23 Norma. 24 ironic. 25 Con- tents. 26 Sadder. 27 Ascender. DOWN.—I Repose. 2 Scenic, 3...

ACROSS 1 Doctor takes to drink with a , consequent fog (10) 6 Tips back a whole spadeful (4) 10 The bonnet's the thing when made In this matbrial (5) II The Victorian...

SPECTATOR COMPETITION NO. 463: Report by R. Kennard Davis Competitors were asked to compose rhyming admonitions on the lines of 'Life is Sweet! Drive carefully in Street for...

usual prize of six guineas is offered for a translation in the same form of Jean-Baptiste Chassignet's sonnet: Malade je couchois stir la chambre devant Oh le bruit du Marche,...