22 SEPTEMBER 1939

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THE THIRD WEEK THE Prime Minister was wise in wasting

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few words in the House of Commons on Wednesday on the speech Herr Hitler had delivered at Danzig the day before, for apart from abuse of Britain and a singularly crude attempt...

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NEWS OF THE WEEK

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P RESIDENT ROOSEVELT is expected to have delivered his message to Congress regarding the amendment of the Neutrality Act before these lines appear. The situation has been...

Japan and Russia

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The announcement of the conclusion of an armistice between the puppet States of Mongolia and Manchukuo, in other words between Soviet Russia and Japan, on September 6th,...

The Position of Turkey

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All the pieces in the international chess-board have been thrown out of position by the action of Russia, and for Turkey it is particularly difficult to readjust them in the...

India's Co-operation

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The degree of conviction and resolve with which a country of such potentialities as India throws itself into the Allied cause is a matter of the first importance in its bearing...

The Northern Neutrals

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The four northern neutral States have denied individually and categorically the German allegation that Great Britain had been bringing pressure to bear on them to trade with her...

Bewilderment in Spain

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It was not to be expected that Spain would look on with indifference when Germany, who intervened in Spain with the avowed object of combating Communism, made her deal with the...

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The Week in Parliament

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Our Parliamentary correspondent writes: The House has got into the habit of meeting expectantly every week to hear the Prime Minister's report on the progress of the war. Herr...

The Destruction of Courageous'

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It would be idle to deny that the sinking of the aircraft- carrier Courageous,' with the loss of about 50o men out of a crew of 1,200, is a blow to the British Navy and a signal...

The House seems strangely effervescent and Question Hour revealed how

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the war has shortened Members' tempers, while increasing their curiosity. Some of the Questions were incredibly remote from war-time. Members became irritated at the desire of...

A Reckless Insurance Scheme

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No worse method could have been adopted than that of the War Risks Insurance Act for insuring commercial stocks against war damage. The Act imposes a flat rate of 3os. per cent....

The Government benches emptied when Mr. Chamberlain had finished, and

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many Government supporters, therefore, missed hearing a powerful speech by Mr. Greenwood. His plea for a thorough re-examination of .the position of the Home Front received...

The Ministry of Suppression

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That heavily-weighted institution which has recently be- come familiarly known as the Ministry for the Suppression of News has been the subject of complaints not only here, but...

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THE UNHOLY ALLIANCE A NUMBER of people have hastened to explain

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rather unconvincingly after the event that they had always expected that Russia would take some such action as she took in Poland on Sunday. If the expectation was in fact...

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AIR-WAR AND THE CITIES T HE present complete immunity of London

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and other British cities from aerial attack, and the similar immunity of French towns far behind the lines, may merely be due to the fact that the Germans have not yet got into...

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I hear it suggested that the halfpenny postcard should be

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restored. With the present dispersal of the population and break-up of families, much more communication by post will be needed. But the evacuees are in the main not letter-...

Evacuation stories multiply, though the publicity given to them does

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not justify the inference that the scheme as a whole is working badly. But cases like this show some of its weak points. A child billeted within reach of London is being kept—at...

The appointment of a new Canadian Minister at Wash- ington

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is only less important in present circumstances than the appointment of a new British Ambassador. It is hard to see how Mr. Mackenzie King could have found anyone better...

A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK

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W HEN the news of the Russian invasion of Poland came one of my first thoughts was to ascertain what interpre- tation the accredited mouthpiece of Communism in this country, the...

Speculation has naturally fastened on the passage in Hen Hitler's

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speech at Danzig in which he spoke, or is repre- sented as having spoken, of " a weapon which is not yet known and with which we could not ourselves be attacked." I say " or is...

So far as evacuated children are concerned the success of

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the scheme must depend to a large extent on the teachers. Their help in the matter of discipline is obviously needed on occasion out of school hours as well as in, and if they...

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THE WAR SURVEYED POLAND'S ECLIPSE

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By STRATEGICUS HE military campaign in Poland is over, and, in effect, I Russia gave it the coup de grace. Even on Monday a considerable force lay about the confluence of the...

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A REGIMENTED NATION

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By HONOR CROOME T HE economic regimentation of Great Britain has reached a point, after only two weeks of war, which it took two years to reach from August, 1914. The...

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GERMANS AND NAZIS

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By DR. REINHOLD NIEBUHR' I T does credit to British moral imagination that the corre- spondence columns of the daily and weekly Press have been filled with appeals to the...

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LIFE IN WAR-TIME

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By R. A. SCOTT-JAMES L IFE in war-time as in peace has its rhythms, alternating between the slow and monotonous and the swift and all too exciting. For a year all of us had...

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SECOND THOUGHTS ON EVACUATION

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By W. LI BURN T HE lapse of a fortnight and a debate in the Commons provide some material for assessing both the results and tendencies of the evacuation scheme. A very large...

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ALIENS AT BOW STREET

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By R. C. HUTCHINSON A YOUNG policeman, in his rather theatrical helmet, keeps the queue close to the wall. Today it only extends for thirty yards or so ; on Monday, the 5th, it...

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LAST TRAIN HOME

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By ROWLANI) 1V1NN W E just made it! Yugoslavia, Italy, Switzerland, France, the Channel and Victoria Station—we just made it. It all started on Sunday. You can guess which...

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FOREIGN OPINION

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New York Times. Germany having killed the prey, Russia seizes the pan of the carcass which was unusable to Germany, and plays the noble role of a hyena to the German lion. It...

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I have been interested this week in ascertaining and noting

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down various shades of opinion throughout the country. Those who are really in the know are reticent and firm. Those who are half in the know are also reticent but asking for...

* * * * The thoughts of our people, and

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of the German people, should be directed, not so much towards the actual condi- tions of peace, as to the sort of world which the eventual peace must safeguard. The destruction...

Few things are more illustrative of the difference between the

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temper of the country in 1914 and our present frame of mind than the attitude of the intellectuals. In 1914 the vast majority of the intellectuals faced the situation in a mood...

It is a hive, I notice, into which countless bees,

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and some drones, are most anxious to enter. I have received many letters this week from the distant cousins of distant acquaint- ances telling me that they know French quite...

I should imagine that if Mass Observation were still functioning

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Mr. Tom Harrisson and Mr. Madge would find that this phrase was almost universal. It is mainly inspired by a natural desire to serve to the best of one's capacity. People are...

PEOPLE AND THINGS

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By HAROLD NICOLSON OME amusement (and we are in need of amusement) 13 has been caused during the last days by the Ministry of Information. It is not in any sense malicious...

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STAGE AND SCREEN

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THE CINEMA -Young Mr. Lincoln." At the Leicester Square Theatre. " I Was a Captive of Nazi Germany." At Studio One. AT the best of times Young Mr. Lincoln would be impres-...

MUSIC

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Disbandment EXCEPTING literature, the fine arts have been. among the first and not the least significant casualties of war. The national galleries and museums are shut for the...

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The Rural Mind

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How deep and wide is the gulf separating the country and the town dweller few of us wholly realised till this exodus from the town began. Of course, poor children, given a...

The New Ploughmen

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A letter is before me from the most modern of ploughmen, to wit a young woman. She writes: " I can now drive a tractor quite well, but it will take me at least ten years to...

Inland Gulls

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It is interesting to watch the gulls, which now frequent ploughland far inland, in their attitude to horse and tractor. They follow the tractor-drawn ploughs more closely,...

COUNTRY LIFE

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Desired Streets When the great exodus came, two expectant mothers from London were received in a country house that has all the charm associated with the name. The rooms are...

In the Garden

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The garden of a pleasant country house has one border fringed with a plant that has enjoyed a generous measure of " unearned increment." At one moment on one single head were...

A School-Girls' Service

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On behalf of country children, this incident may be told. A lady, carrying a very large number of cardboard boxes con- taining gas-masks, was approached by three small girls...

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LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

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[Correspondents are requested to keep their letters as brief as is reasonably possible. Signed letters are given a preference over those bearing a pseudonym, and the latter must...

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THE ONLY GERMANY SIR,—Rom Landau's letter has surely clarified the

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issue of war aims " more than any other pronouncement on the subject in any correspondence. May I press it one step further to a practical point, which must be settled unless...

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WAR GUILT AND WAR AIMS

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SIR,—" Cest du choc des opinions que jaillit la lumiere." Mr. Felix Fries considers my- suggestion to inform the German people of the responsibility of its own Government for...

MILITARY OBJECTIVES

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SIR,—During a black-out it is no doubt hard to con- centrate on principles or, in other words, on reason, but many of us find difficulty in understanding the parti cu l ar...

THE PURPOSE OF THE WAR

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Sm,—Public opinion seems already to have sorted itself into two camps. There are those who hold that our only task at the moment is to win the war and then, when we have rid the...

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THE MUNICH SETTLEMENT SIR,—In the second column of the article

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on " The Chances of Revolt in Germany," in your issue of last week, the following sentence occurs : " This is our price for 'Munich,' and it is not yet fully paid." It would, I...

" THE SPECTATOR " COMPETITIONS—No. 2

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IT was once the pleasant habit of architects to decorate their buildings with inscriptions appropriate to the build- ings' use. Prizes of a book token for LI Is. and a book...

JEFFERSON'S WALL SIR,—Mr. Edinger's poetic interpretation of Thomas Jefferson's serpentine

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wall (The Spectator, August 25th) is a good story. Some of your readers might be interested in the true but prosaic interpretation. Build a straight-line wall, six feet high,...

THE ARTIST IN WAR SIR,—Study of the Schedule of Reserved

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Occupations yields the conclusion that in a nation organised on a war footing the place for the artist is deemed to be the fighting forces. By artist one means, of course, the...

THE B.M.A. AND MIDWIVES should like to thank Mr. D.

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C. Macdonald for his letter, in which he confirms my statement that the B.M.A. is a voluntary organisation to which a certain number of doctors and dentists belong, and I am...

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Books of the Day

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KARI. MARX, E. H. Carr 414 AN ANGLO-AMERICAN INTERPRET ER ... 4 1 5 THERE LIES A VALE IN IDA, Anthony Powell ... 4 1 5 WAY OF LIFE, George Edinger ... 416 THE THEORY OF IDLE...

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Words Across the Sea

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Ir has been a long fight to get recognition of the fact that • .,lard American usage, not merely slang and illiterate ch, is different from standard English usage, and among...

" There Lies a Vale in Ida "

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Greece with a car, a kettle and cameras. By Dorothy Una Ratcliffe. (Eyre and Spottiswoode. r 2s. 6d.) IT would be hard to devise a more exacting subject for a literary...

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Way of Life

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EVERY man, so it has been said, can write one good book, his own biography. Well, two men have done so this month, and although their lives were passed in very different ways,...

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<< Regrettable Idleness " MR. Hui - r's book is a noteworthy

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essay in pure analysis. It consists of careful definitions of the different reasons from which resources come to be idle in a capitalist economy. The book is fruitful in so far...

Claude Bernard

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Claude Bernard, Physiologist. By J. M. D. Olmsted. (Cassell. iss.) ALTHOUGH he was subsequently to be overshadowed by his friend and contemporary, Pasteur, Claude Bernard was...

Scenario

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MR. GREENE'S new book is labelled " An Entertainment," which presumably means that it is not to be taken seriously. It is a straightforward thriller of slight literary...

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FICTION

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The Arrogant History of White Ben. By Clemente Dane. (Heinemann. 8s. 6d.) SIR HUGH WALPOLE occupies an official position among popular writers: he is the liaison officer...

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FINANCE AND INVESTMENT

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WHILE the stock markets are still partially frozen, invest- ment values are still in the melting pot. Nobody could have expected that the complicated mechanism of City markets...

* * * * TIN QUOTA AT 100 PER CENT.

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Tin, the last of the metals to be brought within the scheme of maximum prices, was fixed on Monday at a maximum of f230 a ton. This does not involve any change in price. For...

MINIMUM PRICE PROBLEMS

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This week has witnessed another sharp fall in home industrial equities, bank and insurance shares, and gold shares. When average yields on leading home industrials have risen...

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RAILWAY PUZZLE

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It is understandable but none the less disturbing for stock- holders that the market in home railway securities has virtlially dried up. The reason, apart from the general...

SOLUTION TO CROSSWORD No. 28 SOLUTION NEXT WEEK

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The winner of Crossword No. 28 is Mrs. E. Playfair, New Copse, Wootton Bridge, Isle of Wight.

"THE SPECTATOR" CROSSWORD SECOND SERIES-No. 29 IA prize of a

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Book Token for one guinea will be given to the sender of the first correct soluuon of this week's crossword puzzle to be opened. Envelopes should be marked " Crossword Puzzle,"...