24 SEPTEMBER 1954

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The Amateurs in China

The Spectator

The more that is learned about the ill-considered Labour mission to China, the worse it appears. Mr. Morgan Phillips takes exception to the way in which the mission was reported...

HOW FAR WITH MENDES-FRANCE?

The Spectator

• T week it was Mr. Eden who took the initiative in the attempt to clear up the confusion caused by the French rejection of EDC. This week it has been the turn of M....

THE SPECTATOR

The Spectator

No. 6 5 8 7 FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 24. 1954 PRICE 7d.

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The Montesi Affair The resignation of the Italian Foreign Minister,

The Spectator

Signor Piccioni, in order to defend the interests of his son in the Montesi affair, rapidly followed by the arrests of Pietro Piccioni and Ugo Montagna, are further and...

The Coach Kills

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The recent conviction of a coach driver for dangerous driving, following on the death of a girl cyclist on the Rochester road, draws attention once again to the dangers of the...

Another CrIchel Down ?

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Wherever there is any reasonable cause for suspicion that officialdom may be encroaching on the rights of the individual , a public inquiry is the remedy and it should be...

The United Nations and Cyprus

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The UN General Assembly opened its ninth session on Tuesday by rejecting Russia's demand that the Chinese Nationalists should be thrown out and replaced by the Chinese...

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FLEET STREET. IN FERMENT

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F ERMENTATION used to be regarded as the permanent natural state of Fleet Street. Readers of books, from the history of The Times down to the latest collection of gossip,...

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Demarcation to ' demarcation ' (which means, roughly, not allowing

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member of one union to do anything which ought theoretically to be done by a member of another union). He quoted two recent cases, both from Sunderland. In one 200 welders had...

How many people know that you can get up-to-the-minul weather

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reports from the nearest RAF Meteorologic station? I say you can get' because I believe the public ai entitled to this service, and at the place I ring up they sees to take it...

The Pilgrims There is only a superficial irony about the

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fact that, whi most Christian churches are more than half empty, police hs to link arms to control the thousands of citizens who this we have been flocking to the ruins of a...

Dormitories for Motorists Motels,' which in America offer the traveller

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self-contained , one-storey overnight accommodation for himself and his ca r, are as yet almost unknown in this country. The project, which is now afoot, for opening a number of...

Captive Drinkers A lady writes to ask me if I

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can do anything to deter the authorities in Watford, Kilmarnock, Anglesey and Darlington from putting fluorine in the municipal water supply. This sort of challenge to one's...

A SPECTATOR 'S NOTEBOOK

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W E were given two salutary reminders this week that it is illegal to dr6s up on a Sunday. In the course of what seems to have been a fairly hilarious session of the Ryde...

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Beautiful Lizard

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Y THOMAS HODGKIN AGANDA women, I was 'told, have a song about the lizard—'Munya munya gweriira munyale.' Its theme. roughly, is that the lizard is a beautiful creature; it...

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Glavlit Over Literature

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By JOHN ARDEN I N the annus mirabilis which began with the arrest of the Jewish doctors for murdering Zhdanov and ended with the execution of Beria, a number of reports from...

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Free for All

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BY CLIFFORD COLLINS T HE holiday season past, pain and hunger begin again on Monday morning at ten to nine, and will last at one stretch until five days later at ten to four. My...

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OPERA

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The Turn of the Screw OF all Britten's previous operas it is with Billy Budd that The Turn of the Screw has most in common. In both he has been attracted by, and more or less...

ART

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East Anglia and the Netherlands To enter the church at Saffron Walden is like stepping into one of those cool, clean, white interiors beloved and painted so often by Saenredam...

Concert Hall into Opera House IT was a strange fate

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that united the first visit of the Vienna State Opera since 1947 with the operatic debut of the Royal Festival Hall. Would the two unfamiliar elements produce a gain or a loss,...

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THEATRE

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WHAT does a woman do when her husband Is away in the Arctic for ten years without giving any sign of life? Of course, she makes other arrangements and it is therefore very...

TELEVISION and RADIO LONDON is admittedly the most provincial town

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in Britain, provincial in that it neither knows nor cares about what goes on outside its own borders. It has taken television, however, to ram this fact well between the eyes of...

CINEMA RomeoandJuliet. (Odeon, Leicester Square. —Salt of the Earth. (Academy.)

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A Time Out of War. (National Film Theatre.) ONE, doubts whether the cinema can ever come satisfactorily to grips with the great Shakespearian tragedies: cut the poetry, as...

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Letters 'to the Editor

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SHOULD CHURCHES BE SAVED ? SIR,-1 am sorry That the Archdeacon of Leeds has come out in open support of the proposal to' demolish the noble church of Holy Trinity, Leeds, for...

PATTERN OF HISTORY

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SIR,-1I is ironically amusing to find in an article by Professor Toynbce, which sets out to extol the elimination of unconscious prejudice from the teaching of history, this...

THE CRISIS IN THE CHURCH OF ENGLAND

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SIR,—Here in Wales we have the different schools of thought in varying degrees; but, generally speaking, they in no wise interfere with the happy personal relationships that...

THE SHARP-HAND ARTIST

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SIR.—Many who have spent a lifetime in India will recognise the Sharp-hand Artist's application for a post as given in Tam bimuttu's article in your issue of Septem- ber 3. More...

SIR,—May I suggest that where Dr. Toynbee finds the '

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Chosen People' pattern in history text-books it is due to unthinking repetition of past ideas and words, for I do not think that this belief about ourselves is alive and active...

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DANUBE FLOOD RELIEF FUND

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SIR, — Many of your readers wilt, we feel sure, sympathise with the peoples of Austria and Southern Germany in the distress they have suffered through the recent disastrous...

MY GOODNESS, MY GUINEAS I SIR, — Authors of Sir Compton Mackenzie's

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status may tremble for their quiddative shilling but I rather think that the pay-off where the rank and file are concerned is likely to be much the same as that concluded below,...

BARON CORVO

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SIR, — I have for some years been compiling a detailed bibliography of the writings of Frederick William Rolfe. Fr. Rolfe, or Baron Corvo, or Nicholas Crabbe, or Frederick...

NO CHINESE CANCER

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SIR, — ] feel sure that all your readers, as well as those of your other journal New Statesman, will be delighted to hear of the sudden cessa- tion of lung cancer in the Peace...

ENOSIS

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SIR, — In its issues dated August 13 and 27 the Spectator highlights the recent role of Greek ecclesiastics in Enosis agitation. Sen- sational and unseemly as this has been it...

JOHN O'LONDON'S

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SIR, — Let the passing of John O'London's Weekly achieve a degree of immortality, serving as a reminder that a certain culture must be fostered if the nation is to remain...

SCOTTISH ROYAL COMMISSION

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SIR, — Arising out of the correspondence on the Scottish Royal Commission Report, Mr. D. Bond asks, ' Why if Scottish Nationalism is so powerful and popular a force as we are...

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SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 240

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. . Competitors are asked to note that Oscar Wilde's Tile Street house is requisitioned by Chelsea Borough Council, and not (as stated last week) by the LCC.

Perch Fishing

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Perch are the small boy's fish, I have always been told. Anyone can catch them, and I suppose that where perch arc present in a river or lake it takes no great skill, and anyone...

Sharpening Stones

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Bob, who knows the hills well, having worked in remote places first as a shepherd boy and then on water schemes, told me about a place where I could find sharpening stone. The...

Country Life

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SOME time ago I was talking to a shepherd who gave me details of a few of the markings of sheep employed by owners of herds that range freely on the mountains. arc gathered up...

SPECTATOR COMPETITION No. 241

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Set by Sid Poshbloke Jones The Spectator recently published an article on The Cockney Renaissance (Spectator, August 27), a literary movement comparable in importance to the...

Care of Leeks

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The leek is a vegetable more h g ught of in the north than in the south perhaps. The northerner often uses it in broth, and farming families used to be fond of chopped leek in...

The Eye-Rhyme Clerihew

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Competitors were invited, for a prize of £5, to submit sets of three clerihews whose rhymes are eye-rhymes and whose subjects are any writers, "ging or dead. For example: The...

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Compton Mackenzie

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F OR a brief moment when I opened my Times on September 18th to read the headline `Stable in Form' I hoped that Mr. Justice Stable was giving another lesson in common sense to a...

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SPORTING ASPECT

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The Hurling Irish 13 ) J. P. W. MALLALIEU COULD you please tell me where Renshaw's Corner is 7 ' ' Man, you're standing on it.' ' Oh I Then could you tell me where Mitcham...

UNDERCIIIADUATIg

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Perugia By ,DAVID WILSON (Brasenose College, Oxford) T HERE had been a sleepless night spent in the Orient Express from Paris to Milan, a breathless 'race round platforms to...

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Anatomy of Colossus

The Spectator

By M. M. POSTAN T HE story of Unilever, as Mr. Wilson and his team have told it,* may, in strict chronology, go back three quarters of a century to William Lever's activities as...

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Sins of the Father

The Spectator

Son of Oscar Wilde. By Vyvyan Holland. (Hart-Davis. 18s.) THERE are two interests in this book which are separate and not even of the same order. First, it tells us something...

A Great Reporter

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My Civil War Diary. By William Howard ,Russell. (Hami s h Hamilton. 21s.) • RUSSELL, who had made himself a great reputation as a war reporter , especially in the Crimea, saw...

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Communism in India

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The Communist Party of India. By M. R. Masani. (Verschoyle. 18s.) Titr Third Congress of the Communist Party of India, attended by about 300 delegates claiming to represent...

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Social Action

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Science and Social Action. By W. J. H. Sprott. (Watts. 15s.) IN putting down this book, one is conscious of that subtle sense of dissatisfaction which, to those with a...

Sailors Remember

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Wild Waters. By Klaus Toxopeus. (Victor Gollancz. 15s.) Two books of reminiscences by two men who have dedicated their lives to the sea; the one a retired Captain in the Royal...

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Cakes and Ale

The Spectator

The Memoirs of Aga Khan. (Cassell. 21s.) LIKE an agitator's dream of Capitalist Society, the Aga Khan has beamed a pleasure-loving way across five continents and three...

New Novels

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THESE five novels, and some of Mr. Hartley's short stories, rely on suspense. They present characters in predicaments designed to excite us and make us eager to know what will...

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FUN

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Elaine sleeps in her maiden bed Still as the moonlight overhead; Dreaming, across the way from her, Mrs. McGonigle's boarders stir; Innocent boarders' dreams are sweet- Of...

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Pirates, Pirates, Pirates and Indians, Indians, Indians. Short stories selected

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by Phyllis R. Fenner. (Chatto & Windus. 8s.6d.cach.) Pirates, and Indians (for short), are the two latest titles in the Terrific Treble Title series, which has already presented...

I Was A Drug Addict. By Leroy Street. (Rider. 15s.)

The Spectator

THIS book is less sensational than its scream- ing dust-jacket might at first suggest. It, is a sober and careful (sometimes, perhaps, too careful) account of the author's...

The Anatomy of Prose. By Marjorie Boulton. (Routledge & Kegan

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Paul. 10s. 6d.) The Anatomy of Prose. By Marjorie Boulton. (Routledge & Kegan Paul. 10s. 6d.) THE tone of Miss Boulton's book, says the blurb, is tentative and non-dogmatic.'...

THIS was the case whose oddest legal point was the

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appearance in the dock of a man already committed to Broadmoor Institu- tion as 'unfit to plead' when charged with the murder of two earlier victims. During a brief escape from...

Jumping. Edited by Lt.-Col. M. P. Ansel!, C.B.E., D.S.O. (The

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Naldrett Press. 15s.) LIFE in Mike Ansell's squadron before the war was an exhilarating if sometimes terrifying experience; the word 'dynamic' might have been invented specially...

OTHER RECENT BOOKS

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nd English Cottages and Farmhouses—Text by he Olive Cook, photographs by Edwin 'Y, Smith. (Thames & Hudson. 42s.) THE subject lends itself all too easily to a ity facile and...

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FINANCE AND INVESTMENT

The Spectator

By NICHOLAS DAVENPORT SOME of the criticism of Mr. Clore's latest and most remarkable deal seems to be on ' the wrong lines. I refuse to have my pity or sympathy aroused for...

Company Notes

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By CUSTOS IT has taken quite a long time to clear up the market weakness caused by excessive speculation. There is no big firm or interest in trouble, as far as I can discover,...

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SOLUTION TO CROSSWORD No. 799. Antoss: 1 Jettison. 5 Scotch.

The Spectator

9 Martens). 10 Damson. 12 IL Hies. 13 Pecans. 15 Standing room. 18 Ways and Means. 23 Bust-line. 24 Marie. 26 'Truism. 27 Bell-tent. 28 Oafish. 29 Metaphor. Maws: 1 Jumble. 2...

SPECTATOR CROSSWORD No. 801

The Spectator

Two nrkes are awarded each week - a copy of the De Luxe edition of Chambers's Twentieth Cete- ra1. Dictionary and a book ate,, f o t- one g al e a. T hese will be as anted to...