The evidence of French willingness to play a full part in the defence of Western Europe will not readily be sought in the debates of the National Assembly. But, despite the...

When Mr. Herbert Hoover pronounces on issues of state he has a method all his own. It is simply to resurrect the great programmes of the past and state them as if they were...

x CORPS has successfully completed the evacuation of the Hungnam bridgehead, taking much of its heavy equip- ment with it. It has been disembarked again at Pusan, and is now—or...

Comment and conjecture about the theft of the Stone of Scone from Westminster Abbey very quickly reached a point at which Scottish Nationalists were saying that this performance...

Sir Eustace Missenden is not leaving the post of Chairman of the Railway Executive in disgust. The letters which he exchanged with Lord Hurcomb, the Chairman of the British...

The lecture on government which Mr. Nehru has despatched to the Prime Minister of Nepal is not likely to do the people of that State much good. The Indian Prime Minister has...

Contrary to expectation the Government of the United States has anticipated our own in resuming full diplomatic relations with Spain. Mr. Stanton Griffis, till lately American...

I N what many listeners will consider the - best of the many Christmas broadcasts he has delivered, the King on Monday sounded a note that could hardly have been improved on....

interesting decisions on record before laying off for Christmas. A motor-cyclist on to whose machine a horse jumped over a hedge sued the horse's owner for damages and lost ;...

by Canon Braley and just published by the S.P.C.K. at 15s., is full of the kind of pungent observations that might be expected in Dr. Henson's correspondence. For one who (in...

departments of this office that few of the kind things sometimes said about us (this does, surprisingly enough, occasionally happen) are ever accorded the publicity of print....

to letters but also to broadcasting, for he had the gift of projecting something of his individual charm and sense of poetic fantasy whenever he spoke over the air. For most...

the admirable suggestion thrown out by Sir Evelyn Wrench in The Times before Christmas that, as some recognition of the immense generosity of the American people in providing...

Wt ELL, Christmas is over, and we have leisure to cast up he follies committed in its name. High on the list must come the despatch of Christmas cards, for surely of all the...

By ROBERT WAITHMAN Washington I N America the year 1950 is ending with an argument—one of the big, noisy, free-for-all arguments which must often seem abroad to be tearing this...

By SIR FRANCIS LOW* M ORE than three years have elapsed since Kashmir, beloved of the Moghul emperors and in more recent times the " happy valley " of holidaymakers, flared...

By 'GOROMN Y REES ' I N a recently published book, Kann West Europa Verteidigt Werden ?, a distinguished German general has drawn up a balance-sheet of Western Europe's military...

By DILYSROWE T HE island is Irish, and it has one adornment—the rugged coping of the sea. The islanders who have not been able to leave it dress in shawls and homespuns,...

By NINA EPTON C6 I N OROCCO," gushed the elderly lady at the table .next to mine at the Minza in Tangier, " is like a superb colonial exhibition." " But, Madam," protested an...

By A LAY READER W HEN the canon married money a two-acre garden cramped his style. He made inroads on the rectory field for the sake of statuary and a terrace. A new wing to...

wise man and therefore reticent. When he does make some pronouncement we may be sure that it is based upon a careful planning of policy and a precise calculation of...

given at Covent Garden on December 21st, is the composer's brother Modest, who turned Pushkin's sardonic, Hoffmannesque tale into a conven- tional operatic libretto. The...

" Samson and Delilah." (Carlton and Plaza.)=—“Transcontinent Express". (London Pavilion.) IT is impossible to write of Mr. Cecil B. de Mille's productions without using the...

THEATRE "Bartholomew Fair." By Ben Jonson. (Old Vic.) " Tuts Way to the Fayre " says a large notice which is visible throughout the opening scenes; and at the sight of the...

of open testimonials which satisfy simultaneously their bearers and the truth. A prize of f5, which may be divided, is ofiered for sup h a testimonial from his headmaster for...

Here it is much as it was last week, with the vagaries of the weather triumphant. The main activity has been the laying down of wire-netting over the fish-tank under the weeping...

With the world under snow we have had the close company of the robin again. I have thus been able to put to the test a statement by a friend—that the robin has a blue feather...

THE Kent County Council has just issued a statement, drawn up by the Kent Planning Committee, on the development plan for the county. It needs to be studied in relation -to the...

for the Port of London on the River Swale and the southern half of the Isle of Sheppey has been dropped, as larger, national planning favours only one marine airport in the...

Magazine Post) Id.

Carman, takes exception to what he calls Anglo-Catholics' " official attitude towards the reunion of Christendom," and asserts that they " stand exposed as Pharisees." May I...

not apply the term " sonnet " to the sixteen-line poems in his cycle " Modern Love "; but he is falling into an error of generalisation in supposing that " it has been always...

The Life of Bonar Law SIR,-1 cannot but be obliged to Janus for the complimentary references which he makes to me in his Notebook, but I must take issue with him on one point....

SIR,—Mr. Christie's article has 1 doubt not touched an answering chord in the soul of many a loyal layman. For more than thirty years the question of home reunion has been...

SIR,—Your correspondent, Mr. W. J. McCombe, finds fault with me for speaking of " the Meredithian form of sonnet." But it is not I with whom the fault lies. Mr_ McCombe must s...

SIR, —A few comments may be made on Mr. Wilson Harris's balanced article on the evidence for and against the Virgin Birth. There is an obvious slip in his statement that the...

Snt,—For denying what he calls the worker's " freedom to join or not to join a union," Booth Walters likens me to a German acquaintance, who, after experience of Hitlerism,...

The election contest at Sl'Alban's has been one of unusual excitement. At the nomination, Mr. Jacob Bell, the wealthy Quaker chemist, was proposed by Mr. Kinder, and seconded by...

`Below are printed the answers to the Christmas. Questions published in the Spectator of December 22nd:— 1. a. The man who lived on the other of the river. b. The chief actor in...

I T was Hume's verdict that Machiavelli had lived in too early an age of the world to be a good judge of political truth ; his studies had been confined " to the furious and...

Caribbean Journey The Traveller's Tree. By Patrick Leigh Fermor. (John Murray. 2 IS.) INFORMATIVE, and often enough entertaining, the standard English travel-books upon the...

Testament for Social Science. By Barbara Wootton. (Allen and Unwin. i Ss.) ONE of the most convincing proofs of our persisting irrationality is that we follow fashions in...

The Anarchist Prince. By George Woodcock and Ivan Avakumovie. (Boardman. 2 I S.) THERE has been a revival ' of sorts in this country in recent years of anarchist philosophy, no...

HUGH SHEARMAN'S book on Ulster has already been published in the " County Books " series. Now Frank O'Connor has written an informative and interesting book on Leinster, Munster...

The Crest on the Silver. By Geoffrey Grigson, (Cresset Press. us.) THIS is Mr. Grigson's autobiography. It bears the date 1930-1949, but it is not the fruit of nineteen years'...

Collected Poems. By Alfred Noyes. (John Murray. 2is.) IT is good to have Mr. Noyes's poems in a single volume, and see in perspective the ambition and the span of his work....

IN 1943, when China joined the United Nations and foreign Powers ceded their extra-territorial rights, the question of the future of Hong Kong was raised by China, but was...

Tests revision (and expansion) of the Maurice Lectures delivered by the Dean of St. Paul's in 1949 has much significance. The Dean is anxious that his book shall be read in the...

Chardin. By Bernard Denvir. Delacroix. By Jacques Lassaigne. (Longmans. Masters of Painting Series. los. 6d. each.) Gauguin. Introduction by Jean Taralon. Manet. Introduction by...

The Creative Craftsman. By John Farleigh. (Bell. 2 S.) THIS book has many admirable qualities Mr. Farleigh has given us an illustrated chart of craftsmanship from the dawn of...

Farmer's Progress. By George Henderson. (Faber. los. 6d.) HERE is another practical farmer who has decided that he is on the side of the ancients when it comes to making farming...

Prehistoric India. By Stuart Piggott. (Penguin Books. 2s. 6d.) PROFESSOR WHEELER and Professor Piggott had established great reputations for themselves in occidental prehistoric...

Traveller's Quest. Essays by several hands. (William Hodge. i is.) To travel is an urge present, to a greater or lesser extent, in almost everyone. Only a small proportion...

2s. 6d.) THIS is the reverse side of Mr. Hugh Seton-Watson's recent ,book on Eastern Europe in approach, treatment and point of view, for Miss Warriner has a lively pen, she...

Spotlight on Films. By Egon Larsen. (Parrish. iss.) MR. EGON LARSEN has bravely set himself, in the course of some three hundred pages, not only to trace the entire history of...

The winner of Crossword No. 605 is Miss MONA STANWELL, Colt Hill, Hants. 12 Odiham,

[A Book Token for one guinea will •be awarded to the sender of the first correct solution of this week's crossword to be opened after noon on Tuesday week, ?tummy 9th. Envelopes...

By CU STOS THE year is closing quietly in the stock markets, a,.. is appropriate to surrounding conditions. Balancing the performance of security prices against the main...