F the concluding stages in the proceedings which will culminate I with the signing of the formal instrument of surrender by japan on an American battleship on September 2 should...

Politics in Spain will always be sui generis. Today they are being evolved in two centres, Madrid and Mexico City. At home the administration, warned by Mr. Bevin, and...

The treaty concluded between the Soviet Union and China is on the face of it a most valuable document, which stabilises the greater part of the mainland of China on a thoroughly...

The impending crop of by-elections is interesting on more than personal grounds, important though that aspect of them is. To get Mr. Harold Macmillan and Mr. Richard Law back to...

The ending of Lend-Lease has made clearer than ever the neces- sity of a speedy transition from war to peace production, and it is going to test this country's capacity for...

The Government's proposal for a Select Committee on Procedure in the House of Commons would have raised few questions but for statements made by various Ministers before the...

The Morris Committee on the control of the selling price of vacant houses has probably made the best contribution it could to the solution of a difficult problem. It is contrary...

The outlook in Bulgaria, and in the Balkans generally, is much improved by the decision of the Bulgarian Government to postpone the elections. This is a direct outcome of the...

T HE Prime Minister's statement on the sudden cessation of Lend-Lease, described by Mr. Churchill as " very grave and disquieting," cast a shadow of gloom over the country which...

the House, it varies. The Prime Minister has been quietly adequate —certainly in no way a failure, but certainly no notable success ; we shall have to wait longer to discover...

Ministry of Information in last Sunday's Observer, but as it was shrouded in the anonymity which that admirable journal cultivates so assiduously it is impossible to tell...

of declara- tions by Labour Ministers that their predecessors have left things in such a shocking state that they. with all their virtues, cannot be expected to reduce chaos to...

W ITH ratifications of the United Nations Charter coming in fast: speculation about the appointment of a Secretary-General is beginning. It is the most important post connected...

stop was the despatch of Rhodes scholars to Oxford—the few German scholars of course, but the numerous American ones also. Now, fortunately, the flow from America is to begin...

as plaintiff or as defen- dant, wins his case, but finds himself heavily out of pocket, he always seems to me to have a just complaint against things in general. So has a...

By HUGH MASSINGHAM I N a brilliant evocation of pre-war Paris " Palinurus "' remem- bers " bookstalls along ' the quais, with old prints that no- body wants, naughty novels...

By VERNON BARTLETT, M.P. A VERY different House of Commons. In quantity, in quality and in enthusiasm. To take last things first, how could members who had so long outstayed...

By BRIGADIER STEPHEN H. LONGRIGG P ALESTINE is and will be much " in the news." Sound argu- ment about it will be mixed with the usual foolish or malicious misrepresentations....

By T. 0. M. SOPWITH• The main reasons for losses, rot necessarily in order of pre- cedence, are : (a) Errors of judgement. (b) Lack of adequate maintenance. (c) Weather....

By JOHN IL HUMPHREYS T HE single transferable vote form of proportional representation was first applied to University parliamentary elections in 1918. Prior to that year each...

By HAROLD NICOLSON A S we read the newspapers, or listen to the broadcasts in our own and foreign tongues, there is one word which recurs with bewildering frequency. It is the...

as manifested by the General Election of July 26 last, and the system adopted in Eastern Europe, as manifested by what is happening in Hungary, Rumania and Bulgaria, differ from...

Democracy " to denote our own Liberal system, under which the State is regarded as a balanced organism,• and under which the interests of minorities and the rights of the...

has acquired in the vocabulary of Europe and America arose therefore from a misunderstanding of the sense in which it had been used by the Greeks. To them the expression was not...

uy such emotionalists as J. J. Rousseau and Tom Paine, this difference between selfish and =selfish, undiluted and diluted, systems has become obscured; and that we have...

'Lady Windermere's Fan." At the Haymarket. —" Sigh No More." At the Piccadilly. Lady Windermere's Fan was the first and it is the worst of Oscar Wilde's comedies. It has a...

"A Bell for Adano." At the Odeon. IT is early to assess the war-time record of the studios, yet this week's new film conduces to retrospection. Both here and in America war...

THE following verses, by the nonagenarian Cambridge poet, Mr. Thomas Thornely, formerly Fellow of Trinity Hall, deserve a high place among predictions of atomic warfare. They...

Subscribers are reminded that notification of change of address should reach the office of The Spectator seven clear days before the alteration is to take effect.

be hoped Mr. Shinwell will give as much attention to distribution as production. Consumers want coal in their homes this winter." Well said, Sir! He certainly should, and that...

to add my contribution to " R.A.F. and Training," the letters on which subject I have read in the issues of July 6th-zoth, which have just arrived. I am interested in this...

FRANCE AND BRITAIN 'SIR, —Two recent letters published in The Spectator, one by Mr. F. C. Stone, formerly British Vice-Consul in the French Cameroons, and the other by...

Sot,—In your issue of the 24th instant, Miss Mary Cubitt asks whether there is any evidence that the reviving Churches in Germany are " calling their parishioners to...

Sta,—Lord Wavell's persistent effort to normalise India's political life deserves commendation from all quarters eager to see India happy, pros- perous and free. It would be,...

SIR, —One read Professor A. V. Hill's article " Science and Secrecy " with interest and yet felt that it demonstrated what the professor had no intention of doing, the...

SIR, —Three main points seem to arise in regard to the use of the atomic bomb. (t) The trouble about the argument that it is justified because It shortened the war is that we...

pruning of apples, as of roses, is overdone ; and one of the best forms of pruning is the least widely practised, that is summer pruning or pinching. It is curious how some few...

Norringc has more strikingly illustrated the complete and surpriiing disappearance of the coney from many districts- than the reaping of our most excellent harvest. The new...

up one day last week of the poisdnous nature of the pyrethruth, which 'supplies the belt of insect destroyers:. Was the' garden hybrid pyrethrum also poisonous? On the following...

the discussions on the use of the atomic bomb, namely, what kind of city precisely was Hiroshima? At the time of the bombing the statement was made that Hiroshima was an...

or other visible warnings on telegraph wires quite . " fallen into desuetude," in the phrase of ,an Oxford Don accounting.for the dunes he had neglected? . My experience is that...

Sur,—I see that " Countryman " has been reading the recent correspon- dence in The Times regarding the hatching of eggs, and I think an experi- ence of my own might interest...

" of Greek and Latin as " those extremely dead languages." I will not comment on the interesting implication in the word " extremely " that there are degrees of death, but I...

As I write, I hear the not disagreeable hum of a tractor-drawn three- furrowed plough (or plow) persuading an ungleaned stubble to take on " the good gigantic smile of the brown...

Stage Conventions Shakespeare and the Popular Dramatic Tradition. lay S. L. Bethell (King and Staples 10s. 6d.) THIS is a book at once comforting and irritating, with many...

Quiet Skies on Salween. By Ellen Thorp. Cape. 7s. 6d., AFTER all the English books on India and Burma whose centre gravity is Home--so•that everything experienced out there is...

Defence is Our Business. By Brigadier J. G. Smyth, V.C., M (Hutchinson. 10s. 6d.) THERE has been a general and insistent demand that the Governme should make known its plans...

Building the New Age. By E. B. Castle. (Rich and Cowan. 7s. 6d.) IF the present generation fails to build a new age, it will not be from lack of architects' drawings. We must...

THE individual importance of each man in war is an obvious theme for a novel, but the number of novelists who have simultaneously claimed it for their own is disconcerting. In...

The Future of British Farming. By H. W. Menzies-Kitchen. (Pilot Press. 5s.) DR. MENZIES-KITCHEN is head of the Economic Department of the School of Agriculture in Cambridge, and...

29 .1:4 4111 111[..Q .1 /8 i En. /6 \\ m, Iran MAL \ 111 "\\ :\\ .6 27 \ 25 28 ACROSS t. With which to study the barometer, perhaps. (7, 3-) 6. Biblical character...

SOLUTION ON SEPTEMBER 14th The winner of Crossword No. 336 is BRIG.-GEN. F. J. MOBERLY, Fairlea, Bideford, Devon.

We regret that in the advertisement in our issue of August 17th the intermediate bonus of this Society was incorrectly stated. The present rate of intermediate bonus is 3os. per...

By CUSTOS WHILE it would be incorrect to say that the facts of Britain's externa balance of payments uncovered by Lend-Lease developments hay come as a surprise to the more...

THESE two well-known annuals, both edited by Dr:Mortimer Epstein, are indispensable volumes of reference for anyone concerned in any way with public life. This year both arrive...

TANDARo BANK OF SOUTH AFRICA STRONG LIQUID POSITION 132nd ordinary meeting of the Standard Bank of South Africa, ited, was held on August 29th in London, Sir Dougal 0....