st governments begin by making their mistakes and end by making those of r civil servants. The conspicuous unpopu- ty of the present Government stems from unique ability ....

The lull that has followed the international monetary storm prcivides t*i . opportunity lo assess the wider political consequences of the Bonn finance ministers' meeting and its...

The British ambassador in Moscow was given a violent dressing-down by Mr Gromyko. Britain had apparently been using the events in Czechoslovakia to launch a propaganda campaign...

POLITICAL COMMENTARY AUBERON WAUGH One of the better jokes written into the Queen's Speech at the opening of the present session of parliament was the promise of a Genocide...

From the 'Spectator', 5 December /868—Mr. Disraeli has not been deceived by the hurrahs of his county supporters. He knows that even were his Cabinet not divided on the Irish...

AMERICA JOHN GRAHAM Washington—One of his friends once said that he doubted whether Richard Nixon had ever had any fun in his life. Certainly he doesn't look especially...

LORDS REFORM IAIN MONCREIFFE OF THAT ILK Sir lain Moncreille of that Ilk. DL, PhD. eleventh Baronet and twenty-fourth Laird of .11oncreitle, is Albany Herald. 'I knew a lord...

THE LAW R. A. CLINE This week two evidently rival reports emerged from the political lawyer associations offering poverty areas. The main proposal of the Society ways and means...

CHRISTOPHER IIOLLIS The British show no signs as yet Of ever getting out of debt, Nor can the Americans contain The erosion of their dollar drain. In France unpatriotic sharks...

J. W. M. THOMPSON We have had a heavy crop of intemperate and even lunatic remarks from extremist immigrant spokesmen in recent days. 'One of the biggest ways we can help...

PERSONAL COLUMN JOHN BRAINE The reviews of my latest novel, The Crying Game, having now all come in, this is the time when I lick the wounds or cherish the caresses. It's been...

TELEVISION • STUART HOOD It used at one time to be said slightingly of television journalism that it took its lead from the daily papers. rarely initiated news and was...

CRICKET .1-1 4 CHRISTOPHER HOLLIS The feeling is fairly widespread that the mcc and its selectors managed the affair of Mr d'Oliveira about as hamhandedly as possible. First...

THE PRESS BILL GRUNDY Sir Dingle Foot must be a happy man this week. For not only did his name appear in 'Albany at Large' in the Sunday Telegraph, but that same morning he...

DENIS BROGAN I spent exactly a fortnight out of my native land and have discovered how quickly one sets isolated from the centre of things, that is Britain, and begins to...

ASHLEY BROWN Gertrude Stein's place in modern letters is a curious one. For many years before her death in 1946 she was a legendary mother-figure seated in state among her...

JOHN TERRAINE Why France Collapsed Guy Chapman (Cassell 63s) It is always disconcerting for a reviewer to find himself in complete disagreement with the first sentence of a...

PATRICK ANDERSON Letters of Arnold Bennett 1889-1915 edited by James Hepburn (our 84s) Letters from Edward Thomas to Gordon Bottomley edited by George Thomas (out' 63s) A...

LIONEL TIGER Such a long book, such little paragraphs, all roughly the same size, like the ideas. This is . supposed to be a wide-ranging study of the new conditions and events...

Bonn ton PETER PARLEY The Bang Bang Birds Adam Diment (Michael Joseph 25s) Spy in Camera Richard Grayson (John Long 22s 6d) The Nathan Hale John R. Vorhies (Neville Spearman...

FRANCIS WATSON The Brahman is One, but there are 330,000,003 deities. There are 88,000 chakras, or centres of psychic energy, in the human body (among which the anus provides...

J. ENOCH POWELL, MP This is a strange book, essentially a journalist's book, not a politician's. 'Another reason,' says the author, 'why I have written this essay is a hope that...

Truth Will Prevail Marian Slingova (Merlin 21s). The author, though English by birth, was Czechoslovakian by marriage to Otto Sling —victim of the notorious show trial of 1952...

BRYAN ROBERTSON At the present time, as I often complain, there is a good deal of work around which is called 'didactic' and rather like the kind of painting or sculpture that...

ARCHITECTURE STEPHEN GARDINER There is a brief moment—a fleeting glimpse through a litter of red-brick houses, gravel and trees—when the new History faculty building on the...

MUSIC _ MICHAEL NYMAN Stockhausen's one-night stand at the St Pancras Town Hall was predictably a staggering and welcome shock to London concert life. (Normal service was...

NICHOLAS DAVENPORT According to every expert commentator the world monetary crisis is likely to go on un- resolved until—until what? A final solution? I am beginning to doubt...

C USTOS Another nail was driven into the coffin which is the gilt-edged market with the quarter point increase to 6+ per cent in American bank prime rates (borrowing rates for...

PORTFOLIO JOHN BULL What are the investment implications of the two big mergers proposed last week—Rank/ De La Rue and Unilever/ Allied Breweries? There is. first of all, an...

LETTERS From R. R. Milner-Gilliam!, Tibor SzamitelY, Robin Chichester-Clark, MP, W. A. P. Wad- din a gion, John Lamer, 'Ranter' Cobb, Andrew Sinclair, John Ashe, Nicolas...

Sir: For crying out loud, where does J. W. M Thompson (Spectators Notebook, 29 Novem- ber) live, in Tibet or the Fiji Islands? He does not know that ten days after Armistice Day...

Sir: Alack! I am by now struck down & oerthrou'n & awaiting Tryall by the young murtherers.

seems to have made him neglect Bologna la dotta ('the learned,' the city's other invariable epithet). San Petronio isn't the cathedral of Bologna, though admittedly it looks as...

Sir: Denis Brogan had fun in your issue of 15 November with a misquotation from one of my speeches. I make no complaint of this, but write to reassure any friend(s) I may have...

must correct two errors in this one (29 November): 1. King Enzo, who was imprisoned for many years at Bologna, was a son, not grandson, of the Emperor Frederick II; 2. Italian...

upon my article on Yevtu- shenko (Letters, 29 November), make no attempt even to question my facts. Instead, he rants about 'character assassination,' a small clique of cold...

We continue to receive a large number of letters on this subject. A selection, held over from this week for reasons of space, will appear next week.

Sir : In the current phase of criticism of the Greek government in the British press the dis- continuation of `Demotiki' (an unsuccessful attempt to spread a fusion of spoken...

Sir: Your leading article (29 November) is of a piece with some excellent others in your con- siderable attempt to reason with an economic junta dazzled by its excess. (One...

Sir: I am writing a critical biography of Paul Verlaine (1844-96), and I should be most grateful for any help which your readers are kind enough to give me. John Wells's...

Sir: Lord Monson has misunderstood me and, I think, the student rebels (Letters, 22 Novem- ber). I said that they approve of 'violence against the rich and strong rather than...

Sir: Michael Nyman in 'We never close' (22 November) discusses the London concert scene. He writes : . . in the past few weeks our well-fed musical culture has shown that it...

Trevor Grove reports: Competitors were in- vited to compose a papal encyclical on tax evasion, parking meters, the use of chemical hair removers or any other suitably unlikely...

COMPETITION Set by Joyce Johnson: A book on human beings, written in the manner of a book on birds, would probably include descriptions of the Black- coated Commuter, the...

Across 1 Sulky canine (5, 3) 5 Seizes a large number of snakes (6) 9 Rousseau in customary guise! (8) 10 No baldhead, the doctor, and perhaps a trace of goatee) (6) 12 Halifax...

PHILIDOR Black White 3 men 6 men Specially contributed by G. K. Hicks (Wolver- hampton). White to play and mate in two moves; solution next week. Solution to no. 415...