T HOUGH nothing specific has been revealed at the time of writing regarding the conversations between Col. Beck and British Ministers there seems good reason to believe that...

and consented to stand for re-election to the French Presidency. The greatest pressure came from M. Daladier, who has the strongest reasons to desire M. Lebrun's re-election. A...

agreements with Rumania and Yugoslavia recently signed by France are now published. The treaty with Yugoslavia is designed to encourage French exports, to facilitate the...

of the progress of the negotiations between the Yugoslav Prime Minister, M. Tsvetkovitch, and the Croat leader, Dr. Matchek, are of good omen for the peace of South-East Europe....

and the Soviet Union has once again been settled by a compromise, which may prove to be only temporary. By the agreement signed in Moscow on Sunday, the U.S.S.R. grants Japan...

little change in the position of the parties ; and the Socialist Prime Minister, Herr Stauning, now in his tenth year of office, can proceed with his constitutional reforms....

the Chief Justice of India, in the dispute between Mr. Gandhi and the Thakor Saheb of Rajkot has considerable psychological im- portance. This, it will be remembered, was the...

a good deed in a naughty world; and Belgium now seems to have good prospects of extricating herself from the morass of internal difficulties into which she had fallen. The first...

Vorposten last week, that Memel is immediately to be fortified as a naval base emphasises the strategic value of Herr Hitler's latest acquisition. Memel, in the centre of the...

generally accepted, his speech had the desirable effect of disturbing some of the Government Members who had not yet grasped the full implications of the Polish guar- antee. Any...

a decline from the figures for February ; this March, how- ever, the decline was greater than usual, and for that reason is encouraging. The total of 1,726,929 unemployed in...

of Supply will be renewed when the House meets after Easter. Quite apart from the doubling of the Territorial Army, and all that that involves, Members are concerned about the...

the fact that the House listened for three hours to a suc- cession of speeches from its most notable Members. The House was deeply interested throughout, though seldom very...

distribution of broadcasting programmes over the tele- phone is of special interest in existing circumstances. The decision carries out the recommendation of the Ulls- water...

National Union of Railwaymen on Tuesday creates a serious situation. The conference decided by a large majority to reject the National Tribunal's award on the rail- waymen's...

is too early, perhaps, to judge what the effect of the Polish guarantee will be at home. The appearance of the House :n Monday's Debate was of almost complete unanimity, but one...

T HE question raised in these columns a week ago, " Action or Drift? " received a swift, satisfying and decisive answer. If ever a speech was action it was the terse but...

T HE coincidence of the Easter holiday with the opening of a new quarter, and the consequent restoration to the roads of cars that have been laid up for reasons of economy...

arranging a national defence display in Hyde Park on Saturday was well rewarded, in that the public flocked in thousands to see and hear,—and deserved to be. It might perhaps...

the properties of the barrage balloons. They keep up, according to one young gentleman in the crowd, because they are filled with petrol. (Each balloon actually, I believe,...

I AM not surprised that The Times figured so largely in the foreign affairs debate in the House of Commons on Monday. No single factor contributed so much to the disasters of...

the flocking season has begun. This is how one of them flocked, thirty-six hours after the announcement about doub- ling the Territorials was made. Having a free afternoon (X....

banks of Czech holdings in London was a sound and necessary move, but it seems to have had the effect of reducing a number of perfectly well-to-do Czech residents in this...

on Wednesday, that it had just been necessary to give orders to the Fleet to man its anti-aircraft guns should perhaps be read in the light of information which reached me from...

By A. APPODORAI T HE agitation of the people in the Indian States for a share in their government is now the most noteworthy feature in Indian politics. To understand the...

By ERWIN D. CANHAM [This article was written before Mr. Chamberlain's statement regarding Poland, on which, nevertheless, it has a direct bearing] . Washington. W ASHINGTON,...

By D. R. GILLIE T took two days for the French public to wake up to I the significance of the destruction of Czecho-Slovakia. This was not surprising, for the influence of the...

By S. E. MAINES T HE division of society into classes is a ridiculous, but I suppose, quite natural phenomenon. Although the classes are incapable of exact definition, and the...

By DR. ERNEST MUIR M ANY people are surprised when they hear that leprosy still exists in the world. They think of it as something remote in time and distance connected with...

By ONE WHO IS LIVING IT T O seize opportunity is a secret of living. When, there- fore, after graduation I was offered a job as a learner on a local newspaper, for twenty...

By JEAN-JACQUES BERNARD T HEY lived side by side and did not understand each other. Someone was between them : she. The one, who was her husband, had given her his whole heart,...

read again the solemn words " His Majesty's Government would feel themselves bound at once to lend the Polish Government all the support in their power," I hear again the...

last six months they will be perplexed by the fact that Mr. Chamberlain, after his recent change of policy, has enhanced rather than diminished his hold upon the country. It is...

ordinary private Members. It may be that I have an exaggerated sense of occasion, but nothing on this earth could have in- duced me on that Friday afternoon to rise and comment...

must be defined. The electorate of this country are not permanently swayed by a statesman who comforts them in their material anxieties unless he also possesses some outstanding...

By HAROLD NICOLSON H ISTORICAL occasions have a strange effect upon human attention ; what one remembers afterwards is not so much the central event as some incidental episode...

DENMARK AND ITS PAPERS By MONICA REDLICH NEWSPAPERS in Denmark are so different from those in England that it takes a considerable time to get used to them (quite apart from...

MUSIC BartOk's New Work THE Royal Philharmonic Society ended its season last week with a programme that conformed to the Euclidean definition of a line, having length without...

" Three Smart Girls Grow Up." At the Leicester Square.— " Black Eyes." At the Berkeley. — " Inspector Hornleigh." At the New Gallery. INNOCENCE is a tricky subject : its appeal...

'un correspondent parisien] POURQUOI la France et l'Italie n'arrivent-elles pas a se com- prendre? Ne repete-t-on pas a Lout propos qu'elles sont soeurs? Serait-ce precisement...

The Donatello Canon LET all those who think that they know about Donatello visit he exhibition of photographs after his works which is on .iew, till April 14th, at the Warburg...

The Strangest Migration The strangest of all the recorded marvels of bird migration is carried a step further by the latest news from Skokholm, that " dream island " which...

Grasholm, home of seals as well as gannets, lie off a coast that is in tune with them. There is a scheme for making a long strip of this Pembrokeshire coast into a National Park...

the kingdom not of birds, but of butterflies, has been recorded in the West Indies. Hosts of butterflies—one was estimated at zo,000—have been watched on purposeful journeys...

may be called Rock t Alpine or Scree, or in one aspect Moraine, may claim certain superiority over other gardeners. They do much mot( travelling in search of the flowers that...

The birds of Skokholm, as well as any would-be farmer there, are deleteriously affected by the immense population of rabbits. The animals themselves often suffer much from...

to an offshoot of Grirruns Dyke) has enjoyed as wide a vogue as the rarer, and more difficult, slype. The discussion on the meaning may be concluded with two comments, one from...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Sta,—Being partly of German-Swiss extraction, I was keenly interested in Miss Elizabeth Wiskemann's article on Switzer- land in your issue of...

[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...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] S nt,—Within recent times democratic institutions have come in for not a little criticism. They are accused of inepti- tude in the face of...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Snt,—I note that a correspondent in the issue of your journal for March 24th strongly advocated the necessity of some action being taken "...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR,—AS one who has lived for some years in England and cherishes memories of friendship and hospitality received there, it is with deep regret...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Sut,—In your paragraphs under " The Week in Parliament," in your last issue, you write: " It is a sad commentary . . . that policy is so...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR,—In connexion with Mr. Powys Greenwood's contribu- tion to your last issue, " Hitler and Hackney," will you allow me, as chairman of the...

Arnold Wilson, M.P., accuses my imagination of playing tricks. The Government training schemes, as put from Sir Arnold's idealistic viewpoint, differ a great deal in fact from...

THE SPECTATOR] SIR, —In an otherwise kindly notice, published in your issue of March r7th, of my book, The Defeat of Poverty, your reviewer charges me with some sins of which, I...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR, —There is no Irishman, whose moral sense has not been .obscured by early political teaching, who will attempt to justify or condone the...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Sta,—Your contributor " Janus " has had no more success than I have had in bringing Sir Edward Marsh to the point. Yet it is both simple and...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Sur,—I have just seen in the Country Life page of The Spectator of March 24th a paragraph referring to the East Kent Hunt. There is no need for...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] Snt,—General Lethbridge Alexander, in your issue of March 31st, asks: " Why do the English invariably dodge the issue and appear unable to...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR, —Have any of your readers noticed the parallel with present-day wickedness denounced by the -prophet Isaiah about the year loo n.c.? He...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR,—I have spent several weeks in France this winter, and have talked to all sorts of French people. I have not found one whose thoughts about...

[To the Editor of THE SPECTATOR] SIR, —May I correct both an error and an erroneous im- pression in the review of my book, Who is for Liberty? I am not Sir John Simon's nephew,...

The German Mind (A. L. Rowse) ... . Henry Grattan and His Times (Frank MacDermot) Rothermere and Hitler (E. H. Carr) ... . The Facts about Property (Honor Croome) Christianity...

THE warnings and predictions of the title were uttered by Lord Rothermere to his countrymen during the past eight or ten years, most of them in the form of articles in the Daily...

Roger McHugh, there has been no Life of Grattan for over 35 years, and much has happened meanwhile to make him of greater topical interest and importance, as well as to provide...

Public and Private Property in Great Britain. By H. Campion. (Oxford University Press. 8s. 6d.) Tinsis a straightforward, businesslike and valuable state- ment of the results...

Christianity and Economics. By Lord Stamp. (Macmillan. 5s.) AMONG the tragic features of human life is the apparent impossibility of combining loyalty and enthusiasm with judge-...

Let Dons Delight. By Ronald Knox. (Sheed and Ward. 7s. 6d.) THE port at Simon Magus, a college in the University of Oxford, is a potent soporific. A post-prandial glass or two...

A Number of People. By Sir Edward Marsh. (Heinemann and Hamish Hamilton. 15s.) SIR EDWARD MARSH is a Conformist, and proud of it. All his life he has drifted safely with the...

Down Wind. By George Digby. (Collins. 12s. 6d.) The Horse and Buggy Doctor. By Arthur E. Hertzler. With an Introduction by Francis Brett Young. (The Bodley Head. 12S. 6d.) MOST...

The Letters of William and Dorothy Wordsworth. The Later Years (1831-1850). Edited by Ernest de Selincourt. Three vols. (Oxford. 63s.) VERY few men (or women either) improve as...

Birds as Animals. By James Fisher. (Heinemann. 12s. 6d.) MOST of us, I suppose, take birds—their habits, their origins —for granted. Certainly we are not inclined to consider...

By FORREST REID Judas. By Eric Linklater. (Cape. 6s.) FOR me astronomical romances have always had a peculiar fascination. I get from them a thrill quite different in kind...

is an artist, went to American Samoa to paint pictures of native life. To get a proper understanding of her subject, she lived for a time in a village where she was the only...

The Prime Minister's momentous statement of March 3; on Poland has necessarily rendered much of the political comment in the April magazines out of date, but they supple...

MAJORCA By Francis Caron This book (Cassell, 8s. 6d.) is the diary of a young painter who lived for a time, before the revolution, in El Terreno, a suburb of Palma de Mallorca....

All lovers of Jane Austen know that she was intimately acquainted with Bath, where as a young girl she stayed with her uncle, Leigh-Perrot,. and where she lived with her parents...

The Middlesex County Council has done well in com- missioning its Clerk to prepare this Jubilee handbook on the history and growth of the county (Evans Brothers, 2s. 6d.) " for...

BY CUSTOS MARKEL'S have reacted favourably to the growing accumu- lation of evidence that the Government's policy is stiffening. Steps such as the pledge to Poland and the...

There are some interesting sidelights on the " business as usual "-defence work problem in Sir Felix Pole's survey of the activities of Associated Electrical Industries. He made...

AUTOMATIC TELEPHONE AND ELECTRIC COMPANY, LIMITED INCREASED ORDERS AND PROFITS SIR ALEXANDER ROGER'S SPEECH THE nineteenth ordinary general meeting of the Automatic Tele-...

THE ASSOCIATED PORTLAND CEMENT MANUFACTURERS, LTD. SALES WELL MAINTAINED DIVIDEND OF 20 PER CENT. SIR P. MALCOLM STEWART ON GROWTH OF GROUP'S ACTIVITY THE fortieth ordinary...

VICKERS LIMITED IMPORTANT NATIONAL WORK THE seventy-second annual general meeting of Vickers Limited was held at the Hotel Victoria, London, on April 3rd. Mr. A. A. Jamieson,...

the smaller ur,its in the textile machinery trade, have sprung a surprise in announcing an interim dividend. The inference I should draw is that Textile Machinery Makers, the...

Last year's experience of Radiation, Limited, the gas stove makers, is typical of a fairly wide range of British industry. On the one hand, costs followed a rising curve owing...

(Continued from page 61o) A DEFENCE OF COMBINES Contrary to some market expectations, Sir Malcolm Stewart was unable, at the annual meeting of Associated Portland Cement...

DUNLOP RUBBER CO. SATISFACTORY RESULT FOLLOWING RECENT IMPROVEMENT SIR J. GEORGE BEHARRELL'S REVIEW THE fortieth ordinary general meeting of the Dunlop Rubber Company, Limited,...

One of the last of the season's dividend announcements from the London department stores comes from the Army and Navy Stores, who are paying a final dividend of rod. r= 1 *...

MARCH UNEMPLOYMENT THE spring recovery in industry seems, without a doubt, to have been unusually sharp. The March unemployment returns show a drop of 169,782 following on a...

Chairmen of many banks operating in New Zealand have protested against the method of assessing bank income-tax there. At the meeting of the Bank of Australasia last week, Mr. D....

Sir Alexander Roger, who is head of an important group of companies manufacturing cables and telephone equipment, is devoting a large part of his speeches at the shareholders'...

Provincial Cinematograph Theatres, which is an important company of the Gaumont-British group, is to forge ahead with a programme of equipping more of its theatres with...

RADIATION, LIMITED THE IMPORTANCE OF RESEARCH MR. H. J. YATES'S ADDRESS THE annual meeting of Radiation, Limited, was held, on the 30th ultimo, in London. Mr. H. James Yates,...

PROVINCIAL CINEMATOGRAPH THEATRES MR. MARK OSTRER ON TELEVISION THE twenty-ninth annual ordinary general meeting of the share- holders of Provincial Cinematograph Theatres,...

BANK OF AUSTRALASIA TRADE CONDITIONS IN AUSTRALIA THE one hundred-and-fifth annual general meeting of the Bank of Australasia was held, on the 30th ultimo, at the office, 4...

On a purely commercial view of the outlook, Sir George Beharrell, chairman of the Dunlop Rubber Company, finds much that is not displeasing. The better conditions in British...

Vickers on Monday as clear a picture of the company's growing volume of rearmament work as the necessary secrecy which surrounds this class of business would allow. He disclosed...