"WHEN I CONSIDER . . . By RICHARD RUMBOLD IT was growing dusk ; and our instructor, a Flving-Officer, was talking to us about the earth, its shape and size and diameter, its...

The mood of suspicion or disbelief by which young men and women are now assailed can be ascribed to many causes; some of these causes, being closely connected with the almost...

I am not sure that this mood of diffidence, or even distrust, is not as valuable as the rather self-satisfied optimism with which my own generation in 19i9 faced the problem...

Mr. McCallum disposes of the facile theory that the discredit into which the last Peace Settlement fell between I920 and 1939 was due to ingenious German propaganda, and makes...

MARGINAL COMMENT By HAROLD NICOLSON LORD WINSTER, in last week's Spectator, had some sharp things to say about what "Captain, B.L.A.," thinks the soldier thinks. Having been...

It was upon-such strange variations of opinion, some admirable and some the reverse, that pacifism settled like a mould. There are three vital lessons which Mr. McCallum's book...

Talking of monarchs, King Haakon of Norway told in an interest- ing couple of sentences at the Nansen Club lunch yesterday how he came to be king and why he thought he had been...

Mr. Drew Pearson, the American columnist, was publicly scarified by President Roosevelt no; long ago. His latest exposition of truth should act as a kind of self-scarification....

* * * I There is a good deal that I should like to write about Malta, and the Shrine of Remembrance, if space were available. One subscriber sent his cheque with a quotation...

A SPECTATOR'S NOTEBOOK IT is unfortunate that the first important act of Mr. Stettinius, since I becoming Secretary of State, should have been the issue of a statement on the...

Lady Astor may have the defects of her qualities. A certain exuberance has led occasionally to minor dlashes across tMe floor o0 the House of Commons, but they have added much...

I see that Sir Norman Birkett, in a foreword to a pamphlet issued by the Standing Committee on National Parks, commits himself to the assertion that for ten years the Committee...

I SIR,-You rightly observe that there are numerous syrnpathisers with Poland in this country, and they certainly are disturbed at the worsening of the situation. Without a...

POLISH FOLLY SIR,-The comments on "Polish Folly," published in your issue of December Ist, are tendentious, mean, and illogical: altogether, they constitute a disgraceful...

EIRE, GREECE AND SPAIN SIR,-When Mrs. Margery Whitehorn asserts that " Eirc could not have counted on adequate defence by Britain if she had been attacked by the Axis " and...

SIR,-I should be grateful if Vou would allow me a few words in which to reply to the letter of Miss Margery Whitehorn in your issue of December ist. Like so many others she...

COUNTRY LIFE A CHARMING scheme, parented by the National Trust and a arouD of Cantabrian naturalists, is, I believe, being prepared against the piping days of peace. In the...

Pills for Sick Trees What a scientific age we live in! and though there are some who, with weekly clamour abuse novel ideas, especially in husbandry, fertility and the yield of...

In My Garden II The wild barberry, as well as the lovely dwarf hybrid, Wilsonae, is still hung with its long narrow berries; and it is a shrub well worth growing (even if you...

Are Birds More Numerous in Winter or Summer?. | It is an old question: whether birds are more numerous within this blessed island in winter or summer. What hosts of starlings,...

EDUCATION NOW SIR,-Nine different experts have commmented on " Education Now" (Spectator of November ioth). First two exceedingly experienced people who punctuate with, "But...

MUSIC Beecham at the Albert Hall. SIR THOMAS BEECHAM has lost none of his remarkable skill in the command of an orchestra. Few conductors could get such delicacy of playing...

rHE CINEMA ",Summer Storm." At the London Pavilion.-" Laura." At the Empire.-" Casanova Brown "and" Second Battle of London." At the Odeon, THE film is a medium luxuriously...

[hE. I HEATRE "Candida." At the Lyric Theatre, Hammersmith. "eAnna Christie." At the Arts Theatre. The Sadler's Wells Ballet. At the New. THE production of Candida at...

GOVERNMENTS AND DISORDERS o task is more thankless, none more delicate and none more N inescapable than that devolving on Allied Forces in various countries of Euprope where...

I The Case of Count Sforza Liaison between the British and the United States Governments has in most matters of joint concern been singularly good, but it has been faulty, as...

NEWS OF THE WEEK h HE International Air Conference at Chicago has negotiated an air convention of limited scope. But it has failed to reach agreement on major points because...

The Future of Lend-Lease There had been doubt and some anxiety as to what would be the position in regard to Lend-Lease after the conclusion of the war with Germany; but Mr....

The Nation's Health | National Health Insurance. By Hermann Levy. National Institute o1 Economic and Social Research. (Cambridge University Press. 18s.j THERE is much...

Children's Books Puffin Books: Story ot Louisa, History of the Countryside, Puzzle Book, Mourzouk. (9d. each.) v - . . . - AISA Babv Puffin Books: The Holiday Train, Puffin...

SIR,-" Captain, B.L.A.," told us what the men in his unit were thinking. Mr. W. L. Outwin confirms that the troops in Italy have the same suspicions and, if you will, the same...

SIR,-The most depressing thing about " Captain, B.L.A.'s " article and I the correspondence arising from it is the lack of concern that a one-man investigation is the best...

THE COAL PROBLEM SIR,-I am obliged to Mr. Smithson. It is plain that I was somewhat wrong in saying that miners at the coal face in the area I visited -get from is. to 2S. a...

SIR,-Both " Captain 1914-18 " and Lord Winster express surprise, even horror, at the article by "Captain B.L.A." The former asks "And is it really true that our men have lost...

SIR,-The article "What the Soldier Thinks" wvas most interesting, and I your contributor's conclusions are much the same as mine. His reference to religion is most timely....

LETTERS TO THE EDITOR WHAT THE SOLDIER THINKS SIR,-Neither "Captain, B.L.A." or Lqrd Winster are wholly right or wrong. Lord Winster in analysing the original article...

BOOKS OF THE DAY A Cornish Spirit The English Spirit: Essays in History and Literature. By A. L. Rowse. (Macmillan. 12s. ()d.) IT would seem that Mr. Rowse is over-writing...

Those Happy Days A Victorian Diarist. Edited by the Hon. E. C. F. Collier. (Murray. 16s.) I IT is not easy to explain the curious blight or fluffiness which appears to have...

A Fragment of Q Memories and Opinions by Q. (Cambridge University Press. 6s.) SIR ARTHUR QUILLER COUCH declined to write a book of reminiscences, but afterwards he repented...

Fiction Two Mirrors. By Peter de Polnay. (Constable. 1Os.) - - T[he Cup of Astonishment. By Vera T. Mirsky. (Cresset Press. 9s. 6d.) I Love on the Supertax. By Marghanita...

FINANCE AND INVESTMENT By CUSTOS THERE is nothing in the full details of the Richard Thomas-Baldwins fusion which calls for any modification of the view expressed here a...

THE EASTERN FRONT By STRATEGICUS AT the present moment so many reports which confuse rather A than illuminate are arriving from the Western front that somefling must be said...

GENERAL, GO By SALVADOR DE MADARIAGA GENERAL FRANCO, go. 'I do not want to offend you, but I do want to be clear, since apparently you still harbour some illusions as to what...

COMPANY MEETING CONSOLIDJ S( kTED )UTH GOLD Fl AFRICA IELDS OF EFFECT OF. LABOUR SHORTAGE THE ordinary general meeting of The Consolidated Gold Fields of South Africa,...

The Social Reform Programme Safe Mr. Eden made a statement in the House of Commons last Friday which should reassure all who, knowing that the Government's programme of social...

The Outlook in Agriculture Farmers will study carefully Mr. Hudson's statement in the House of Commons last Tuesday, for the time is approaching for a gradual change-over from...

The B.M.A. and the Health Scheme While it is obviously the case that the last word about a National Health scherme supported by Parliament and financed by the nation does not...

Indiscipline Among Miners The'Minister of Fuel and Power has invited both sides of the mining industry to meet him to consider means of increasing output and combating...

TELLING THE WORLD y IIHAMIL'I'ON KI'RR, M1.P. AS we look back now, after four eventful years, to the August and Septemnber days of 1940, we realise more and more that the...

PROGRESS IN THE SUDAN By E. N. CORBY'N (Formerly Governor of Khartoum) A CONSTITUTIONAL advance now in progress in the Sudan has gone largely unnoticed. That is natural...