1953-10-26 — Page 4

SHE LIVES WITH MATTERS OF LIFE AND DEATH

★ Continuing THE WOMAN IN HIS LIFE. the series that explores the wife's role in the lives of famous

men. No. 2 - LADY MAXWELL FIFE.

L

by Francis Martin

LADY MAXWILL FYFI.

her job is to understand.

THE CHINA ̈MAIL, MONDAY, OCTOBER. 26, 1953.

She is always up and waiting for him

debates. after late

ADY MAXWELL her husband will want to talk to sizable her about them. In that case ale FYFE has a career of her own. As mul de in a posliion to sien often he brings with Wm boxes

intelligently. one of the Tory party's two vice-chairmen.

helps she Lord Woolton run the party machine and keep sand out of the cogs.

When not putting in a ten-till-live working day at Tory headquarters, Abbey House, she scours the coun try in her 1946 Vauxhall, bright-eyed, humorous and tireless, addressing arca rallies nisl confirming the faith of a million and a half Tory worgen,

But along with all this that goes a second career: of Home Secretary's wife.

After long sessions at the bedroom clesk, Fyle bus

way of coming into the sliting room and standing on the hearth with his back to the chimney- plece and ཧཱུྃ་s row of china horses.

With he wife's audience, le reviews the essential facts and legaments of the care in hari. weighing the factors for and against reprieve or other action,

He down this not with a view to seeking his wife's opinion of advice (which the never proffers, of course), but rather in the canner of a man thinking cloud, for the purpose of getting things in focus before making up his

bed.

From the fa corner Lady

The burden of this second Maxwell Fyfe puts in an occa career IN heavier and trickler.

man

sonal query or comment. It is her job to follow the argument en:make it clear the understands

From time to time mat- it. ters of death or reprieve

11: hang

the balance. Shadow and stress dog the decide. who must These are not things he can discard with his coat and umbrella in the vestibule, They are with him at table. They sit by

£4000 MAN

TE Fyfes live in a modest way.

of Cabinet or Home Ofce påpers which he has had no me to This absorb during the day,

means another hour's work either before going to bod or before

breakfast next morning.

Men Behind the Sound Barrier

A

over

HH

by LES ARMOUR

of

QUIET, scholarly- plicated cookery takes up until an Ameriena patrol rescued

him but he shot 28 looking man pores too much time.

Germany's best in the process. П battered' Mike Lithgow, two years He won the DSO and the DFC "notebook. It is late older than Duke, and top with two bars.

At the end of the near midnight and Fiest Air Arm pilot in the

war, he the household is asleep, the war, has two children, An- was offered a diplomatic job as room quiet.

thony, G, and Philippa, 5. air attache in Chungking.

dying was his life and he chose He tries to apend as much to fly with Hawkers. time as he can with his family at Stockbridge, near Winchester.

The man may be Neville or Duke or Mike Lithgow any one of the half-dozen other top test pilots of to-

Six houre sleep is his normai | day, portion. Often he has to make do with four hours for days on end. Ret spells are few but vital. Lady Moxwell Fyto plous them famly

This summer she took him down to a borrowed house in. Sussex near the sea. Nobody knew the address except a smalt inner ring, Wearing slacks and open-necked shirt, he sat for a

fortnight in the sun re-reading Henty (he la bey still in some ways) and John Buchan,

DEFEATED

OCCASIONALLY she fixes an

escapist jaunt to the pic- tures. Gangster films and West- erna are his delight. When their younger doughter, Miranda, from boarding comes home

at Christmas the thrce school of them usually do a theatre together.

اله

hus-

Lady Maxwell Fyle has

Latiling

ປ່າເ But green average middle. been class commitment, a Cabinet band's side all the way up. Minister has a relatively modes:

I 1924 she was Sylvia Harri- income, Not only is his £4,000

son, daughter

Liverpool family, eighteen, not long out of school and newly engaged to a reverberant young barrister from Scotland.

of # his hearth, ed. Out of it, into the bar His wife is uneasily aware gain, be has to meet all expenses of their presense.

THREE ROOMS

WHEN Sir David Maxwell Fyte has crucial issues on

of office.

Thus Lady Maxwell Fyfe pre- fers to run the Gray's In flat

for single-handed. SIVO

two hours' help in the afternGONS.

For her hand she cooks a

Like a reverberant young barristers, Maxwell Fyfe had political ambitions. As a result he found himself fighting Wigan for the Tories. To his dancee he and telephoned: "Come over give me a hand."

For this is the way the men who crash through the sound barrier, shatter

world records, and put to- morrow's planes through their paces, spend most, of their evenings.

much

But

Lithgow might have ended as he begona sea-going noval officer had not the fates inter vened. He joined the Navy in March 1939 as a midshipman. Then the Navy deelded to send him on a ying course.

From that he went to aircraft

RELAXATION

time is spent HIS spare

mostly in simple relaxa carriers in the Mediterrancan tion. He and his colleagues one of the hottest spots in the He soon proved that geldom show it, but they air war. necessarily live under al- be had courage, resource sent and most constant strain and nagination, and the

him to the діг research their relaxation must take station whatever. form diately available.

of lry

at Bascombe Downs. is imme. In 1944, he took charge the Royal Navy's share the US. naval air experimentai Patuxent, Maryland. station at

The test pllat is more than a man who soars through a dark mauvo akty and comes down to find his

David Morgan, Lithgow's na picture in all the papers.

sistant and the man who flew None of today's test uces from London to Parls in about would admit the preten- the me it would take you to but walk across the street and have tious title "scientist:" that, in fact, is what he is. a cup of coffee, airo spends lits time with his preelous leisure Each second in the air is family -- wife and 1wo recorded not only by

his daughters In

hume at double battery of instru. King's Somborne, Hants.

John Derry, for whom deuth ments (one on the plane panel and one stored in the lay at the end of a power day at Farnborough last year, like:

birds. fuselage) but by the pilot's to watch

He would notes, jotted on a, pad on spend hours lying motionless in deserted fields, his field glasses his knee and recorded on a

trained on the

the sky. tape machine.

he

When

he

was demobilised, Supermarine ( tradi- supplier of navol craft)

John Derry started his Aying snapped him up quickly.

Ag ап carcer

air gunner- wireless operator with the RAF, From there, he fought his way into a pilot's course. He, too, was an obvious choice when de

Havilland started its search for peacetime test pilots.

NERVELESS

LMOST to a man, they ap- almost dedicated to their jobs.

The first Briton to crash Die A peur nerveless, serious, At night, he leaves the sound barrier, he had publicity field not to celebrate his showered on him. But he pres

ex- ferred to duck it when latest triumph but to pand his, notes and clarify could, and spent almost all his fico evenings at home with his his suggestions for modifi- wife. cation in the design.

18

Most of the year, he in the air every duy weekends included. When I

Lithgow, Morgan, Derry all

movie, "Sound Barrier," but helped to make the now famed

they

laughed among them- selves afterwards,

Thero is ttle of the movie PUBLICITY-SHY

heroism on the job. There is test for u not one dramatic without exception, plane but scores--perhaps even fact, Britain's great test pilots hundreds-spread over a year

publicity - shy, When or more. ence, with the battery of Duke shattered the world Each

is tested part

with a designers who guide a craft speed record, his wife told separate fight, each flow veri- "Neville's probably fed at least once before modi- from the drawing board to reporters:

were afraid

photo- fications are made. of being the production line. Time graphed when he lands than he They know that they flirt off" is a luxury — and even ever is in the air."

with death each time they fly. that is likely to be spent close to the job.

he is not, he is in confer are is bacon-and-egg breakfast before mid such as the Bentley, Straffes he leaves for the Home Office a

nine.

or Christie-Evans caper, he works at home in their Gray's Inn flat. He has no office or study there. The flat is mexiest three-reemer at the top of a bare stone stal:.

His work desk is in the main bedroom. Here he reads and re-reads triat reports and other material.

On Sundays and free evenings the produces something plain an English: grilled steak or a zoost with ccnventional 0 vegetables.

Their dining-room is the hail of the Bat.

or street-corner

For economy's sake Sylvia good, stayed with the local party ngent in his small house, sleep. ing on a shakedown in the nursery alongside the agent's small boy. She and Fyfe put in three weeks of doorstep can- vassing as well as a fury of school-hail At such times Lady Maxwell Lady Maxwell Fyte watches FHe makes a point of being on over her husband's weight with meetings. They still smile affec-.

about the old lady hand. She is the watchdog, nips out using him about it, laughs off fulle telephone calls, moves zt diet charts of the extremee sort. who said: "I agree with every rbout quietly, thinks hari. bullies him factfully when he word Mr Fyfe says. But I could works through lunch-hour on a not meet my dear ones in sandwich at hin Whitehall detic, Heaven it I votel anything but and is thankful his health is so Liberal." astonishingly good after years of overwork at the Bar and in the

Whenever her husband handles Bentley or Straffen problem, she keeps higself informed and up to the minute on the main points involved. As likely as not House.

የኝ

CEREBOS

SALT

THE WORLD'S FINEST SALT

Cerebos

SALT

Carabos sale is free running to the last grain. Crystal pure, it la cho perfect salt for table use.

THE WORLD'S BEST GRAVYMAKER ISTO

BISTO

FOR GRAVY

Ah! Blato for the gravy, Browns | Thickens!

Seasons ! making rich tasty gravy in ono easy

process.

Trade enquiries se : John D. Hutchison & Co. Ltd., Pasi Bar 43, Hong Kong.

THREE

Largest Morning Circulation

SILENT

Largest Afternoon Circulation

COMRADES

A someter meet-

the

N opulent Wigan helper ran

tings in his car. For

unable 40 nfford cars of their own, they fought lghurt

on fool and by tram. By the end of the cam- paign the pollical innocents had become case-hardened paigners. They were defeated. But that was part of their initiation.

CEM-

Since then they have been through

crucial more

con. dests. In 1950 and 1951, Fyle fought West Derby (Liverpool), once a gill-edged seat, after the division had been reshaped to his detriment. Lady. Max- well Fyfe orated and canvassed herself hoarse.

he

é

Fyfe afterwards owned that if had campaigned alone ho could not have hoped to suc- In the last analysis he owes his 1051 victory to Lady

ceed.

Maxwell Fyte.

They are something more than man and wife. They are comrades,

I doubt if 100. politics or the law con comradeship quite like it.

SALESMEN

Largest Bunday Circulation

show #

are

bom

TRIESTE

la Russe

Who sups with the Devil should have a long spoon....

London Express Seviree

A

LISBON ROUNDABOUT:

VALUABLE BEACHHEAD?

By J. B. Dominick

Lisbon. come some 60 heavy tanks, TT is one of the marks and airfield, equipment, 20 E of Premier Oliveira Sabre jet fighters and no end Newspaper files on Lithpaw That is their Job. If there

Salazar's statesmanship of jeeps. almost bare-simply

was not the possibility of

that, unlike his neighbour, cause ho hates to talk about something going wrong" and

In two months Canada has hanself.

Generalissimo Franco, he if there were no unknowns to

delivered 400 1% and 8-ton plunge into, there would be no

has managed to keep on ex-

lorries, 25-pounder army test pilots.

cellent terms

the with

field guns and ammunition Western Powers. Moreover

WEEKENDS NEVILLE Duke, 31-year-

in other respects, too, these men are much alike. old World War II ace,

They came into the business often spends weekends fly- by different routes-but once ing an ancient 130-mile-au- there they seemed to acquire hour Hawker Tomtit. More characteristiq "trade marks"

They know, too, that every newspaper in the country has their obituaries written, ready to dash into print.

of his precious free time is pilot in his boyhood. He spent it.

Duke wanted to be a test

he has bound Portugal and to the value of £7 million in nll, and units of the Spain by a Treaty of But they do not dwell upon

Friendship and Non-Aggres- Portuguese Army are being

given intensive training. apent building model planes, his leisure time building model

sion signed at the begin- Ask them about it and they He likes to play squash and planes me at Tonbridge was a probably what keeps us here."

haunted the air circusés say

last war, and ning of the

All in all a lot of people which it is claimed-helped and a lot of organisations he has occasionally found time to do a little under favourite pitch for them) and

Franco to resist the would

to appear

be his pennies for Ave- water fishing In the south shillings-a-time rides in ancient

-blandishments-of-Hitler-and-preparing-for-a-lot-of- of France.

kites.

But not often.

He joined the air force in

too late for the Battle of

1940

simply:

"The danger Ig

Arthur Wateron, bache lor Canadian who heads Glosters' test team, lives in battles and in the 1tallan cam them, they have, a healthy

But they have nothing in common with-the-flashy-young-- sters who zip around the coun- try in fast sports cars,

or the boys who run air circuses. Britain but in plenty of time twentieth

They are the explorers of the century, and, like to make his name in the desert tho

and the moun- taineers

who explored before & palgn. He a converted barge on

Was sho! down 1wice-once-over a canal at Tewkesbury, and Libya when he nearly drowned, work in. They take no

lake in respect for the elements they likes to cook. His speciality and once behind enemy lines In necessary chances, but they do is rum omelets. More com- Inly when he hid for hours not shun the necessary ones.

scamen

un-

PIN-UPS FOR SHIPS' PROWS

By J. W. TAYLOR

was

Mussolini.

eventualities.

anki

Be that as it may, Lisbon just now hums with NATO

the £103 activities. Indeed it is MEANWHILE evident that the Allied million Six-Year Economie

Plan

goes forward, strategists regard Portugal with the zest of university as a valuable beachhead in professor (which Is

exactly what lie was) Dr Solezor case of a big Russian sweep wh

launches a government lecture over Europe. General Eisen- lau

course on the various aspects of hower and Ridgway know us the schome. He is followed in well and

Marshal his lectures by the Minister of Field

Public Colonics, Montgomery has had long Economy.

Works and Communications, chats with the Portugese General Stuff.

First fruit to this plan is the now hydro-cectric dam on the What is perplexing in river Cavado at Salamande, part scheme which will very that though these visitors of all mean to fight on the same electrical output in Portugal, shortly have doubled the total side, they come to this coun- from all sources, try under various organisa-

COBY

1.

Vast plans are envisaged for tions which claim hardly to the Upper Douro, which

by

and

know one another. The Bri- means of a run-of-the-river dam 600 tish keep a modest establish- is ccheduled to generante ment, but the American million KWH por annum. Bri- Embassy

not only have tich manufacturers of turbines eléctrical equipment are their service attaches naturally interested in the triplicate but give house developments, room to another team of warriors (headed by the very popular General Camm)

Aid and Assistance Group..

A PICTURESQUE custom vessels: the Romans busts of mission at the now is coming back into their leading warriors; the-famous-atom devastated shipbuilding fashion-put- English and Dutch Hons, Japanese port of Nagasaki, ting life-size figureheads on and the Spaniards the like at a time when Nippon the prows of ships. Several mess of suints.

suspected all foreigners and vessely with new and im-

scorned trading with other posing "pin-ups" on the.

Eighteenth and nine- nations. The ship

American seized and broken. The crew prows have lately been seen teenth century in British ports, notably shipbuilders stepped in with were never heard of again.

enrved from Norway.

lions, cherubs, goblins, mounted knights, It was in 1937 that Fred Red

Erasmus's figurehead of Indians, characters a saintly-looking man was Olsun and Company, of Iron: Scott and Shakespeare, claimed as personal booty Oslo, one of the lead- and modern celebrities from

by the ing Norwegian shipbuilding ship-owners to queens as eventually passed into the

Governor, and it who represent the Mutual firms, set out to disprove their legendary guardians the modern theory that against disaster. steel hulla and figureheads don't go together. So a start was inade to revive an old

FORTUNATELY Portugal can

go in for these economic rehomes without impairing her traditional way of life--such as the none-too-frequent Procession of the Tabuleiros in the town of SHAPE, not to be out of the Templars. In this festival Tomar, once the headquarters done, recently sent a four- no less than six hundred focal man Anglo-American mis- girls, each supported by an at- sion from Paris and three fendant swain, carry on their British Army Majors from cane through which new heads beflowered erections of the Grenadier Guarda, loaves have been skewered, Royals and H.A. respectively weeks in Portugal, living in pre-Christian in origin and was -have just spent a few. Though the parish clergy tako part, the ceremony is clearly Portuguese barracks so 38 probably dedicated to Cerce, the to acquaint themselves with godds of the cornfield, or per local conditions. All these haps to an even earlier, harvest groups, however, seem to act,

deity. Independently, not within gido

Oxon with garlanded and the effigy and found on one common scheme of gilded home being up the rear training, believing no doubt ard "sacrifood" no longer In that it takes all sorts to the market place but decently in

bitire slaughter housO, - S make an army.

Their fch and the loaves aro distributed among the poor next Meanwhile, military

morning. equipment continues to In other words, Portugal has arrivo. From the USA have Harvost Postival, tool

temple, where the priests had it placed in a prominent position. This wondrous effigy, they said, was that ship's custom with figure had already built ocean- Katedi.

American Red Indians of the Japanese saint heads comprising a barefoot goddess in flowing robes going, canoes with prows and an armoured chevalier, bulging to suggest whales, which were built into the r topped with figures of

bears or other flerce For over 800 years the prows of two sleek cargo animals, whilat later the Japanese people worshipped shipa.

White Man'a cargo vessels the figurehead, implicitly and other craft bore wooden believing it to be an idol, figureheads of famous Then, earlier in the present The custom is almost as Americang like Franklin, century, a Japanese pro- ld as ships themselves. Washington, Jefferson, Cay, fessor of sociology examined All over the ancient world Webster and others. primitive sailors had figure- heads or painted devices ont One of the strangest of "Erasmus" and the date their craft as an omen of bizarre tales told about 1698. He informed the good.. Gradually the custom, ships' figureheads concerned priests and they agreed to spread to other nations. the tiny Dutch ship. have the figurehead' placed, The Phoenicians used Erasmus (only 870, tons). In the Imperial Museum at carved horse-heads on their In 1698 It arrived on a Eyeno.

the "'foreign" word

of the

the procession, and at the end