1958-09-20 — Page 14

THE

NO REVOLVERS, GENTLÉMEN,. SAID THE EMPIRE MAN PAGE

by GEORGE MALCOLM THOMSON

FIGURES IN EDONY. By Raymond Tong. Cassoll. 16s.

NYBODY who tries to find a coherent pattern in the

A building of the British Empire has his work cut out

for him.

Anybody who supposes thet tion was all that was left of a

angle-minded passion for en ary work. larging the area on the map coloured red is taking far too simple a view.

"It's just

THE CHINA MAIL, SATURDAY, SEPTEMBER 20, 1958,

When Gordon

THE HICK

BOOK unleashed a terror WHO CAME

on London

KING MOB. The Story of Lord George Gordon and the Riots of 1780. By Christopher Hibbert. Longmons, 27s.

¡HETNER it was worse

its builders were inspired by a century of Portuguese mission- W

about time," sad one of the British sailors in the punitive force, "comebody did point. visit this place!*

By accident, by mistake, of one local through the zeal officer, or the Imprudence of unuther-30 were the Empire' frontiers pushed outwards and the home government, often to ita dismay, found that it become responsible for e title office, more of the earth's surface!

Take the case of Benin, in Nigeria, once a Negro kingdom.

Uneasy magic

to live through the air

raids of 1940 or the Gordon lots of 1780 is a debatable

On

the

By Roger Fulford

difference between Holy

Con-

munion and High Mas

Mr Hibbert makes the good point that they were probably ithred by anti Irish feeling.

'WAGE-CUTTERS'

where

till the night sky seemed "ilke blood."

The worst night, which had been Immortalised by Dickens's prose and Phiz's pencil, was when the mob sacked the distillery opposite St Andrews Church en Holborn 113.-

Immense caska unrectised

BACK...

A SUMMER PLACE.

Wilson, Casself. 161. THE

Sloan

4

Teach me to dance said the King...

AND ERIKA PLAYED VICTOR SILVESTER

By ROGER FULFORD

WITH A KING IN THE CLOUDS. By Erika - Lauchtag.

Hutchinson, 181.

"HE summer place in

question is an island off the coast of Maine, the spirit wore burst open and fier jealous preserve of a dozen contents capable at once of wealthy families, fuddling the brain and poisonig the atm-were lopped up by when Km Jorgenson, a poor, At least, that was how was

the rioters,

Mr Jibbert properly reminds clever, ambitious youth employ To modern lastes a rearing

us that efthough King George III od by the Islanders as a swim- The British Empire visited

crowd, bent

arson, may

may have lost us America heming instructor, first knew it. Ho soem ruther Benin and there, to this day, it

tame, but the

With saved London.

famous was enormously impressed by it Where the war-god's vulnerability of London to fire remRUNS.

words "here is ene

magisunte all. The worst of the rioting who will do his duty," he took shrine stood, soaked with blood, (and cur forbears's terror of IL)

Ken fell in love with Sylvia that had is now the provincial education suggest

pante of started in Moorfields Londoners during those warm many Irish labourers lodged and over from the craven, bumbles at Raymond and she would have

resented the Mansion House and gave the and fortunately windless nights English working men of June 180 years ago was by no them es wage-culting black necessary orders to the soldiers done with him if she had not He deserves our gratitude for realised that to do so would have

made her a figure of fun. ICRS." means misplaced. Benin, with its appalling, very

Prostitutes and boys an even the most paciile of us would Chief with agree

the Lord recent past. exercised a spell

Mr Christopher Hibbert, wear- observer noted that a large part

Justice, whose

own splendid Its ruler, the Oba, had, like over Raymond Tong, who, spenting his iccating lightly. has of the rabble up four years there in the Flucu-ven as a punt of the Riots

house was gutted when he said sogie ulher African kings, a

that it Was "the highest to which is capital; it is also excil- the fun. parHality for human sacrince. tlon Service. He has tried Sir Richard Burton,

explorer pass on the uneasy mogle in the ing and completely satisfying. Night after night, chapels, humanity to check the infancy

of tumults." Arablan pages of this inexper! but sin

and private houses

the great and Transistor of The

Frist he shows us how a prisons flamed to the

heavens

-{London Express Service). Nights, took a chartlable view cere ile book.

maniaclay of the practice.

(anade or a work on the traditional English responsible position was able to

hatred of the Roman Church.

Asked why another, Africa lang did not abolish the custom. Burton exploded: "Alter the Would you have the custom! Archbishop of Canterbury alter the Liturgy?"

Borders shut

Not at British officials 100% this tolerant view.

lits readers will be left with an uneasiness of their own. The

pro-British

past may bloody

And the present Beem remote. Oba of Benin hus cut down the

royal harem to eight wives.

But in the palace of an in- telligent, Benin chief Mr Tong now a little shrine

on which someone had recently sacrificed a cock.

civilisa-

After 50 years of carnest Bri- In 1892, one of them per- tisk effort, what Will Benin Sunded the Oba of Benin to finally absorb of demoertey and abolish the practice. The Oba other products of our 'hen regretted his declalon and tion? shut the borders of his kingdom to Europeans. The ban Ignored by Consul General Thillpa

This

Wil

resolute, 1 l-advised, Englishman brushed aside the Obu's explanation that, during an important religious festival,

coulet trangers.

he

not

be

Men

by

A TREASURE

A CONCISE HISTORY OF ART. By Germain Bazin, Thames and Hudson. 35s,

A HEHE s treasure indeed!

history of art which is con- case without being indigestible, which has a great nyany illustro-

Lord George Gordon, Member of Parliament for a Wiltshire consiltuency, with the fervour of a dervish, scunded the anti- Roman tocsin both in and ou! of Parliament after some trifling made to the concessions were Catholics in 1778.

HAT PIECES

buys in their mid-teens-joined

By JOHN

FICTION SHELF WATERMAN

HUSBAND FOR VICTORIA.

the

scores a

*

10

By

of them all

Tristead, she treated aim as a agura of tun and married Bart Hunter, the grandest young man But the Hunters lost hele money, Bart turned the summer place into a hotel and became 'ag alcoholic, and the beautifu Sylvia became a drudge.

Mechanical plot

6TTE was God. I have seen a light shining from his forehead." This verdict on King Tribhuvana of Nepal, who died in 1955, explains something of the devotion and simplicity of his secluded subjects, immured on the southern slopes of the Himalayas,

In 1949 Miss Erika Leuchlag, teeth and wigs. "In these I steal a physiotherapist, was asked to away at night,"

The really of the King's cáp- Hvity is Impiled by his showing the author his beautiful suite of rooms for photography. "My reception room," he said with pride, and then added: **Bu whom do I receive fr

go to the Capital of Nepal

vory Katmandu-to treat highly-placed lady,"

This was the Senior Queen, one of the King's two wives who

as "Birdy" on a was known

Queen was called count of her bright eyes. The Junior "Dreamy."

moro

And when he showed off a fine stock of writing paper he At that time Miss Leuchtag explained that the Royal Family was one of only a dozen Euro- were allowed the paper, but that peans in the country. The King the Government did not allow was in all but came the prisoner them to write letters, of the ruling oligarchy, who had In the following year he ded seized for themselves every ves- to India, and he was subse- tige of political power. quently restored with

The author writes briskly and authority. He did not long gives us a most unusual and survive. highly entertaining book.

The author recaptures some- From her first meeting

King's elusive she thing of the nitracted the Queens, their charm, and we share her feel- daughters and the King him- ings when she heard by chance self, The picture drawn of the the news of his death over the King is fascinating.

wireless in her bed-sitting room in North London,

FIRST STEPS

Ken, on the other hand, became a millionaire, and what should he do then but come to the island in his hired yacht anri put up at the hotel with Helen, his

and Molly, his frigid wife,

He smoked "Lucky Strikes," teen-age daughter,

Inhaling the anoke through his You have guessed it: Ken has clenched ist illustrating the

---(London Express Service).

ELEPHANTS NEVER

FORGET

● THE DEVIL AT

THE FOUR

CONFESSION. By O'CLOCK, By Max Catto, Mario Soldali. Drulech. 11a, ed. Heinemann,

the Translalun 15. Before

by Raymond Pacific island of Taluha blows Rosenthal of Italian novel con2= Iself out of the sea everybody cerning 14-year-old boy who is Teaves-except a stubborn Irish to be a Jesult priest when he never forgotten Sylvia er she Nepali dis lice of anything priest and three criminals he has grows up. But he is disconcerted him, and they fall into each | touched by saliva. persuaded to help bring leper by physical business of other's arms.

After, a very few visits from children and hospital start down growing up. He confesses to In the divorce actions that the author, the King asked her lis Protestant following march- the volcano slur. In a hellish Father Genovesi who decides follow the sex-hating Helen is teach him to dance, and to ex to the House of Commona on

rece between human endurance reserve him for the Church by given the custody of Molly and the tune of Victor Silvester's June 2, 1780, and insulted and and rivers of molten lava, they acaring him off women for ever.

the drunk Bart the custody of Pego My Heart, played on a mauled members of both Houses

gramophone, King Tribhuvana Parliament; they opened the escape death. Excitement moves. This ccclesiastical plot has its his and Sylvia's son John.

The boy and girl are in love took his first steps in ballroom dour of the Prime Minister's fuse to an explosive climax.

like the spark on a dynamite own fronie reward. Essentially

a short-story in novel form which with each other. Young as they dancing, The lesson always FOLLOW THE WHALE. By

the successful anti-clerical arc. can their love triumph over ended in the same way;

Ivan T. Sanderson. CassorÍ, conch and sezied his hot off his herd; they then cut it up and

the tangled situation in which King placed his hands before point,

25%. sold the pieces for a shilling coch.

thetr parents exist? Will this face and said: "May 1 go Won't it? I docs..

now, please?"

ELEPHANTS, But Lord George had put the By Vaughan Wilkins, Cape. 159. THERESA'S CHOICE.

Sloan Wilson believes in

"By Richard Before Victoria announced her Rachel Cecil. Constable, 18a

He explained to her that his match 16 alar langer boufre

Carrington. Chatto. 251. the emotional mangle. It would his principal one was ordering Philips and eight other white lions, yet none of them imposes than he imagined, for Mr Hib- betrothal to Albert of Saxe- Bloomsbury and Mayfair girl of putting his characters Urrough life was nothing but hebbles; Coburg Golho there were 30 years ago takes 370 pages to be more moving for the reader goods from Engilsh or American

Tthe age of nine Mr men were ambushed. "No re-

too great a strain on the eye-bert shows us that from then on

thut took rumours avery different

his type

parentage muke her choice, between a if the characters were more valeers, gentlemen," said Phil-- sight.

was not what it seemed, and this middle-class

under- Ivan Sanderson wriggled charge:

several nights for

doctor,

catalogues watches, upper subtly drawn and the plot less wear, stockings, cigarette lighter through the main artery of Tips sterity to his companions,

London was at the mercy of a would make him an unsuitable middle-class artist and end, and

mechanical, more dangerous husband for the English Quec. nristocrat impeccable U.

piled up in the palace. He led a 70 ft. whale and seated Jow mob, far

Where A Summer Place ale private cottage with endless himself inside its heart. an than the blue-ribboned roles. On this basis Vaughan Wilkins certificate and vaguely cultural succeeds is ran guide to

founds his well-told story of a occupation. This first novel by intricacies of American snobbery and hideous electric clocks.

the gadgets-lamps, fires, hair-dryers vlot stop the marriage and the wife

Such a bizarre experience! 1. of Lord David Cecil After this, Britain lumbered count of man's plastic expres-tents or Lord George.

sion of his feelings which is

and the Victoria's makes a fresh but solemn survey American class system.

mysteries of Lic

imagine, must affect you power- the embiliered give the fronte to Benin was relective enough to appear com-

He once appeared wearing fully in one of two ways: either of the labouring wicked uncle. For those who like of a landscape over which Nancy

Karish American tic, orna- captured. Ghoally relics of plete. It is unusually readable members

classes, who had probably hardly no perceptible barrier between Mitford

manerial

mented with a exercises

balf-naked you will be forever, inscinated of human sacrifices as well as easy to look at,

WALTER ALLEN

blonde. ever been inside a church and fiction and history here is a rich rights. Crucifixions were

In a chest of drawers by whales or else you will never would not have delected the slice of 19th-century cake.

-(London Express Service).

-(London Express Service). he kept heaps of maske, false wish to see one again,

Mr Sanderson was fascinated. and when you read some of the extraordinary inets in his book, you are hardly surprised that he was.

Their monument can be seen to this day.

into punlive action.

hundreds

were found. frequent.

This form of execu-

In fact, it may be said tha: clever M. Bazin, who is Director of the Louvre, hat written

Lorton Express Service).

They

were

VIGNETTES OF LIFE

"WAY DON'T YOU GROW UP ? “

THE ANNUAL YEARNING FOR THOSE CAREFREE BOYHOOD DAYS AND

THE OLD HOME TOWN.

SURE I REMEMBER

YOU, WHY ? HAVE YOU

BEEN AWAY **

The Old Home Town

"HOW ABOUT THE

TIME

ME...

"REMEMBER WHEN

YOU

COPE,

GEMERAL, FEATURES

COMO THE WHALE OGHTE KESÄKTER,

THE BLIGHT WHO WELCOMES YOU HOME

WITH A FANFARE OF NOTHING.

A FEW MINUTES WITH YOUR

·BOYHOOD PALS AND THE WIFE WILL BE CONVINCED THAT YOU

LEFT THE OLD HOME TOWN BY REQUEST.

WINERY

OF COURSE THE OLD SWEETHEART

HAS PUT ON.

WEIGHT-BUT YOURÂU

OWN FIGURE · ISAT WHAT. IT

USED TO BE EITHER.

THE

SCANDAL

IS ABOUT

THE SAME—

[ONLY THERES,

MORE OF IT~THIS IS LA FAST AGE

AND THERE'S

A LOT HAPPENING.

By Harry Weinert

THERE'S A NEW CROP OF YOUNGSTERS \TO CARRY ON THE TOWN TRADITIONS,

SOME OF OUR OLD HOOKEY PLAYING PALS ARE MOW PILLARS OF SOCIETY. ... AND OWA

EVERYTHING

IN TOWN

THAT ISN'Yayo MAILED

DOWN-

THE AUTHOR WHO MAKES A

NICE LIVING WRITING ABOUT THE OLD HOME TOWN BUT-

WILD HORSES COULDN'T DRAG

HIM BACK.

A

an

about

for Black right whales, example, have on their anouta excrescence or horny skin two 'fect in tiaracter, riddled with tunnelling parusilic worms and garlanded witla hang- ing barnacles, which is known to the whaler as its “bonnet."!

So skittish.... Humped-backed whales, when mating, become extremely skittish and loll side by side on the surface of the sea giving ona another affectionate 10-ion elapa which can be heard for miles around.

The strength of whales s immense harpooned whale once towed a port, twin-sCTEW steam chaser-ship, running full astern for seven hours at "eight knots.

Me Banderson's books, however, is not so much a study of whales as a detailed history of whaling. It is a story of increasigiy efficient methods of butchery, the latest of which VER AI attempt to kill, whales by drop- ping bombs na then.

Ar mammals, they are prob.... ably capable of as much buffer- ing as a dog or a horse. I shut the book wishing profoundly that modern chemistry would been

that

devine methods of gynthesising the vile and fata whales possess in Buch abundance 10 that soon the glaughter which Mr Sanderson describes. Bo, vividly will no longer be necessary..

Killings over?

Mr Richard Carrington has a happier atory to tell about the largest of all living land animals, the elephant. He seems hopeful that over a greater part of Africa at least, the massacre of. elephants wrought by big gano hunters and Ivory poachers ljus largely been stopped.

One popular belief has KLITS vived scientists' probings. A Gler- man profesor irpinsă a Ave- year-old elephant to distinguish between one box marked with a square which containes food, and another; marked A circle, 'which was empty,

The elephant needed 330 triole before it grasped, the distinction, but eventually it learned to foll the difference between 20. ouch pairs

The professor reposted tho test à year laten with 13 of the same pairs. The slephant chose correctly k nearly every case, thereby proving, concktwively that of lon bản bị cho l characteristics of Cthie-splendidi tenka) is true. It never foretag

DAVID ATTENBOROUGH

London Express Service).

12