1947-12-06 — Page 6

I CALL THIS A WASTE OF

YOUR MONEY

LONDON.

Such a zum surely needs a justifica-{ OME details of how Bri- tion of the highest milénal urgency tain is spending public at a time when the country is cutting own vital imports of food and rew terials, when newspapers have to reduce their size to four pages In order to save £1,000,000 worth of newsprint dollars.

money on entertaining "good will" visitors from abroad has come into my handa.

They show that, however austerity-minded we may have fo be in other departments, ap- parently when it comes to hos- pitality and culture we are lavishness itself

The startling sum of £434 6s, 63. was spent on entertaining six Greek nurses who camo to Britain.

The European tour of the Sadler's Wells Ballet

cost us £20,000.

company

But what dismays me about the British Council in

Just the not woollow of their spending. It is the woolliness of their whole attitude. They have no clear Iden of what they |

re trying to do.

I asked Mr, Shreeve what the chicctive of the British Council was. He said it was "to push British culture as far as we can.

1 arker whether the British Council had ever tried to clarify them out in what might be called a General Diree- tive, stating the longterm and short- term objectives of the British Councilf and the methods by which they mean An Argentine poetess named to attain them, Victoria Ocampo, who

on her

No, he said, they have never work- arrival here announced shed out such a document. All they wanted to get in touch with the ud was the charter. But he felt they ought to have such a directive, It was common people of Britain, was a splendid idea. He linked me for put up in a suite at Claridge's. my constructive criticism, Private hire cars were engaged as Mr Shreeve whether

Comell frept any kind

Britiall

the

at public expense to carry her record of what happened to all these around. She was lunched and tors they entertained, What, for

Sefton Delmer's NEWSMAP

dined and weeks,

wined for eight stance, hud the poeters done after?

ber departure from Claridge's%

Mr. Shreeve did not know. But

She was taken

to theatres, to thought it a lenti ide Bouquets of orchids were pre- they ought really to keep a record.

sented. The cost? My infornia- tion said £800,

But when I went to discuss this and other items with the British Council, the authority sponsoring this hospitality. I gathered that £800 was only a partial figure.

Tell them

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Mern Christmas Debartment

What happens next

in Palestine?

W

ILL the Arabs fight if

the United Nations at- tempt to impose the

partition of Palestine?

by MAJOR-GENERAL SIR EDWARD SPEARS, British Minister in Syria and the Lebanon, 1942-44

For obvious reasons, Zionists.

Would the people of Kent; and whisper down the thousand their neighbours in Sussex and Essex, channels of their propaganda neerpt this? that they will not

Of course they would not, any more than the neighbouring Arab As far as the British people States will tolerate such a state of Do not blame the officials of the fare concerned, they have made affairs in Palestine.

no up their minds. They require check-up on the resutis of their no evocation of future catas- wurk.

11

British Council for having

Leth

entertainment

have you Mr J. 11. Shreeve, a middle-aged

allowance of £89,000 for hospitality (0 visitors overseas, plus another civil servant with a high record of

£64,000 for general entertainment efficient public service who has re- cently become a Deputy Director (these are Mr Shreeve's figures) for

sucti General

vaguely defined the

purposes Council, Su Brition

"furthering

international

under laughed incredulously when I told

or "promoting a "better standing" bim about the expensive poetess.

comprehension of British culture, no doubt any cocktail party could be made to fit these objectives,

ol

"Don't tell me!" DESPITE the cautious altitude of pobile relations officer Paul Red, he rang down to the accounts department and asked for the figures,

33

But I am surprised at the Foreign

out of whose funds

comes Office,

£2,500,000 of the total £3,500,000. I belleve that if the Foreign Ollee and the Treasury were to insist on clear directives, they would

trophes to confirm their support of the Government in its stated resolve to evacuate Palestine.

They are utterly opposed to the sacrifice of a single soldier's life or the expenditure of an other pound to establish Jewish State.

Fight for land

Right of peoples

liory with turbulent populations, and could not be denuded or troops without risk.

The Ane Iraqi Army is sepurated from its objective by great distances and could send only a comparatively small contingent to Palestine.

The Transjordan Army is absolute- ly first-class, but not very numerous. The action its ruler may take hus not

I may be he intends only to oc- cupy the purely Arab part of Pales- ting, which might embroll him with his neighbours.

THE United Nations Committee's been made clear.

proposals are even more fantos- tie than this enalogy suggests,

Violating, in the Arab view, the most fundamental right of peoples to committee, their own country, the taking no account of the claken of the Arabs to land they have inhabited

Egypt is apparently undecided, wishing to lead the Arab World with- a fer longer than the English have out undertaking the leading part in

been in England, have apportioned defending Arab Palestine. the greater and larger part of Pales- line to the Jews.

They propose to include in the Jewish State some two-thirds of its

total area, both its ports, most of its invital water supplies, and most of the

aptations. Arab as well as the Jewish citrus

When he got them he sighed into

ONIST propaganda is utter findly misleading in this the house telephone: "Don't tell me any mare,"

put down the very quickly that the functions of and

the British Council, in so far as they stance, as it has so often beea "You were receiver.

quite right,"

are relevant to British Interests at in others. he said, turning to me. "I cost

all, could be taken over by the News even gore,"

"How much was it?" I asked. Me Department of the Foreign

-and its Shreeve said:

hundred

Olivers abroad. pound

Nine

You know," he went on, trenes. South Americans are always expon- sive. They are accustomed lu thelr

a countries to having everything I'

In the shop window, and you just have to do them well."

The expense account of the poetess Mr Sarreve Fast time was the

the figures on the house

checked

telephone, When

Omce The Arabs, and not only those network of Information of Palestine, will certainly fight

A better

if an attempt is made to enforce partition

Its population would be 403,000 Jews, and 505,000 Arabs (9 percent. of the Jewa and 45 percent. of the Arabs in all Palestine),

And as there are 100,000 Jews in cause

Tel-Aviv, the Arabs would out- the Government has foreign They will do so for exactly number the Jews by three to two in the whole of the Jewish State outside currency to spare for political the

as would the urban areas. purposer abrand.

in similar circum- Intelli-Britons see it given to the rather gence Services.

I wondd much

I am told the Intelligence Services are being made to cut down their

Bame reasons

stances.

Imagine that after the 1914 war but the case of a sanitary allocations by the same ten percent. we had offered the Jews a National inspector from Gambla before him which has been ordered for theone in Kent instead of imposing, the recount ontained an item of Council.

1

the cover

cost of warm Sherva wald

Therefore. I say, cut

Argentine

them on the Arabs of Palestine. £30 to winter clothing-Mr

Suppose

settled that they had that in his view such expenditure pactesses off our payroll. No more would be in order ton grounds of money for orchids at our expense. there in such numbers thut 25 years humanity."

Let us give any cash we can spare later, having become a third of the Mr Red, not Mr Sreeve, dealt to our eyes and cars if we don't population, they claimed that Kent should become a Jewish State, but aced it for our mouths.

waffle were prepared as a great concession And They had been working very hard about "pushing British culture as to be content with two-thirds of the while they were

county? said Mr Reid.

with the case of the Greek nurses, +

let us stop all this

in this country far as we can.

A dinner for four Belg'an rectors at the Ecu de France Restaurant In London, the bill for which amounted to £14 155. 5l, seemed to both of them quite in order seeing that in addition to the four Belgians there four members of the Belishi me in the party, and two other Kuests.

Mr Streeve thought well worth 20,000 to have the Sadler's Wells

Bulle! visit Warsaw and prove to A

the Poleg hat we vel n art S

Britain.

BY THE WAY

by Beachcomber

CORRESPONDENT who is deeply interested in, ballet writes to ask me if the ́enreer

"But there are two stockings." "Yes. As a matter of fact, have a cold in both legs."

No, you could not expect the of Miss Eurydice Flatt. (Irina In passing ballet tour to pay for self. They could not stay long enough in the Konsatina) was confined to the

very properly called vaunus capitals to cover their ex- one unfortunate experience I A CRITIC

attention recently to the fright- penses. He thought £20,000 would described.

ful dullness and toredam cover the difference between the takings and expenses of the tour. No, no. No, no. She made what latest experiments in crazy art. It It might, however, still turn out to is called a come-back, She was en- used to be very different. Think of

gaged again by Eugen Bulb to play the high days In Girouette, with music by Slej- hammer. choreography by and choreology by Mungo Wurst."

be a bit more.

£3,500,000

Ow, I am baly a repeter, I

NOW

Pippi,

All she had to do, as a Greno-

Is it possible to conceive that the people of Kent would necept such a slate of affairs, turned into strangers in their own country, ruled by an tirely allen race, speaking a for- sign tongue?

Worst nightmare THERE is no Arab who will accept thinks he eau'd hold his people back if Aghting starts in Palestine,

partition, not

The desert riders Saud are far away.

TF

of Xing Ibn

Middle East alarm

Sa soon as the Jews attempt to es-

UNCLE SAM'S OTHER ENGLAND

AMERICAN COMMENTARY

HAVE

by Arthur Webb

been

wandering | Thackicing': "Venity Fair."

through Essex, Middlesex, Norfolk, and Suffolk.

Despite

a fow 2015-skyscrapers and ultra-modern bulldings, there Is still a lot of the atmosphere that

I have been to Cambridge, caused Dickens to write a hundred

Brighton, Dorchester,

Win-years ago "Boston is what I would ke the whole of the United Stales to be

chester, Lynn, Chelsea

and

Hyde Park,

was, I more than

from my hotel.

21

the

But at no time ti hua slums-some ₤38 bad

there ten miles those of Liverpool-but

miny gracious houses and many gegant buildingu.

It was all quite simple..

to Boston, took a plane chusetts, to attend the

of

the Congress of Organizations.

I just

In short, Boston is a city, of con- Massa- conference trasts and contradictions. It is lon- Industrial pooned by New York, which is stolen. its overseas trade although Boston is two hundred miles nearer

Boston is the centre of the New to Europe. England of the Pilgrim Fathers.

Despite

slight differefres

some

No plan

that occurred at a little ten party way back in 1773, nobody tried to obliterate the old ties by renam-T la n city that grew, like London,

of the State of without

It plin. ing the counties Which Boston is the capital, nor elevated railway that runs under-

"traina" ground-many of s those of the outlying townships.

Just single-decker trolley trams.

Paradoxes

an

are

It is notorious for artupid, “nat-- row censorship that gives bad books INDEED, even after the Irish inilux such a boost that they become best- sellers everywhere clic in the eighty years later, Boston went United Stnics. Yet it permite strip-

names lu 113 on giving English streets-Ashford, Church, Chatham, Euston, Greenwich, Poplar, *And although Northampton, Oldham, Marlborough, Major is in prison on Federal Somract. Wallington and Windsor, charge, the State's Republican to pick a few at random.

Governor made it possible for him

tense show,

Democratic

There Is

I hardly મી Gaelic one to retain his office and contiage to

the lot.

That is one of the many para-

doxes that struck a stranger wim

nd been

told that Boston was more

had

Irish hur Dublin

And

that

draw his salary.

English acent would wart a riot. Jests And

Wandering throu the streets!!

heard

brogue.

There

Do

are

is way only occasionally one

really heavy Irish not misunderstand me.

a

Irish in Boston all right. You can

fnet them in the police and the City: Hall

Jeers

"In

afternoons," the leisurely writes a historian, "the court ladica century liked to And in the telephone book. There of the sixteenth must be some ten thousand of themeurt up with a book," Sul others presumably were content just to liated there,

curl up with some of the pages.

•

Many people who pose as foun- nothing more than little squirts.

I counted five pages of Sullivans, two and a half poges of O'Briens. two pages of O'Connells-could they all be descendants of the proliler Daniel O'Connell, the Irish states-tains of knowledge are Intellectual- man, known as the Liberator? Then there were two puges of MacCarthys, two of Mahoneys, one of O'Learys. and one of Flynns.

Some shocks

BUT what came as

WAR

cacy.

The

matron fashionably-dressed wes stopped at the church door by jan usher.

"May I see your invitation to the wedding?" he asked.

"I have none," she snapped. "Are you a friend of the groom?"" he ventured.

"Certainly not!" was the indignant "I am the bride's mother1"

a shock the suggestion that not all could claim Irish descent. Certainly more by the Arub

than a few of the two hundret States is not to be, the alterna-thousand Italians, Afty thousand tive is net pleasant.

Poles, thirty certed action

thousand Swedes, answer. twenty-five thousand Germans and twenty thousand Lithuanians who

A woman was driving her car at have sent greater Boston's popula

two millón mark.sixty miles an tion over the

hour when she Citizenship.

names when

the they sought I noticed

motorcyle policeman following. Instead of slowing down. Why only two years ago a Rus she hit seventy-then seventy-five tian immigrant even obtained per- then eighty,

to call himself Cabot! And mission that was in the face of legal action

tablish their State, the Palestinian Arabs will revolt; then, whatever the

plans or hesitations of the Arab Gov- ernments, may be, there will be an inevitable rush, growing in volume. every week, of armed men from all- over the Middle East towards Pales- tine.

Governments or kings that resist- ad would be swept away.

It may well be that in the ensuing. turmoil the Arab States may quarrel among themselves.

The Hashemite dynasty which rules Iraq and Transjordan is not on the best of terms with the formidable King of Saudi-Arabla, Ibn Saud. Palestinu

a leader who und Saudi-Arabia.

Transtordan lies between

The worst nightmare of the Arabs, is that they might become involved in armed conflict with the British.

It is good news indeed to them that the British are roing. The conflict w at least not be with us.

It has been made clear that neither

The soldiers of Ibu Saud, the handsumest, the grimmest, and the mast determined warriors I have ever seen, may dunand right of way, und as they go remember that their King lays claim to the Transjordan towns of Akkuba and Moon.

Unity may end

biandishments nor threats wi' icad JEALOUSIES will be awakened and

wars may follow.

The present unlty may evaporate; though not before every trace of a

us to accept the preposterous Ameri- can proposal that we should impose partition before we go, or the American-Russinn suggestica that our troops should play the poilceman Jewish State has disappeared from Iat the orders of a United Nations Paleatine, together, alas, with the Commitice, which could command thriving and numerous Jewish com- Brish Folders to kill Arafos, und in nuunities that have lived in prazo in turn be ked themselvis,

the Arab lands for centuries: for a wave of hatred will be started which will sweep, for and deep.

of Dadaism, that French lark. The leader boasted of the fact that their object was to make fools of the publle-and they suceceded.

They "composed" music by bang-

cannot make the British Council bloist, was to lean against a booth produce their accounts for me. Nor

In the market-place while a gen-ng the keys at random. They pro-

talked complete balderdash. In

om I a chartered accountant capable darne flirted with her. She leaned, duced plays in which the character and the booth capsized, shooting a gross of sham

One orange

We have no intention of becoming eithre the unpaid mercenaries of the United Nations, or Ben Hecht's Janis sarles.

But what will happen when we go? Probably the best solution would be that contingents, from the named forces of the Arab States should oc- eupy, Palestine as the British with- draw,

Orderly solution

Hatred of the Zionists will lead to

hatred of the Jews, then of the

Christians.

Only one State will prot: Hussia. She has only to wall.

America and oil

WIT

X/ITH Incredible filly the Ameri- cans, in the narrow pursuit of *electoral interests, have already con-/ eeded to Bussla a key to the Middle Eust

of checking the accounts if they were prosented to me.

oranges into the one play a man stoed on a ladder AN Arab committee is at present But I de urge most strongly that the orchestra-pit.

Hot and gabbled, while a black man said studying this solution. It would East, by centuries of wise diplomity. Treasury,

who have ordered

be the best means of ensuring that a ten wedged in a French horn, and the lie was Gounod. percent cut in the British Council's cold noise ensuing started a row on

order was maintained. gigantic £3,500,000 budget, should not the stage. content themselves with a routine consideration of the council's promosen| Nothing to do with me

economy cuts.

MUGGLING

They should look carefully into all dimeuit, they tell me. I is becoming is expenditure and consider scrupulously whether it la really of a man who, had a silk

moet

It was all done with great galely, the crowds who came to gape weTO

The Jewish armed forces would told quite plainly that they were probably not be so unwise as to at- faleis to be taken in by such im-tempt to fight en a wide front and pudent tricks.

would withdraw, to defend their bare round Tel-Aviv.

very hear stocking out of his breast-pocket

No wonder

wherd his handkerchief should have

91

possible to justify it as being in the sticking

public interest in the present crisis.

The Council, Mr. Shreeve Informed been.

me,

are spending £1,700,000 In The Customs official pointed to foreign currency this year. Much of it," "I have a cold,” said the travel-

this is being spent in South America,

Spain, Portugal, and other hard mur

"A cold?"

In my Ivg."

rency countries)!!

Fatty has a swelled head, after

all this talk of igures.

the

We kept Russla out of the Middle because we know that were she to gain a footing there she would

and thereforo

control, world.

That was before the days of_oil. If Russia now gains the Middle East she will control our cli. No other source can supply our needs. Eventually the Jews would have to

In Without it our ships remain accept to live

the minority they harbour and our factories close down. are, but under ample guarantees Es

the Europe will be docmod and to their safety, in Arab Palestine.

Lime United States herself may in This orderly solution, which pre- be in Jeopardy of her life. supposes a central authority obeyed Surely this is'n high price to pay by all, may well 'nót materialise.

to Bollary Zionist nspirations

and

The Lebanon has the smallest of placate the Jewish voto in Now forces: Byrla has an immezne

ter-York?.

Suddenly she' upled a petrol

and dashed

into the ladies'

by the country's oldest family, the station, pulled up in front of it, ran Cabots who had settled

before suchusetts years flower was buit.

In Mas-out the May-room.

Friendly city

centuries

are to

Ten minutes later the came out and faced the police. Without balting an eyelash, she said coyly: "I'll bet you thought I wouldn't make it."

POSTON'S aristocracy has origina Das dubious as many of our own,

Admiral Nimliz and General Mac- who after

have Arthur went fishing together. In o their legislative powers curtailed, sudden squall the boat capsized and And Boston's big fortunes, now sold the eminent fighting men were to be more than five hundred mi-floundering helplessly in the water, Hoti

when inid. pounds,

Bostoninns traded In rod und and "black Ivory" and swept the reas in Boston clipper.

were

The Admiral was dmt to reach the boat. With the aid of an oar he Anally got the General aboard.

"Now, Mac," he asutioned, "don't

Boston is a likeable, friendly city mention this to anyone. I'd be dis

the men of the Navy with many narrow, crooked streets graced if

could be duplicated round learned I can't swim." London's Cheapside. Elsewhere you "Don't worry," MacArthur ro- find architecture that is near enough plied. "Your secret La safe. I'd to Kensington to provide as it hate to have my men and out I did the settings for the film of can't walk on water."

DAVID LANGDON CARTOON

1. TOBACCON,

NO CIGARETTES

2. ACCONIST

NO CIGARETTE