LONDON TOPICS

Evening Star, Issue 21286, 15 December 1932, Page 5

LONDON TOPICS

CONFUSED ECONOMICS [Frou Our Correspondent.] October 27. Two university professors and Mr J. M. Keynes are amongst tho six distinguished economists who have issued a manifesto against economy. These experts are thinking mainly of private economies, though they by no means exclude municipal, and are certainly right in arguing that constriction of personal spending, multiplied over tho whole community, disastrously intensifies the economic depression. What they overlook is that so long as public expenditure extorts one-third of the nation’s steadily dwindling private income, a corresponding restriction of private spending must occur. That is just what is now happening, and it is that economic stranglehold which is, with increasing rapidity, equeezing the life out of Hhis country. Had our overhead, costs been kept down rigorously on other matters, wo might now have had a margin not only for adequate public expenditure on unemployment, but tor vitalising private expenditure, too. BOLSHEVIK CRACKS, We are now getting tho truth about tho recent ostracism of Zinovieff and other prominent Moscow personalities from the Communist pale. These worthies, some of them trusted henchmen of Lenin, urged that capitalist brains should be called in, along with capitalist methods, to salvage Russia’s Five Year Plan factories. This is the first inside information the world has got from Russia as to the real progress of that ambitious scheme. In many cases, at huge cost, the necessary mechanical framework has been assembled and the hands conscripted, but the colossal machinery to function rightly. Moscow’s commissars are discovering that extreme politics and iron tyranny are not adequate substitutes for business gumption and sound practical methods. Moscow is rather like the man who tried to kill alcoholic rats with an imaginary mongoose. WHAT RUBBISH! We are told the saddest day in the late Prince Blucher’s life was the day war was declared between England and Germany. This is brought out in his memoirs, by Evelyn Princess 'Blucher and Major Chapman-Huston, just published by John Murray. The Prince was tho eldest great-great-grandson of Wellington’s Blucher, the Waterloo field marshal, and Prince Blucher had after the revolution to sell the Berlin palace given to his illustrious ancestor by the German people after Waterloo. He married an English lady, whose family lived near Liverpool, and was himself a Stonyhurst _ boy. There was nothing of the Prussian Junker about him. He was both a fine gentleman and a fine sportsman. I wonder will his authentic memoirs undo one historic lie? When his famous ancestor was in London an English friend took him to the top of the monument, and enthused about the view over London. The grim old field marshalj who saw little but London fog, exclaimed: “ Was fur plunder!” Which does not moan “What a city to plunder!” but merely “ What Tommy Rot!” Prince Blucher gives us one arresting peep at the British Foreign Office from inside.. About 1900 . someone brought the Prince and a. friend a proposal to form a syndicate in South Africa to

build a railway in Angola. The Prince got an introduction to Sir Frank Bertie, then Assistant Under-Secretary for Foreign Affairs. His reason for doing so was that German and British jealousies in Africa were acute, , and he desired to proceed with caution. “ Bertie was perfectly charming, but rather outraged my German mind by starting off with ‘ My dear fellow, do tell me where is the darn’d country you are interested in.’ He then dropped the subject and started telling me funny stories. The consummate ease with which British diplomats carry off this sort of diplomacy completely flummoxes the ordinary foreigner. I had a most pleasant visit to the F. 0., but what Bertie thought of my scheme or me. I have no notion to this day.” OUR DANDY ARMY. Are our War Office brass hats bent on having a dandy army Some time ago they started issuing safety razors instead of the old manly ones to all recruits. Now the British soldier is to wear a lighter and smarter boot, and keep it, polished instead of merely greased.' The now, boots are nearly a quarter of a pound lighter, which must, combined with polish instead of grease, considerably reduce their hard-wearing durability. Mr Atkins may like the smarter footwear, but the polishing is a snag. It will add one more terror to the ordeal of company inspection. The news may, however, be welcomed at Geneva, it surely indicates that the War Office expects more parading than fighting in the near future. The old Army boots were none too stout for real campaigning pui'poses. A light ungreased boot will not stand much heavy marching in damp conditions. So the War Office’s move, even if pacific, is not economic. TRAFALGAR. It is almost incredible that a photograph exists of anyone who fought at Trafalgar. But the United Service Museum in Whitehall has one of Boon, the stout A. 8., who hoisted Nelson’s signal on the Victox’y before the battle on October 21, 1805. It was taken, of course, over half a century later. Originally the immortal signal ran “ Nelson confides,” but was changed, on the suggestion of Nelson’s flag-lieutenant, Pasco, to “ England expects ” as being easier to send. It was recognised on the Victoi’y’s quarter-deck, however, that the amended version was far more dramatically impressive. Trafalgar must be the most mispronounced word in English history. It should, of course, be accented on the first and last, not the second, syllable. A popular song must be blamed for that fact. ‘ ’Twas in Trafalgar Bay with the correct accentuation of Trafalgar—would be a sheer impossibility. It %vas Nelson himself who first used the phrase “ Nelson Touch,” which has since become a cliche. 11 I am anxious to join the Fleet,” he wrote in a letter to Lady Hamilton, ‘‘ for it would add to my grief if any other man was to give

them "the Nelson touch, which, ,as we say, is warranted never to fail.” There is a sublime and dauntless egoism in that sentiment that is characteristic of Nelson. The United Service Museum has another letter, also addressed to the beautiful platinum blonde whose portrait is the most popular exhibit in our National Portrait Gallery, in which Nelson describes his attempts to coax the French fleet away from their harbour anchorage and into a sea action. ‘‘ Hut they would sooner bo damned,” wrote Nelson, “ than let ns catch them five miles from their own forts.” I wonder how “ the Nelson Touch ” would have worked at Jutland? AUTOCRAT OF MONTE CARLO. M. Rene Leon, about whom we have recently heard so much in connection with sweepstake rumours, is director of the company that runs the Monte Carlo Casino. Ho is the son of a wealthy French father, who left his wife a widow with a young son, and thereby spoilt M. Leon’s youthful plan of becoming a doctor of medicine. He wont into banking, and drifted to New York, where he was when the maelstrom of the Great War caught him into its eddies. He was a real front-line soldier, in the sky blue uniform and steel helmet of the French army, all through that business, until ho was badly knocked over in front of Arras. M. Leon, who has a moustache of regulation R.S.M. red,_ is a thoroughly businesslike personality, but his important association with the Kingdom of Monaco. with its Alice in Wonderland politics and economics, compels him to take romantic views of life. Ho has been the target of an assassin’s pistol, and always travels “ heeled ” now. LORD BYNG. I have been delighted to find, amongst ex-service men of the humble " other ranks” variety, bow much satisfaction Lord Byng’s promotion as Field Marshal has given. The Third Army Commander on the old western front was perhaps the most genuinely popular of. tbo lot with the men in the trenches. They put great trust in his capacity as a soldier, but most of all liked bim for his fine manners. These Lord Byng combined with the oldest imaginable clothes. Ho used to roam around the lines attired in a wretched old khaki suit, with the fewest possible insignias of rank, and usually an equally old mackintosh. He smoked a pipe, hut a tiny affair that held little more than a cigarette’s tobacco. I once saw Lord Byng show a panicky, sergeant how to manage a frightened horse without either cursing or kicking it. This little demonstration was given with calm finesse under intensive shell fire. A HAPPY ENDING. The curtain rings down on the Newchwang kidnapping drama to quite a conventionally happy ending. The two high-spirited if somewhat slangy young people who were the victims of the Chinese carpenter-bandit chief have been restored to their friends and their relations apparently little the worse for wear. It is stated that they have even put on weight during captivity. This is not to be wondered at if it is true that their diet consisted of chickens, eggs, pancakes, and macaroni. These earslitting Chinese brigands “ do ” their victims rather well. In fact, we gather that on closer acquaintance the brigands improved a good deal, and that the parting between them and their victims was almost melodramatically cordial. Lest other enterprising Chinese bo tempted to make easy money the same way we are told that 'the source of the £13,000 ransom is to remain a secret. It is no secret to Fleet street. The drama has ah eminently practical “ copyright ” side to it. OLD-FASHIONED. Four young gentlemen with patrician connections and two of them holding commissions in the Army or the Navy have been fined for obstruction in the West End. As a matter of blunt fact, they had been celebrating at a bachelor party, and, after refusing not to sing a chorus in a West End music hall, were thrown out by the janitor in the good old way. This episode rather surprises me. I can imagine their respec-

tivc c.o.s gravely admonishing them for being old-fashioned. Not since the war have I seen or heard of any music hall “chucking out’’ operations in London otherwise than on a ’varsity night. And even then it has been a fare and mild case. Time was when to be tlu-own out of tho old Empire by a brawny doorkeeper, who was as blase about tho business as a stoker is about coaling, was a recognised ritual, and enjoyed the most distinguished patronage. But times have changed. Nowadays it simply “ isn’t done.” NEW BRIDGE LAWS. We aro now to have revised contract bridge laws, drafted with international agreement, by a sort of cards League of Nations. How much more sensibly and reasonably, by the way, card experts come to their international pacts' than do the illustrious diplomats who frequent the lobbies at Geneva. The main interest in the revised rules centres in whatever modification is made in the relative penalties for an overcall, as demonstrated by the result in actual tricks made, when a partnership is and is not vulnerable. It is pretty generally agreed that the existing penalties press too severely on the side that has got a game and is vulnerable, and give far too much latitude to the non-vulnerable side for cheap flagflying to save the rubber. I hear the existing penalty in the latter case is to be more steeply graded. All the old fogies are fiercely expecting, however, that the new laws will kill the so-called “ psychic ” bid. I venture to predict that nothing of the sort will happen, and, further, that if it did the game of contract would very soon cease to interest card players. Some modern contact bridge disciples appear to want to see the game reduced to an exact mathematical science with an exhaustive system of infallible, signals. Such conditions reduce contract bridge to a cast iron formula about as interesting as pitch-and-toss and with just about as much fiuesse._ Nothing amuses me more than the blithe way a couple of experts, adopting purely opportunist methods, crumple up classic exponents of the “ system ” bidding when it comes to a real gamble. Mr Culbertson must occasionally smile at his own neophytes. BOOKIE’S LAMENT. I came across a bookie to-day who had a real grievance. Last week he attended one of tho race meetings in his professional capacity, and was approached by a lady who wanted to put 2s each way on a comparative outsider. She tendered a live-pound note in payment. “Do you expect me to take four shillings out of that?” he asked rather ruefully. The lady hesitated for a moment. “ Oh, well, it doesn’t matter,” she said, “ make it two pounds ten shillings each way.” As the horse was returned a winner half an hour later at odds of 100 to 6 the bookie had bitter occasion to regret making what he called a “ spot of bother about the change. Women, he told me, are betting more and more each year. According to him they’ are extraordinarily clover at it. He did not pretend to know whore they got their information, but spoke ominously of tho bookies being forced before long to shorten the odds.