London, Oct. 9.
Royalty naturally takes the lead to-day for it is the second birthday of Prince Edward, son of the Duke and Duchess of Kent, and the King and Queen and their' daughters will be back from Balmoral early next week, Prince Edward's photograph is in all the papers to-day. Even if he were not a prince he would at once attract attention as a lovely child, with very sturdy legs and arms, fair curly hair and good features: also his expression suggests that the stories of his lovable disposition are really true, His sister Princess Alexandra also promises to be a beautiful girl. But after all the Duke of Kent has decided claims to be called handsome and his Duchess is simply lovely, Royal Holidays The King and Queen had nearly 10 weeks in Scotland and after the Coronation they surely deserved it. They took life very quietly, the King doing some stalking and grouseshooting, the Queen and her daughters just "playing round." Sometimes all four would go off for a picnic in the heather, There is of course always a Minister in attendance, and State duties can never wholly be put aside, - But "it was a real holiday with no big house parties, and only the weekly gauntlet of ' publicity, through hundreds and hundreds of tourists when the royal family went to church.
Now the "little season" gets into full swing, the weather is soft and lovely, the shops look animated again, the traffic has so swelled that in the chief streets walking is really quicker? than driving. It is curious how mich emptier the streets are, not any of private cars but of lorries, when London is empty in the social sense, perhaps because the amusements of the rich make work for the lorries; so that the, rich have their uses, after all. I notice an enormous number of silver fox furs about, no doubt from the increasing number of fox farms, It seems a Labour, is circularizing thousands of wives in working class homes, with a long list of questions to show exactly what it costs them to live. They are asked to enter up how much tea, sugar, cocoa, bacon, eggs, flour and currants they use per week; how much they spend on sweets, ale, wine, fish and chips, pease pudding (is there really such a thing outside the nursery rhyme? dog licences, subscriptions to burial societies and hairdressing, besides other things too numerous to mention.
But how many wives, working-cla: or otherwise, could give any accurate answer? The luckiest wife, perhaps, is she who gets a weekly allowance and, mikes it go as far as she can. Others get what they can and do the same, Others run up bills and trust to luck with the street-corner bookie to pay them off. In any case to remember at the end of the week how music suffers from too much intellectuality and melody is decidedly at a discount, a return to Grieg's limpid and unpremeditated tunes is very welcome, and rather significant, Distinguished Women What a lot of remarkable things women do now. I have been reading this week of two girls, Miss Pauline Gower, daughter of an M.P., and Miss Dorothy Spicer who have set up as professional aviatrixes. They began their training in 1929, and two years later"joined forces to buy an aeroplane and go round the country with a small travelling circus, taking people up for joy rides. Three years later they started a circus of their own and made it pay. Extending their studies Miss Gower has passed examinations as a navigator, in radio-telephony and in "blind flying," while Miss Spicer is the only woman shame to breed these beautiful creatures merely in order to kill them for their coats.
Christmas Turkeys
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.