London, May 25, With regard to the Italian claim that the British naval forces at Crete have been forced to retire to their bates, it is pointed cut in authoritative quarters in London that this is obviously just one more of a crop of rumours put out by the enemy in the past 48 hours in the hope of eliciting information as to the situation in Crete, and there is no intention to fall into this trap by making any com-
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.