"Names make news." Last week the following names made the following news:

George V. A motor ambulance suitable for transporting His Majesty to the Sussex seaside where he will recuperate (TIME, Feb. 4) was driven into the courtyard of Buckingham Palace, last week, and later the Royal physicians announced that they had "thoroughly tested its suitability."

Paul von Hindenburg, President of Germany, eyed last week, for the first time in his life, a cinema. It was shown for his especial benefit at the censor's office. Its name was Waterloo. President von Hindenburg asked whether anyone had been hurt in the filming of the battle scenes, smiled when reassured there were no real casualties.

Carl Sandburg, prairie poet, said last week in San Francisco: "I shall not inflict another volume of poetry upon the egg-headed American public until 1932, and maybe not until 1935."

Mrs. Evangeline Lodge Lindbergh, who has been teaching chemistry at the Woman's College in Constantinople the past semester, received last fortnight from the Turkish Aviation League a medal, with instructions to take it home and give it to her son, Col. Charles Augustus Lindbergh. Medal in luggage, she headed for the U. S. Colonel Thomas Edward ("Revolt in the Desert") Lawrence, Great Britain's most celebrated spy, reputed kinsman of George Bernard Shaw, arrived at Plymouth, England, last week from India, having traveled third class under his favorite alias, "Private Shaw." In the House of Commons the Government parried questions as to whether Colonel Lawrence had fomented the revolt against King Amanullah of Afghanistan (TIME, Jan. 28). Admissions that he had been stationed at Peshawar, India, on the Afghan border, were coupled with the lame assertion that "Lawrence was granted no leave of absence from his duties as a private in the Royal Air Force." As everyone knows, British R. A. F. planes are constantly operating over Afghanistan.

Winifred Lenihan, Theatre Guild actress (Joan of Arc, Major Barbara), went to court last week to defend her right to put a baby and some clothing on the balcony of her Manhattan apartment. Her landlords, the Turtle Bay Holding Co. Inc., testified: 1) that she erected the balcony in violation of her lease; 2) that the presence of the baby and clothing on the balcony annoyed the neighbors.

Miss Lenihan said she did not want to appear "sentimental" about fresh air and a baby, but stood on her renter's rights. The baby, not her child, is the son of her second cousin.

Major and Mrs. Frederic McLaughlin, of Chicago, stepped on a dance-floor at Phoenix, Ariz., but soon stepped off again. Reason: a marathon dance was in progress and the competitors, watching Mrs. McLaughlin (Irene Castle), felt tired, nettled. Mercedes Gleitz, 28, onetime London typist, English Channel swimmer,* last week broke her engagement to Private William Farrance of the British Army, whom she had met by mail. Said she: "I have thought the matter over and feel convinced that I shall never be able to settle clown as a wife until I have successfully swum the Irish Channel, the Wash, and the Hellespont. What is the use of letting a man make a home for me when in my thoughts the sea spells 'home, sweet home to me?"

Louis B. Mayer, general manager of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Corp. (motion pictures), announced last week that President-Elect Hoover had offered him the portfolio of Ambassador to Turkey, but that he had not yet made up his mind whether to accept. The eyes of Newton Booth Tarkington, author (Penrod, etc.), were operated upon last fortnight at Johns Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, by Dr. William Holland Wilmer. Last week the operation was pronounced a success. Author Tarkington went home to Indianapolis. Thomas Pryor Gore, onetime Senator from Oklahoma, sailed with his wife on the Hamburg-American liner New York for a 70-day cruise in the Mediterranean. Blind, he said: "Of course, the impressions on the senses will not be so complete with me, but I believe the impressions on my mind will be sharper, more clearly defined, than those of other persons. ... I want to stand in Carthage where Hannibal stood. I want to stand where the great figures of Caesar and Anthony stood. And in Athens I would be where Demosthenes delivered his speeches against Philip of Macedon. And then, in the Holy Land, I will seek out Gethsemane and Bethlehem." When eight years old, Mr. Gore lost one eye on being hit with a playmate's stick. Three years later, his other eye was put out by a swift-flying arrow. There is a blind man in the present Senate--Thomas David Schall of Minnesota, whose constant companions are his wife and a huge police dog named Lux. Nathan Straus, merchant (onetime partner in R. H. Macy & Co., Manhattan department store) and philanthropist, celebrated last week his 81st birthday by issuing, through the Jewish Tribune, the following proclamation: "My message to America is one of 'Shalom'--Peace. I rejoice . . . [in] the Kellogg Treaty. . . ."

*Oct. 7, 1927, Miss Gleitz swam from Cape Gris-Nez, France, to a point between South Foreland and St. Margaret's Bay, England, in 15 hrs., 15 min.