Not If but When

The only question about Sir Winston Churchill's retirement now seems to be when. His doctors are urging him to quit. So is Lady Churchill. As Parliament reassembled last week, Tory M.P. Cyril Osborne told his constituents: "Nobody knows when it will come, but many think it will be when the Queen comes home." One of the Queen's first engagements, on her return in mid-May, is to install Sir Winston as Knight of the Garter in St. George's Chapel at Windsor. By that time, with the Berlin Conference over, there may be some indication whether the old warrior has failed, or has hopes of succeeding, in his final ambition to help secure "a sure and lasting peace."

A mid-May date would gratify another Churchill wish: to see his political heir, Anthony Eden, inherit his mantle while Churchill himself is still active. Threatened by a barrage of strikes from increasingly restive British labor, many Tory strategists are arguing that it is better to risk a general election this fall, when they can count on the help of Churchill's prestige and Chancellor of the Exchequer "Rab" Butler's economic achievements, than wait until further trouble piles up.

Now in his 80th year, Churchill rests much and often. He has given up much of his reading, and now has precis read to him. He can still rise to an occasion, be agile and penetrating in his brief appearances in the House of Commons. But those occasions are now rarer, and he must save up his resources against them.

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