Dowry for the Duchess

Sir:

Well, if we're going to give a billion dollars to the English, we should get something for our money. I suggest we give it to the Duchess of Windsor and let Elizabeth ask her for it.

LOUISE KEAGY Fort Lauderdale, Fla.

Friendly Remarks

Sir:

The article of Sir William Haley's, published in his London Times [Dec. 10], warms the cockles of my heart. It is like a kindly message from an old and true but not oft-heard-from friend.

GRACE HEBENSTREIT Alexandria, Va.

Sir:

If a man from a fine country like England gives us ideals to aim for, it simply indicates that the breed of men like this must spread all over the world to raise the whole brotherhood of man everywhere.

GEORGE W. WEIFORD JR. Medford Lakes, N.J.

Man from India

Sir:

I was deeply moved by your very accurate portrayal of a brilliant orator and a clear-sighted statesman--our Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru--in TIME, July 30. I assure you that he is not conditioned by any ism. Nehru is the most effective opponent of Communism in Asia.

H. P. GUPTA Bombay

Sir:

Mr. Nehru's tortuous attempts at dissecting and analyzing and describing and explaining the Hungarian struggle for freedom form a curious contrast to the simple, spontaneous, human reaction of the rest of the world.

C. KUNJU Rome

The Chef of SHAPE

Sir:

I noticed reference was made in the Dec. 17 issue to President Eisenhower's cooking by his sister-in-law, Mrs. Edgar Eisenhower, of Tacoma, Wash., who said: "I know the President's cooking is all bluff. He turns the knob on high, burns it to a crisp, and that's all." I beg to disagree.

For a number of years I was chef de cuisine to General Eisenhower when he was SHAPE commander, residing at the Trianon Palace in Versailles. It was always a great pleasure to cook for him as he had a tremendous knowledge of the French cuisine, and really knew how to appreciate what was served to him. Whenever he did his own cooking in one of the private kitchens, he would send someone to me for the necessary ingredients. I could tell, simply from what he asked for, that General Eisenhower, in addition to his great intellectual knowledge of cooking, also had the ability to produce an unusually fine meal.

EUGENE LERCH Chef des Cuisines Hotel George V Paris

Person to Parson

Sir:

After reading your Dec. 10 article on "Recorded Solace," I experienced a vision of the future. Mr. Smith, a successful young business executive, rises in the morning and mutters to his wife: "Well, dear, I've got a big deal on the fire today--I'd better 'Dial-a-Prayer' for some help." After his spiritual Adrenalin shot, Mr. Smith charges off in search of the Almighty Dollar, feeling like Sir Galahad in quest of the Holy Grail. I have yet to decide whether the situation is ludicrous or pathetic.

GEORGE G. EVANS Waukegan, Ill.

Sir:

Automation in religion, or "Dial-a-prayer," is just another step to armchair solitude--a definite trend in today's more-time-to-do-nothing philosophy. What's left? We've got drive-in church services, telephone prayers and one-minute sermonettes. We wonder who will be the first to use a punch-card system of tabulating offerings. This is all very fine--until it starts taking the place of getting up early on Sunday morning.

CURTNER B. AKIN JR. Sewickley, Pa.

In Pursuit of Peace

Sir:

Congratulations on your fine article [Dec. 17] on Christian Herter. He has shown his leadership ability throughout his political career; as Under Secretary of State, I am sure he will fulfill his dream to achieve a position in which he can effectively work for peace.

ED CONDICT Lakewood, Ohio

Sir:

Why should a good man like Chris Herter waste his life in the pursuit of world peace? The proper aim of any man should be the determination to seek right--peace is the fruit of right. Let us forget about the illusory goal of world peace. We can never have it as a prize in itself.

JOHN R. STEVENSON Burns, Wyo.

North & South

Sir:

My daughter is being taught third-year Latin, and taught well, by a Negro instructor in her private boarding school here in the North. I have dined at this instructor's table in the school dining room and enjoyed discussing Terence, Plautus and Catullus with him. Perhaps you would care to let the Southern segregationists hear of this.

BURKE BOYCE Vail's Gate, N.Y.

Sir:

You people up North don't learn much from the lessons of history. At the close of the Civil War, while the South was broke and helpless, you kept an army of occupation here for twelve years trying to force a free intermingling of the races. You couldn't do it then. Why do you think you can do it now?

J. E. JOHNSON Conroe, Texas

Insanity in Court

Sir:

It was with some satisfaction that I noted the recent commutation of the impending death sentence for Slayer Kenneth Chapin [Dec. 10]. Perhaps, with luck, after a few years someone will judge him legally sane again, and he'll be released, if he hasn't in an inadvertent lapse killed an inmate or an attendant.

VERNON AHMADJIAN Boston

Sir:

That the council accepted Dr. Fredric Wertham's judgment, disregarding the findings of the eight other independent experts, suggests, more, that Wertham would do well on the New York stage or in the role of defense attorney than that real understanding or truth has been arrived at in Chapin's diagnosis.

VICTOR B. CLINE Fort Ord, Calif.

Sir:

Your article on the Chapin pardon was a true picture of public feeling here. We were shocked. Two blameless lives sacrificed to a sadist's crime . . .

CORNELIUS G. COTTER West Roxbury, Mass.

Piggyback Ride

Sir:

No tears for truckers over railway piggyback inroads [Dec. 10]. No business is so pampered as trucking. The railroads, however, are being put out of business by strangling regulations, confiscatory taxation and subsidized air, barge, bus and truck competition. It is the railroads, America's first line of defense transportation, that are in peril.

ARTHUR H. ROGOFF Long Island City, N.Y.

Sir:

Late as piggybacking has come into being, its continued growth should eventually result in multimillions of savings to taxpayers who otherwise will have to provide soaring sums for bigger superhighways for trucks.

JOHN C. OTTINGER JR. Westport, Conn.

Moppets in the Mails

Sir:

Re your Dec. 17 article "The Delinquent Teachers": please add harassed parents to the list of long-suffering chambers of commerce, corporations and tourist bureaus which would like to staunch the flow of booklet-type assignments by teachers. In the elementary grades particularly, these booklets must be liberally laced with pictures to be acceptable. Pupil A must have as many (or more) pictures as pupil B, or pupil A's booklet won't stand a chance of being displayed on the wall.

F. O. DEEMER Washington, D.C.

Sir:

One small fry in California implored us to send him the governor to help give a "crucial" class report on New Jersey; another sought a jar of soil from the banks of the Delaware where Washington crossed. Our alltime favorite came from a little wiseacre in The Bronx:

"Dear Men: Send me samples of New Jersey's most famous products.--Love and Kisses, Mike. P.S. My father says mosquitoes are New Jersey's most famous product."

JAMES E. CRYAN Trenton Chamber of Commerce Trenton, N.J.

Sir:

Current public interest in medicine, its techniques and advances, has trickled down even unto youngsters in the third and fourth grades, and I can daily produce a fistful of (usually frantic) letters requesting "all you known (sic) about Rh, blood plasma, hypothermia and 'that blue-baby' operation."

RICHARD C. THOMPSON Assistant Director of Public Relations The Johns Hopkins Medical Institutions Baltimore

Sir:

Would you please send me some mineral samples as I am a boy scout and need to have some.

FRED VESTEA New York City

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