Welsh Journals

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for he has an established transatlantic market. Indeed, of our premier professional writer's hundred-odd collected short stories, I, too, rate 'The Wedding at the Lion', tops, one of the best comic stories written in the twentieth century. It will be passed round from hand to hand. We hope to publish more illustra- tions by well-known artists in future issues. As I write I see one of Wales's' Tory M P subscribers has been flutter- ing the dovecotes of Printing House Square-that hundred yards or so of built-up brick just behind my office- window in Carter Lane. The Times has been known to err- even in leading articles-when it deigns to set before us its views on Welsh affairs, though sometimes its readers in the Principality don't seem to bother to point out the factual inaccuracies in Haley's comets. At any rate, they do not appear in print. But on the language question the Times is sound and space is readily available in the correspondence columns for the free expression of readers' views. My old and gifted friend, the painter and writer David Jones writes from his home in Harrow-on-the-Hill in the Times of August 20th. 'The Latin tradition of theWestern Church is not without consequence even for those of us who have vir- tually no Latin. So also with that most ancient of our island deposits, the speech-forms of Wales. We may, by all sorts of accidents, be ignorant of that language; but even to compre- hend a little of its ethos, and to under- stand its place in history and mythus, is something. I should have thought that ordinary pietas asked that much. Especially considering how very bleak is the prospect of that tradition in face of the civilizional pressures of our present-day technocracy.' David Jones concludes by saying that Miss Valerie Price is to be greatly thanked for the historical awareness and cogency of her letter of a few days previously, Miss Price, who lives in that stronghold. Cwmllynfell (West Wales), always pleads with reason and urgency for the inalienable rights of Wales, so haunted with pagan tribal magic and post-Christian problems. That's the spirit! Another correspondent quotes Dr Johnson during his tour of the Hebrides: 'I am always sorry when any language is lost, because languages are the pedi- grees of nations.' Bravo L C C AUTHORITY-in the shape of the Ministry of Education-is behind the new impetus in language teaching felt throughout the country. But nowhere has more fervour been shown lately than among the London-Welsh. Now, with the perfectly willing co-operation of the London County Council, an infant class (tiny tots aged 5-6) starts at the modem-looking Hungerford pri- mary school, Islington, N.7 from Sep- tember 8. This experimental class of 30 is already full and disappointed parents are clamouring for an extension of these pioneering educational facilities.