From ‘The Military Situation’, The Spectator, 13 March 1915: How does the war look as a whole? The best way to answer this question is to consider it from the point of view of some perfectly impartial person living in Germany, but with intellect and judgment unaffected by any patriotic emotions. What would such a person
From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 13 March 1915: The more the operations at the Dardanelles are considered the more clearly is their vast importance realized. If in co-operation with the Russian Fleet from the Black Sea we succeed in taking possession of what remains of Turkey in Europe, including the great fortress of
From ‘News of the Week’, The Spectator, 6 March 1915: The great German campaign against our shipping, under which we were to be cut off from all human aid and every merchant ship that dared to approach our ports torpedoed and sunk, has ended in what can only be called an amazing fiasco. In the
From ‘Lord Kitchener’, The Spectator, 6 March 1915: We are grateful to Lord Kitchener because at the very beginning of the war he formed what Mr. Bonar Law calls “a gigantic conception,” not only of the military needs of the nation, but of our ability to meet those needs. Other men and lesser men, even
From ‘The “Willing” Badge’, The Spectator, 6 March 1915: A final ground for giving badges to those who have offered themselves and been rejected must be mentioned. Under any scheme for the presentation of badges a register should be kept giving in general terms the ground on which each man was rejected—namely, medical reasons, such
‘The rise of the machines is more prosaic than I expected.’
‘It’s so wonderful you’re buying me an engagement ring, but why do we need a getaway driver?’
‘Oh my God! There’s some sort of major incident going on around here somewhere.’
‘I love you, darling, but I’m leaving you for another piece of wreckage.’
‘Social network sites have made it so much easier to lure sailors to their doom.’
‘They’re called that because historically they had news in them.’
‘Darling, there’s an elephant in the womb.’
‘You may now kill the bride.’
‘What colour is this dress?’
‘It’s that flasher again — pretend we haven’t noticed him.’
A disaster for unionists Sir: I share Alex Massie’s view that ‘this election is going to be a disaster’ for us unionists (‘Divided we fall’, 28 February). It is almost too painful to recall that it will mark the 60th anniversary of a great victory in May 1955 when the Tories, standing as Scottish Unionists,