GREAT BRITAIN: Tallyh o!

The Tories were in full cry, nipping the government’s heels, baying for blood. On defense, on the appointment of an American as NATO’s sea commander, on the allocation of tinplate, on Gambian chickens, the Tories swept to the attack. “Resign!” they yelled in the House of Commons when, for the second time in two weeks, the government was defeated on a minor issue: a Tory motion blaming the government for inadequate stockpiling of raw materials. The Socialists sat silent and embarrassed.

Their only score came early in the week when Winston Churchill lost his temper when interrupted in debate by Defense

Minister Eiranuel Shinwell. Said Churchill to Shinwell: “Be quiet, hold your tongue. Go and talk to the Italians. It is all you are fit to do.”

Said the Laborite Daily Herald: “If a labor member had been guilty of so indiscreet and offensive a reference to a friendly nation the matter would have been plastered across the headlines. But . . . Churchill. . . can display boorish ill manners and the Tory press does not give so much as a deprecatory cough.”

Labor M.P.s scurried around getting signatures to a note of apology disassociating themselves from Churchill’s “insulting reference,” sent it off to Italian Premier Alcide de Gasperi. Churchill apologized, too. Said he in a public statement: “I am sorry if any remark of mine . . . should seem to imply disrespect to the Italian people.” Shortly after, Churchill developed a localized staphylococcal infection (boils), was ordered to rest by his doctor.