War And Peace

War The most famous English general was probably the Duke of Wellington (1769-1852), who fought Napoleon's French army at Waterloo. He was a master tactician. His potrait is on the English £5 note. In the twentieth century the most illustrious soldier is Field Marshall Montgomery (1887-1976)....

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Bonnie Scotland

If it weren't for the Irish , Scotland would probably be called "Pictland". The 'Scots' were originally an Irish race. They crossed the water in the 5th century and settled in the country of the Picts. The Picts and the Scots fought each other regularly. But by the 9th century the Scots had absorbed...

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An Unmistakable Rhythm

Jamaica turned Rock and Roll on its head and conquered on the world. It started in the sixties with the Blue Bat and singers like Prince Buster. But then they changed the beat. Blue Beat became Rock Steady. And Rock Steady evolved into a style with an unmistakable rhythm - the opposite of Rock...

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4.000 Kilometres of Islands

If you meet any of the five hundred thousand West Indian in Britain do not compliment them on their English. It's their mother tongue. If you want to pay compliments, try cricket. West Indians are the finest cricketers in the world. Most English people think of the West Indies as Trinidad, Barbados...

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Watch Out! There' A Thief About!

No jackdaw can get at the Queen of England's jewels. they spend most of their time locked behind heavy plate glass in a heavily protected room in one of the oldest fortresses in the country-the Tower of London. So unless the Queen gets mugged on her way to the Opening of Parliament (one of the...

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Cricket For Beginners

A cricket team consists of eleven players. The lenght of the game varies but the majority are one day long. The aim is to source more 'runs' than the other team. The toss of a coin decides which side will try to score first, which team will 'bat'. Each member of the team has a turn, called an 'innings'....

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The Last Straw

Thomas Hardy, in books like from the Madding Crowd, glorified life in rural England. This was at the end of nineteenth century. But even then he was pessimistic about the industrialization of agriculture: A harsh scene in Tess of the D'Urbevilles shows Tess forced to work at the pace of a steam-driven...

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Farming in Britain

Broadly speaking the British Isles are hilly on the left and flat on the right. The weather is wetter on the left and sunnier on the right. For any geography teachers who may be reading this the west is on the left and the east is on the right. The fact is that the wet, Atlantic winds have lost...

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A Scottish Solution

The Scots have a reputation for prudence and frugality. They are not the sort of people who make a habit of losing their wallets. But is does happen. The following announcement appeared in the Glasgow Herald recently: "Lost in Sauchiehall Street, a black leather wallet containing family photograps,...

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Lost Property

Twenty four thousand people left their umbrellas on the London buses and Underground last year. That's a lot of wet people! Eleven thousand pairs of gloves were found, twenty-six thousand handbags and purses, fourteen thousand books, and one box of glass eyes. Actually some people lose things...

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A Second Chance

If you go to sleep with the radio on, you are likely to be woken in the early hours of the morning by a Professor of Mathematics, or a lecture on history. The quite hum after closedown is broken by the Open University. Since 1971, 25.000 people a year have equipped themselves with books and blank...

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A Superstitious Man

'I'm a very superstitious man. I was born on the 5th May at five o'clock in the morning. On my fifty-fifth birthday I bought a lottery ticket. The number of the ticket was five hundred and fifty-five thousand, five hundred and fifty-five. I won five thousand pounds. So I came to Ascot and I put...

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Royal Ascot

Four consecutive days of top class racing make Royal Ascot the most important meeting in the British racing calendar. But it isn't just the quality of the horses that makes 'Ascot' an institution. It is the hats that the spectators wear. Royal Ascot is one of the major events of the London social...

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Say Cheese

Cheese will always bring a smile to an Englishmen's lips-even the most bad-tempered... even people who can't stand the stuff.Photographers would be lost without it. You don't have eat it. It's just that when you say the word, the lips automatically spread out towards the ears and give that expression...

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It All Started On The River

One sunny summer afternoon a man went out on the river at Oxford with his boss's daughter. The result was one of the most enchanting stories the world has known. The man was Charles Lutwidge Dodgson mathematics lecturer at Oxford, better known by his pen name, Lewis Carroll. The girl was the ten-year-old...

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Twenty-Six Miles From Europe

1066, the Battle of Hastings is the one date that every English schoolchild knows. In that year William the Conqueror crossed the Channel, put an arrow in King Harold's eye, and made England part of the Norman empire. Europe had come to Britain. But in spite of this, for most of her history, Britian...

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The Edinburgh Festival

The Eighteenth century wit and man of letters, Dr Johnson, thought that the best thing in Scotland was the road to England. Each year a million and a half visitors to the Edinburgh Festival show that they don't agree. For three weeks in the summer the city plays host to one of the biggest and most...

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Hamburger and Chips

Who's next ? I'll have a hamburger and chips and a chocolate milk-shake, please. Hamburger, chips and chocolate milk-shake. To eat here.. or to take away ? To eat here. That's two pounds fifty, please. We'll go and find a table, Ben. Nick Right. Hamburger,...

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Wimbledon - The Home of Tennis

Wimbledon is quiet suburb of London. But it is known world-wide for one thing-tennis. The Championships take place every year at the end of June. The first Championships was in 1877. The prize was a cup worth 25. The rackets were the shape of snow shoes. 1884 - The First Women's Championships....

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Who's A Doctor

When Dr David Owen was Foreign Secretary of the United Kingdom, people abroad thought that, for a change, there was a genuine intellectual in the British government. A doctorate is the highest university degree. But Dr Owen is actually a Doctor of Medicine-a fact which is clear to all British...

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There Must Be Some Mistake

Are you in charge here ? Yes, I am. What can I do for you ? We're the 'Arrows of Desire'. Who are the 'Arrows of Desire' ? We're the group that you booked for tonight. I didn't book a group. I booked...

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Those Poor Fish

Tim, I've got a bone to pick with you. What's the matter, Mrs Bennett ? Your cat wants to eat my goldfish. Oh, dear, I'm sorry. He keeps coming into my garden and sitting by the pond. And he stares at the goldfish. I'm very...

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