Herewith are excerpts from letters come to the desks of the editors during the past week. They are selected primarily for the information they contain, either supplementary to, or corrective of, news previously published in TIME.

Friendly "Editor"

TIME Gayhead, N.Y.

New York, N.Y. Mar. 27, 1925.

Gentlemen:

From my lofty pedestal of 85 years, I am looking down on you as probably a mere "kid" compared with myself. And I am going to read you a little sermon. Do not let the ever "Forward flowing tide of TIME roll back to any form of archaism such, my dear boy as you were guilty of in styling Governor Ferguson as the Governess of Texas. Please do not do it again.

I was 20 years head editor of a very successful monthly and my name and title at the head of the page was just this: Frances E. Fryatt, Editor. ....

Pardon an octogenarian's lecture and believe me.

FRANCES E. FRYATT

TIME'S "archaic" usage is employed for clarity. The title of "Governor" is commonly followed by the surname of the officeholder without the first name or the sex title ("Mr." or "Mrs."). Both Governess Ferguson of Texas and Governess Ross of Wyoming were preceded in office by their husbands. To employ the "modern" usage, "Governor Ferguson," etc., would not indicate whether the present Governess or her husband were meant.-- ED.

Dialect Scotched

TIME Akron, Ohio

New York, N.Y. Mar. 20, 1925

Gentlemen:

. . . I'll bet you five quid to a "bawber that David Kirkwood didn't shout, "Wot abaht the Red letter?" (wte your issue of Mar 16, Page 8), when he interrupted the monocled son of Brummagem Joe in Parliament. What he probably said was: "What about," etc.

Being a former Glaswegian, I can't let you get away with that--not that it matters. I like your magazine gey weel all the way and do what I can to get them reading it around here.

J.M. SCOTT,

Managing Editor, Akron Topics.

"Weigh and Cast"

TIME Brimfield, Mass.,

New York, N.Y. Mar. 23, 1925.

Gentlemen:

Page 7, your issue of Mar". 23, "Prince's Trip," we learn that "on Mar 28 H. M. S. Repulse will dip the Prince of Wales standard ... as she casts anchor and moves with silent, increasing speed ... and so on.

L. A. ANDERSON.

A regrettable error. The Repulse "weighed" anchor.--ED.

"Cheap Wit'

TIME New York, N. Y.

New York, N.Y. Mar. 28, 1925.

Gentlemen:

Being one who was present at the birth of TIME, and watched its faltering footsteps at the beginning, I am like a parent, alive to its faults as well as its virtues. It is an extraordinary weekly; and at the end of summer abroad, depending upon it almost exclusively for home news, one returned home, conversant with every subject of importance here, as well as with a good idea of what had been passing under the surface of Europe.

From the point of view of a good many people, however, TIME transgresses good taste in two particulars. First, in reporting the doings of royalty, both crowned and uncrowned, it makes a cheap bid for cheap popularity, with cheap readers. . .

The second annoying mannerism is your habit of employing inverted verbs--"came she," "said he," "went they." Most upsetting!

Give the public wit and it will be amused, but this is a mannerism which can only divert a few and must annoy very many.

JESSIE STILLMAN TAYLOR

Not Priest

TIME Detroit, Mich.

New York, N.Y. Mar. 22, 1925.

Gentlemen:

In your issue of Mar. 16, Page 11, you state that ex-Chancellor Marx of Germany is a Catholic priest. You are mistaken as to his being a clergyman, although you state to correctly his religion.

JOHN HOBERG.

Mr. Hoberg is, of course, correct. Ex-Chancellor Marx is a lawyer. -- ED.

Light

TIME, San Francisco Calif.

New York, N.Y. Mar. 21, 1925

Gentlemen:

On page 24, issue of Mar. 16 (col. 3), there is a slip in the use of different lights. Certainly kerosene supplanted whale oil and also colza, but it was not supplanted by gas. Gas was in use for lighting early in the 19th century, if not actually in the 18th. Mineral oil was not discovered until nearly 60 years later, at which time, in country districts where gas was not available, the lights were tallow candles and colza oil.

There is another error current. Edison did not invent the electric lights. That was the work of Swan of Bromley in Kent, England. He afterwards cooperated with Edison and produced the "Ediswan" filament light. . . The first house to be lit by electricity was that of Mr. Hammond of South Kensington, London, in 1876. The first city lit was Geneva in Switzerland un 1878, by the municipality. . . . . .

R. ESTEOURT