The Birds & the Beasts

Only the Saudi Arabian princes, wearing burnooses and traveling in limousines supplied by Standard Oil, lent an exotic touch. Spotting the Arabs at the Opera House, a glamor-hungry spectator sighed: "This is more like it." For the most part the San Francisco conferees wore drab, diplomatic grey and black.

But the conference had its moments.

The Brazilian delegation got no tickets for the opening. The flag flown for Lebanon was wrong. Britain's sprightly Ellen Wilkinson had hoped to buy kitchenware, discovered that she would be unable to carry the extra weight by air, and settled for rayon stockings. The French complained of boredom. A secretary from the French consulate tried to scare up some French-speaking dinner and dancing partners among the women employes of the City of Paris department store.

In more serious mood, French Foreign Minister Georges Bidault sprang a neat maneuver on Secretary Stettinius, got French accepted as an official language of the conference. Later, during long translations of English into French, the French fidgeted with the rest.

Valets at the Fairmount Hotel on Nob Hill groaned when they discovered that the flowing white robes of the Saudi Arabians had to be pressed daily. The Arabians steadfastly refused to sign autographs (as did the Russians), obeyed Moslem laws and drank only fruit punch and orange juice in the bars. Bellboys at the Mark Hopkins complained that the British and the Chinese were the poorest tippers, averaging a dime (the British are accustomed to tipping once, on arrival or departure).

Indians and Indians. The Top of the Mark, the Mark Hopkins' famed skyline cocktail room, was an international tippling spot. Viscount and Lady Cranborne drank Old Fashioneds, Earl and Lady Halifax Scotch & soda, Clement Attlee plain soda water.

On the fringes of the conference, special pleaders abounded. There were Zionists, Laborites, two representatives of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, and six Poles (three Warsaw, three London) operating as news papermen. Mrs. Vijayalakshmi Pandit, distinguished sister of the imprisoned Indian nationalist leader, Jawaharlal Nehru, challenged the right of the titled Indian delegates to speak for the Indian people.

An Indian Moslem heckled her, was sent scurrying from the press conference.

There were also Canadian Indians, representing the Six Nations' Iroquois Confederacy. Beaded and buckskinned, they tried to interest the world in the repeal of the Canadian Indian Act of 1927. Said their leader, Chief Dagarleehogo (man with two minds) : "We don't expect to get anywhere."

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