THE STORIES THEY TELL

At sidewalk cafes, in dreary queues, on street corners and stubble-strewn fields throughout the world, men paused to rest, pass a word to their fellows and lighten their burdens with a wry joke. Here & there last week, as they had before, TIME'S correspondents bent an ear to listen to the shuttling talk.

A harassed Briton who had watched the shadow of government control creep over his country's coal mines, railroads, steel mills and even into the dental profession, described the situation as "a weeping, a wailing and a nationalizing of teeth."

Other Britons, largely businessmen, were preoccupied with the avalanche of American advice--official and unofficial --pouring down on their country's economic plight. They were telling each other about one high-powered expert who had been invited over from the U.S. to balance the whole Empire's books. "Gosh," he muttered, casting his eye up & down one set of accounts after another, "This sure looks plenty bad. Better lemme see the boss." After a decent interval, His Majesty King George VI was ushered into the economist's office. "Well, King," said the American, "you got things in an awful mess, but maybe we can fix 'em. The first thing you gotta do to get yourself out of the hole is put Canada and the Channel Islands in your wife's name."

London's thoughtful New Statesman and Nation had its own lighthearted way of coping with Britain's servant problem. It organized a contest among its readers for the best spell or incantation for obtaining domestic aid. A runic winner:

As we dish dams elf land ers jade

Adar keir ancol leen

Ach ink aja pan egrom aid

Ap rimitives lo vene

Letch ance bnts endaw ench oft hese

Tomo pour dus tyf loor

Tow ash ourd in nerdi shesp lease

Wed ono task form ore. *

Rumanians were improving the ever-lengthening hours they spent in queues with the one about the Bucharest housewife who found her husband oiling his revolver. "What are you doing?" she asked. "I'm going to shoot Ana Pauker," he said. "But you can't," the wife protested, "you'll be caught and sent to prison for life!" "I can't help it," said the husband. "I can't stand having that woman run the country another minute." With that he rammed the gun in his pocket, kissed his wife goodbye and stalked out. Two hours later he was back. "Darling," cried his wife, "you're safe! What happened? Did you shoot her?" "No," sighed the disgruntled would-be assassin, "there was a queue."

At U.N. headquarters in Paris, Belgium's Paul-Henri Spaak was telling one on himself. Spaak spends three days each week in Brussels. There recently he had to make a radio speech. His chauffeur was away, so he hailed a taxi. "The radio building," he ordered the driver. "Sorry, m'sieur," said the cabby, "I haven't the time to drive you. Premier Spaak speaks on the radio tonight, in a few minutes in fact, and like a loyal Socialist I'm going to listen." Glowing with pleasure at the words, Belgium's Premier nevertheless had to get to the broadcast. Still concealing his identity, he waved a banknote at the reluctant driver. "Ah," said the latter, "step in, step in. After all, that villain Spaak has been repeating himself for 25 years."

Elsewhere in France, the talk was about a British bulldog and a French poodle who were joined by a lanky wolfhound as they strolled along the Rue de la Paix. "Well," said the latter in a strong Russian accent, "how are things with you? Have you been getting enough to eat?" "Oh, things are picking up a bit in England," said the bulldog, "but we've had rather a bad time of it, y'know. Rations and so forth." "Oh, yes," said the poodle, "and here we're not much better off. Why, during the occupation I got almost nothing to eat but boiled turnips and chopped garlic. Now I get a little meat but things are still bad. How are they in Russia?"

"Oh, the government sees that we get plenty to eat in Russia," said the stranger. "Just look at me. Fat steaks and juicy bones every day." "Then," cried the others in unison, "why in the world did you leave?"

"Confidentially," came the whispered reply, "I wanted to bark."

And of course it was an Irishman who said: "Naturally the sun never sets on the British Empire. Who would trust it in the dark?"

* A Swedish damsel, Flanders jade, A dark Eiran colleen, A Chink, a Jap, a Negro maid, A primitive Slovene, Let chance but send a wench of these To mop our dusty floor, To wash our dinner dishes, please--We do not ask for more.

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