Sir, Elspeth Huxley has described how at the end of the Empire, the English clung on to their prestige "like an invisible coat of mail or a form of magic". It was riveting then to see on television last week her words once more made flesh when Sir Patrick Mayhew gave a virtuoso performance in the role of an end of Empire Englishman, as unction dripping, oozing assumed concern, he gravely reproved the Tanaiste for "his rather surprising language" in speaking "outside the channels of the Anglo Irish Inter Governmental Conference".
The sheer effrontery of his statement was such that it took a second or two before one realised that Sir Patrick was actually preferring to a situation in which himself and his Prime Minister had blatantly bludgeoned the consultative process by announcing in the House of Commons, with virtually no notice to their partners in the Anglo Irish Agreement, that the British government intended to hold elections in Northern Ireland before all party talks would commence and this despite the fact that such action would be in breach of an agreement reached with the Taoiseach immediately prior to President Clinton's visit in November that all party talks would take place before the end of this month.
Consultation has never been high on the Imperial agenda. In 1939 the Viceroy of India declared war on behalf of 400 million Indians without troubling to consult a single citizen as to whether they wished to be embroiled in the conflict or not.
Sir Patrick should realise that the day of the Raj is over. Mr Bruton is not an unelected Nehru or Mr Spring a wheel spinning Ghandi. Neither is Ireland a crown colony or a mandated territory.
Sir Patrick appeared, in his chiding of the Tanaiste, to approve of the consultative process. From time to time it isn't a bad idea to listen to one's own advice and act on it. Yours, etc., Fairfield Park, Rathgar, Dublin 6.