Again Trousers

In Boston last week Mayor Curley said: "We will give Gandhi a royal reception here. He is one of the world's great figures. Boston will be proud to entertain him."

The Boston Post stated as a fact that Superintendent of Police Michael H. Crowley is "an admirer of Gandhi."

Nevertheless Superintendent Crowley said, commenting on Mayor Curley's royal promise, "We shall insist that Gandhi be suitably clothed. We can't let any man appear in the streets of Boston in very much less than a one-piece bathing suit."

Plainly the Superintendent's cautious utterance was inspired by Mr. Gandhi's statement that he would not wear trousers while calling on King George and Queen Mary (TIME, April 13). But the scandal of what correspondents called "Gandhi's gossamer loin cloth" had assumed such world proportions last week that sensible St. Gandhi made an amplifying statement on the matter.

"If the weather in London is sufficiently cool," he observed, "I shall wear ordinary European trousers."

That St. Gandhi will visit the U. S. was still uncertain last week, Boston's confident Mayor notwithstanding. More important than trouser-talk was Mr. Gandhi's abrupt decision to constitute himself the sole delegate of his Indian National Congress at the Second Indian Round Table Conference in London. With breath-taking simplicity he explained, "This arrangement will cost less."

If Lone Delegate Gandhi persists in this purpose he plans, however, to take a small retinue of about ten assistants, including Miss Madeline Slade, daughter of a British Admiral, who cares for him, prepares his food. Mrs. Gandhi, according to reports last week, will as usual not accompany Mr. Gandhi and Miss Slade.

In Manhattan reports from India that "Gandhi has been offered a million dollars to lecture in America" were scoffed at by Manager James B. Pond of Pond's Lecture Bureau.

"Admiral Byrd has been lecturing twice a day and breaking all records," said Mr. Pond portentously, "but he would have to lecture for years and years to make a million dollars. That's a lot of money."

Eager to see how St. Gandhi would look in trousers, etc., International News Photos last week placed his head on the well-draped form of one Tod Marshall, male model at the convention of the National Association of Merchant Tailors of America in Pittsburgh, Pa. last January, retouched his hand to brown scrawniness.

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