Lowdowns

In Britain no cartoonist is quite so feared by statesmen and beloved by the public as omnipresent David Low, whose children will not let him shave off the beard he grew on a boat trip down the Volga.

This year that dominant moppet, Rachael Low, 13, her sister Prudence, 15, and their mother accompanied Low on a banging, booming holiday. First shots were in the harbor of Lisbon, where two Portuguese war boats fired live projectiles in a brief mutiny (TIME, Sept. 21 ) before the Lows sailed on to South America, stopped at Buenos Aires while persons unknown threw a bomb at the British Embassy without much effect. Because the bearded Low is definitely pink in his politics, Britons expected him to be kind with his pencil to President Roosevelt in Washington. Last week, with Low just back in London and working again for Lord Beaverbrook's Evening Standard, cartoon fanciers snapped up Low Among the Americans, a written and sketched report of the Lows' holiday, featuring "Mr. President".

"He was a bad sitter," wrote Cartoonist Low of President Roosevelt, "from the waist up alive and on the move all the time, ruffling his hair, throwing his arms about, twisting his body, turning his face to the ceiling, laughing too much, either opening his mouth or distorting its shape by wedging his cigaret holder too far to the side. He may be a swell President, but he doesn't know how to pose for his portrait.

"I sat in at one of his press conferences--at least I was told it was a press conference, but it seemed to me more like a vaudeville item. The only things missing were a set of bones and a banjo. Mr. President called everybody by his first name and it was all very jolly. When one of the boys asked a riddle, Mr. President blew a smoke ring at him from his cigaret and ditched the answer.

"Well, boys, what are we discussing today? Not politics, I hope,' he says.

"Q.--'How's the campaign going, Mr. President?'

"A.--'Traveling about is costing me a lot for laundry, Fred.'

"Q.--'What are the odds, Mr. President?'

"A.--I've got my bet locked in the safe with the result, Harry.'

"(This, I felt, was not how Mr. Baldwin would do it.)

"That was Mr. President in his Great Guy act. But I saw him in his Statesman act also at an election meeting; and we all know the result of the election.

"Mr. President is, appropriately, the Crescendo of Poissonality. He has the most finished technique. You would hardly know it was a technique, but for the occasional revealing split second. Opinions may differ as to the secondary qualities required in a President of the United States, but undoubtedly the first is Poissonality. Such Poissonality, swollen by its own success, has its dangers. Let us hope Roosevelt will not fall for it himself."

This week Fleet Street's greatest suppressed desire was to see the King & Mrs. Simpson cartooned by their approving wellwisher, Low. Said he: "When the King does decide to marry Mrs. Simpson it will be popularly approved, not only romantically, but politically. The fait accompli is everything in England, and besides the English want a Queen. King Edward has always been a fairy tale character and any kind of romance would be popular."

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