"Impossible for Him"

The equal of Mrs. Franklin Delano Roosevelt in effortless daily discharge of endless public duties has for years been the Empire's popular "Smiling Duchess," that aboundingly healthy Scotswoman who is now Queen-Empress Elizabeth. Suddenly last week His Majesty's Principal Secretary of State for India, the Marquess of Zetland, announced that new King George had told him the scheduled Coronation Durbar at New Delhi cannot take place next winter for reasons having to do with Queen Elizabeth's "health." The official announcement voiced vague "hope" that in some other year the Durbar of George & Elizabeth may take place, but the Marquess of Zetland could scarcely have done anything last week more worrying to the British business community which has such an enormous stake in British pageantry.

Because not even the Baldwin Cabinet's best friends could believe that healthy Queen Elizabeth would not be able to come smiling through a dozen Coronations and Durbars if required, correspondents were obliged to question the India Office closely. What about Sir Alexander Hardinge, the King's Private Secretary, only recently dispatched to India to perfect arrangements for the Durbar? What about the King's own uncertain health? What about Mahatma Gandhi's teeming Indian National Congress, its denunciation of the new Constitution now being given by Britain to her Indian Empire (TIME, Oct. 12, et ante)? And what about the Congress' vote to boycott every festivity connected with the Coronation (TIME, Jan. 11)?

In tight-lipped replies this week, India Office civil servants officially denied that the Durbar announcement had "political significance." They officially admitted that Sir Alexander Hardinge was "sent to India in connection with the Durbar arrangements." Presently they produced a printed document superseding the previous official but verbal announcement in terms of the Queen-Empress' health. The original verbal announcement was not denied, but the later printed announcement reads for posterity : "His Majesty the King-Emperor finds the duties and responsibilities which he has undertaken in unexpected circumstances unfortunately make it impossible for him to contemplate a prolonged absence from Great Britain during the first year of his reign." Thus chivalrous King George made clear that the Coronation Durbar, possible for her, is "impossible for him."

In Court circles it was re-emphasized that Their Majesties have not for years been expected to have more children. Private advices to London firms from their Bombay connections were that the Durbar had almost certainly been canceled on the advice of the Government of India. In preliminary elections under the new Constitution early returns show St. Gandhi's followers making great gains.

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