The meeting of Princess Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh with the Washington press corps provided TIME Correspondent Martha Bucknell with two unexpected fillips. The Princess stopped several times to chat with the newsmen and women. The last one she spoke to was Mrs. Bucknell.

Paul Wooton, escorting Elizabeth around the room, asked: "And what paper are you with?" "TIME magazine," said Mrs. Bucknell. "Oh," said the Princess, "that's one I do know." Seconds later, the Duke asked Mrs.

Bucknell about some papers in her hand.

Told they were a mimeographed copy of a speech, he smiled and said, "Why, they do your work for you." Wrote Correspondent Bucknell: "Bucknell's reaction to said smile: something on the order of a bobby-soxer suddenly being confronted with Gregory Peck." Our entire Letters column in this is sue deals with only one subject -- our recent essay on "The Younger Generation." Approximately 80% of the letters we received came from the people we were writing about, those in the 18-to-28 age group. Their volubility seems almost like an effort to disprove one thesis advanced in the article --that their generation is "silent." TIME last month carried the story of the closing of an exhibit of paintings by Jose Rodriguez in Bogota, Colombia, because local religious groups objected to the exhibition of his life-like nudes. Rodriguez was quoted: "It was a pity . . . The public was just beginning to take notice." What the bashful artist didn't realize when he went quietly back to his painting was that the loss of a local audience became the occasion for winning a new, international audience through the story in TIME'S Art Section. Henry Bosemberg, our Colombian string correspondent, reported that the story first made Rodriguez the talk of Bogota, then attracted six prospective buyers into his studio and brought him commissions to paint two portraits for 2,000 pesos ($800) apiece. By last week he had received mail from readers in Louisville, Detroit, Montreal, Manitowoc (Wis.), Bedford (Ohio), Sinton (Texas), Prescott (Ariz.), Bay Shore (N.Y.) and Montrose (Calif.).

All asked for prices and photos of his paintings. Private clubs and a commercial gallery offered him exhibition space. Wide-eyed, Rodriguez is now hoping to hold an exhibition in the U.S.

As you probably know, TIME

sends out renewal notices to subscribers when their current subscriptions are about to end. A recent mailing of such letters included one sent to Andrei Y. Vishinsky, Russian Foreign Minister, whose subscription expires next month. The people in TIME International's circulation department were struck by the overtones of this letter, which said, in part:

"This is no time to be without TIME.

"With the dogs of war baying in the Pacific and a feeling of imminent events everywhere else, you must have a reliable -- and continuing -- report of the news that is important to you.

"You must have not only reports from the battlefields, but comprehensive accounts of all the other important fronts: the economic, the political, the ideological. You want whatever is needed for complete understanding and for help in judging how events may touch your own country, your own fortunes.

"I hope that TIME has been that reliable source for you all during the year now ending -- and especially since the beginning of the current war.

"And I hope, too, that you will act immediately on this reminder that your subscription will soon be due for extension . . .

"Cordially,

"David W. Ballard "Circulation Manager"

Our Paris office has not yet received Vishinsky's renewal, but they expect it will arrive, as it did a year ago. Similar letters will go out, when their renewal dates turn up, to Russian Economist Eugene S. Varga and to Boris B. Boldyrev at the Society for Cultural Relations. Forty copies of TIME go each week to the Russian Military Mission in Tokyo and dozens of others to subscribers in Russia and her satellites.

Each subscriber we reach behind the Iron Curtain, TIME feels, marks another step on the long road to world understanding.

Cordially yours,

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