Cancer and Allied Diseases of Infancy and Childhood

for his historical sense was one of his outstanding intellectual qualities. Alas, his prepared speeches, vivid though they are to read, cannot give more than a faint impression of the unforgettable delight of his conversation, nor of the effect of his extempore contributions at conference or committee. Yet it was by these means that he mainly achieved the great influence he had on his contemporaries during his lifetime. His approach to life had much of the imaginativeness of the artist about it, so that his judgments seemed to be arrived at intuitively, and his opinions often enough had a touch of waywardness about them, leading to his being apt to take an entirely unexpected line on some controversial issue. Inevitably these aspects of his personality cannot be reflected in a book made up of his formal utterances. Yet, happily, something of the charm of his personality, of the enchantment of his companionship, and of the impact which these made upon those who knew him is brought out in the excellent Memoir (in effect a short biography) which Sir John Charles has written for this book. All must be grateful to those who have given us this book, for James Spence was one of the two or three men whose ideas have shaped paediatrics in this country since the War.