In my review of the book last April, after tentatively questioning the authenticity of a passage in which Rawicz describes an encounter with two 'Abominable Snowmen, I wrote: 'The rest of the simply told narrative bears unmistak- ably the stamp of truth.' And so, at a first reading, it does. Both the then Director of Military Intelligence in India and his principal subordinate in Calcutta have no recollection of an incident which might have been expected, even after fourteen years, to leave some impression on their minds. The doctors and nurses who looked after him, the officers who interrogated him or studied the reports of his interrogation have remained silent.

Still more inexplicably-for all three might have died-none of the British troops with whom Rawicz and his companions shared a hospital ward for several weeks in Calcutta has had his memory jogged by the publicity which the book has attracted. None of the three other survivors has been traced or has come forward to identify himself. The main reason why The Long Walk, as well as being widely read, is being widely discussed centres on the question of its veracity. the Gobi, Tibet and the Himalayas to India, which the four survivors reached after a year. Rawicz's book, it may be recalled, describes his escape with six companions from a Russian prison-camp in north-eastern Siberia and their 4,000-mile journey across Outer Mongolia.

I shall not, therefore, be out of the vogue if I return to a subject with which I originally dealt in these pages on April 13. With the author by live speakers on a BBC programme called 'The Travellers.' Next Sunday this programme is in its turn to be discussed by the Critics.

The long walk book slavomir rawicz