Dr Alexander Walk, at that time President-Elect, Librarian, Co-Editor, Secretary of the Parliamentary Committee and our representative on the General Nursing Council, was the first Officer I spoke to when I joined the staff of the RMPA in January 1960. It was typical that he should telephone to welcome the newcomer, and, as I have learned over the years, also typical that he should then have been serving the Association in so many and varied ways, and that he should now still be engaged in the service of the College. To this service he has given his skill, wisdom, generosity and wit for half a century, and last month he and the College celebrated the Jubilee of his first official appointment—as Assistant Editor of the Journal of Mental Science—in May 1928—a record never equalled by any other member.

If I may parody James Agate, who was talking about Sir Henry Irving, who in turn parodied Dr Johnson, who was talking about a gentleman of the name of Hume: ‘If anybody thinks Alexander Walk was the greatest member of our College of modern times and does not say so, he lies. If he does not think so, he is mad.’ I submit this judgment with little fear of contradiction; but should anyone choose to doubt me, let him only glance through Natalie Cobbing's detailed list of the high offices Walk has held, any one of which would cause us to sing praise unto his name.

Earlier analyses (Hassall and Trethowan, 1974, 1976) have examined the pass rates in the Preliminary Test and Membership Examinations in relation to the characteristics of the candidates and after separating those sitting for the first time and those re-sitting. This paper explores the relationship between performance in the Multiple Choice Questionnaire (MCQ) and performance in the examination as a whole, though without distinguishing between candidates making first and those making later attempts.

Henri Ey died on 6 November 1977. For 40 years he had been the dominant figure of French psychiatry. He came from an exceptional generation and trained at the same time as Pierre Male, Jacques Lacan and Sacha Nacht, who together led psychoanalysis in France. Ey himself, though, was not an analyst, but he tried to integrate psychoanalysis with general psychiatry. In this he was much influenced by Hughlings Jackson. The book he wrote in 1938 with Julien Rouart, which was expanded and republished in 1975 as Des Idées de Jackson à un Modèle Organodynamique expressed the views which dominated his life. He thought that psychiatry could not avoid looking at the articulation of diverse levels of psychic life, and their disorganization.

Dr William H. Sheldon, Director of the Biological Humanics Center in Cambridge, Massachusetts, died there on 16 September 1977. Sheldon is the man who invented somatotyping—a classification of variations in human body structure, to which he related variations in temperament, in physical and mental illness, and in patterns of growth and ageing.

Request for Agoraphobic Patients

A controlled trial of imipramine and behaviour therapy in the treatment of agoraphobia is being conducted at the Maudsley Hospital. We would be grateful for referral of patients suffering from agoraphobia who are able to attend on an out patient basis. The patients would be offered early assessment interviews, and those found suitable would begin treatment in the near future. Referral letters should be addressed to Dr I. M. Marks or Dr R. S. Stern, The Maudsley Hospital, Denmark Hill, London SE5 8AZ.

My brief is to discuss the present and future relationships between clinical psychologists and psychiatrists. I shall be speaking from the, no doubt restricted, viewpoint of a Consultant in Adult Psychiatry working in a general hospital unit in a Teaching Area. My comments will not, therefore, apply to child psychiatry or mental handicap, and may well be received less than enthusiastically within mental hospitals. The highly efficient organizers of this conference, in their letter of invitation said, ‘We want a sensible, middle of the road view’. Did they realize, I wondered, that the middle of the road can be a rather dangerous position to occupy? I shall try very hard to avoid a head-on collision.

This article is based on a paper given to a meeting of the Chiltern and Thames Valley Division of the College. It discusses the document provided by the College called ‘The Responsibilities of Consultants in Psychiatry within the National Health Service’.* The need for such a document probably reflects the current uncertainties and anxieties of many consultants and an awareness of their changed role in the health service and in society in general.

Few intending authors appreciate how the editors of medical and scientific periodicals work. The British Journal of Psychiatry rejects about two-thirds of the papers submitted to it, and many of those accepted have to be partially re-written before they appear in print. Some explanation of the editorial reasons for this behaviour may be helpful. I, for one, am often saddened at having to refuse a contribution which is clearly the fruit of several people's hard work—a script which has been carefully written and retyped, diagrams beautifully drawn—and even more so when the study has involved many sessions of clinical interviews or many hours of laboratory effort. The author may be offering a little bit of his individual creative self, and in refusing his paper I am rejecting him. Of course there are plenty of journals in the world, and his piece may find a home elsewhere, but before turning it down we do often ask ourselves whether the observations and results it contains could be salvaged in some form for us.

Among the severe shortages currently afflicting psychiatric hospitals there is one which is particularly worrying and which, if not remedied, will bring the psychiatric services of this country to a full stop. The purpose of this communication is to suggest certain measures which may prove helpful.