be just as infected as that wonderful piece of rough trade last week. As long as the public attitudes on morality, sex and law continue to prevail we are all in danger from social diseases. I don't mean to sound pessimistic, but we must recognize once and for all the fact that the seamier (or more misunderstood) facets of life do exist. What's really needed is a revolution in which we take off the rose-colored glasses and see the enemy in the cold glare of clear, unsmoked lenses. Then we can commence to fire away.

Every gay boy and girl owes it to himself and to his friends to go to his physician and have a blood test taken. Every three months is a sensible approach. Such a course of action is an enormous step in the direction of assuming greater social responsibility. Remember, it's only when the social diseases are undetected and untreated that they become dangerous. But you're off on the wrong start if you say, "I don't need a regular check. I'm very careful; I wouldn't go to bed with anyone who wasn't scrupulously clean." No matter what one's choice of sex partners, it still remains a proven fact that one can be well-scrubbed and still carry VD.

A health feature on a regular basis in the Magazine would be most useful if it treated the problems and issues facing gay life. You could cover VD and many other mental, physical and emotional subjects, thus carrying the work started by the late Dr. Blanche Baker one step further.

Mr. M.

New York, N.Y.

FROM THE LAND OF RADCLYFFE HALL Dear Alison Hunter:

For some time past now I have wanted to write you and express my appreciation for your fine editorials. I must say that I find them fresh, stimulating and in good taste. You see it is most difficult in this country, I find, to get talking to a deviant female; that has been my experience at least.

It is to be grasped at and, I hope, fully appreciated by the whole homosexual world that here in this Magazine is the very thing to start off a new phase of creativeness by giving the deviant, male and female, something to express themselves in; to show that we have, after all, intelligence, ability and the know-how to state our viewpoint.

Yes, I find that I am in agreement all the way with what you state re Radclyffe Hall and Krafft-Ebing (October, 1961). And now to another editorial of yours (March, 1962): it takes courage for the homosexual to resist and keep cheerful amid the intense hetero propaganda, but we must keep our heads and press on. When the time comes, and it most certainly shall come, when the population

problem shall have to be faced on a large scale, I believe it is then we shall have the most useful contribution to make.

An intelligent permissibility of homosexality is the solution-not pills, poisons or potions. When it finally dawns upon people that the Homosexual Periods have been the most progressive, then we shall look more fully into the hope for our next one. Too many deviants have not a real clue as to where they stand and what is yet required of them. This is where the existence of the Magazine and of ONE Institute is a must for our future. The idea of yours re the individual appeals to me immensely. For years I have plugged the thought that it is the individual which is the smallest unit of society, and not the family. Let me end consideration of this editorial with a great and mighty, Hear, Hear, Alison.

And now to your next one (July, 1962) which strikes me rather deeply because I know of a real-life tragedy of an Unlit Lamp who put an end to his terrible, misery-filled existence. He was talented, a brilliant artist and designer, but he always picked out the wrong people in whom to confide and fall in love with.

I find myself also in agreement regarding the Overlit Lamps, just giving a flurry of light without any particular distinctness, nor usefulness. I have hope here in a very seriousminded group of young deviants who are not as promiscuous as the usual run of the group. They are keen on ONE, so here is hoping. It is all a matter of leadership-l think James Barr makes this allusion in his "Game of Fools."

As you say, the coin has been put in the slot now. Let us listen carefully to the 'drumbeat' and get marching. Carry on Alison and let's have more of your forthright views and searching editorials.

FAREWELL TO FRANCESCA Friends:

Mr. T. London, England

Since it has provoked quite a bit of comment, Francesca and the Wicked Giant'' (May, 1962) is the kind of ribald but happy camp that should appear more often in the Magazine. Must homosexuals always suffer?

I recently read Yukio Mishima's "Confessions of a Mask." It is excessively introspective and follows a rather tortuous path to its conclusion emphasizing, however, that homosexuality remains an individual problem of adjustment, no matter what the attitude of the surrounding culture.

Mr. C.

Philadelphia, Pennsylvania