There was some plan to send them back to a museum in the city which had grown up near

There was some plan to send them back to a museum in the city which had grown up near the young Englishman's ranch, under a mountain which had been given his name. Most of the sales were a struggle, with the exception of the snuff-bottle collection at Sotheby's - a field where prices are comparatively modest - and the jade jewellery.In the Hong Kong market, antique ceramics are the big earners, the equivalent of Impressionists in the West, and on this occasion Sotheby's could only find buyers for half the sale - Christie's did slightly better by holding a shorter sale one day earlier. As new wings go, the Aile Richelieu is fairly impressive although also, to the unsuspecting tourist or first-time visitor, likely to prove somewhat daunting. Only Granada - partly because of its longevity, but mostly because of Coronation Street - attracts the local loyalty usually reserved for football teams. He was a successful musician and composer by the end of the 1920s and a recording and radio star from the mid-1930s.

The Duma meets not in the White House, renovated after being shot up by tanks and commandeered by the government, but in more modest premises across the road, a conference hall originally built for the Soviet trade bloc Comecon. He was for eight years a health service executive, joining his mother on the city council as the youngest member (aged 25). THREE men who ran a cross-Channel drinks racket, selling cheap French beer, wine and champagne in Britain were jailed yesterday. It is important that they should retain the right to take up the grievances of individual constituents as they see fit, but the tendency to regard every MP as an advocate-cum-ombudsman is disturbing, because it diverts them from their primary task.Moreover, politicians tend to be self-important and self-aggrandising creatures.

We know it is very competitive there with elements of winners and losers. They will be hoping the engineers are well on top of the task. She was backstage recently at the Boris Godunov Prom, and hugging Andras Schiff in the green room of the Queen Elizabeth Hall. That battle brought him into direct combat with the environmental lobby and with many of his friends and neighbours. IF THERE is one overwhelmingly positive thing to come out of the South Bank's Alternative Vienna series so far, it is the realisation that H K 'Nali' Gruber, composer, 'chansonnier', bass-player and descendant of the Gruber who gave us Silent Night, is a very interesting figure. It's the biggest job I have.'But in Mr Smith's account Jordan emerges as domineering, tantrum- prone and solitary - a player whose superior skills and selfish style of play isolate him from his team-mates.One of Jordan's closest friends, Charles Barkley, basketball's most outspoken star, urges his fans to venerate their parents, rather than a bunch of rich young sportsmen like himself He has a point. 'It could have been poisoned and the resident, who suffers from dementia, could have eaten it.Miss Wale told the hearing that she found the mouse while she and two colleagues were searching for Christmas decorations in the attic.