Browsing a copy of Marie Vassiltchikov's Berlin Diaries that I recently borrowed from the library, I came across the following entry written a few days after the Hess fiasco. Friday, 18 May [1941] The Berliners, who are noted for their wit, have already concocted a few jokes about Hess's escape. Examples: Augsburg [the town he took off from]: Town of the German Ascent (Amer. Ascension) B.B.C.: On Sunday night no further German cabinet ministers flew in. O.K.W. Report: Goering and Goebbels are still firmly in German hands. The Thousand Year Reich has now become a Hundred Year Reich. One zero is gone. Churchill asks Hess: "So you are the madman?" Hess answers, "No, only his deputy." Interestingly, the author mentions Peter and Christabel Bielenberg, both of whom she knew. Christabel, an English woman married to a German officer, lived in Germany throughout the war. I have a copy of the account she wrote of that experience, Ride Out the Dark. Here's a quote from Bielenberg's book: "We were none of us too even tempered at breakfast time, owing to the National Socialist coffee bean." JT