Sir - The comments on the protocol of wearing a (vanishing) mantilla during the President's visit to the Pope recall the top-hats farce when de Valera made his first official visit to Rome in 1933. Fianna Fail had denounced top hats and morning coats as badges of British imperialism, and castigated Cumann na Gaedheal as aping British lackeys for wearing them.
Worried, External Affairs requested its Minister at the Vatican, Charles Bewley, to find out if de Valera must wear a top hat for his audience with the Pope; would it excite unfavourable comment if he went bareheaded? Bewley replied that those who had no military or diplomatic uniform should wear evening dress and top hat, but he thought that the Vatican would be indulgent if there were urgent reasons for not doing so. However, he feared ridicule if unfavourable comparisons with Ghandi were made: those Romans who would do anything for a laugh had mischievously put it about that the Indian leader would refuse to go to the Vatican without his goat and his spinning wheel.
Bewley saved the day by his sleight of hand which enabled de Valera to conform to protocol by wearing his top hat when there were no photographers around.
The Fianna Fail public image of being men of the people was preserved. (A Dublin Opinion cartoon of the time asked: "How would you recognise a Government Minister at a party?" Answer: "He's the one wearing bicycle clips.")
Bewley earned de Valera's gratitude. That did not stop him from sacking the converted Quaker for Nazi leanings on the eve of the second World War. There were more serious matters at issue, which is not to devalue the importance of protocol or to give a hearing to grating academic brats and begrudgers. A hat usually has a macho brim; a mantilla is a Pauline veil. Mind you, I've said nothing! - Yours, etc.,
Cedarmount Road,
Mount Merrion,
Co Dublin.