George Courtauld's many fans will be relieved that the Foreign Office, after having officially retired him from his post as Queen's Messenger, asked him after all to carry on. In this final, brilliant collection of reports, Courtauld describes his recent visits to, among other places, Mongolia, China, South Africa, Kenya, the Persian Gulf, Chile, Brazil, Oman, Israel and Thailand, He is, as ever, infectiously interested in everything he encounters, from flora and fauna, to architecture, art and history, but it is above all the quirks and eccentricities of his favourite species, Homo sapiens, that delight him most. His sharp ear for tricks of speech and acute eye for the absurd are always in evidence, making this one of the funniest travel series around today.