Human conditioning is a remarkable phenomenon. I well remember the feeling of outrage I experienced at Kennedy Airport in New York when I was first frisked a mere two years ago. Nowadays, when I travel by air, at the moment I am to negotiate the last of a series of grids before reaping the reward of an actual seat on the plane, I automatically assume a cruciate position. I am no longer embarrassed, only hopeful that the frisker is sufficiently expert not to tickle and so provoke an ill-suppressed discourteous giggle. All this I rediscovered when leaving Heathrow at the start of the Study Tour of Italy on 10 May 1974.