DIPLOMACY: Toure’s Tour (Contd.)

Up flag-bedecked lower Broadway last week rode Sékou Touré, president of Africa’s fledgling Republic of Guinea, to complete his two-week swing through the U.S. with a traditional Manhattan ticker-tape welcome. Convinced that the U.S. meant its best (TIME, Nov. 9), Touré showed no sign of offense at the fact that the red, yellow and green flags along the street were those of Africa’s Ghana, not Touré’s Guinea. (Embarrassed city officials explained that a flagmaker delivered the wrong flags.)

As the Touré party compared notes, all hands agreed that the warmest personal experience of all had been the visit to the Libertyville, Ill., home of Adlai Stevenson. In the pleasantly chaotic informality of Stevenson’s home, the President and Mrs. Touré escaped for the first time the stiffness of state visit protocol. Stevenson’s lone maid bustled about getting food and drink ready while the Touré party inspected the Halloween jack-o’-lanterns which leered in through the windows from the dark and rain outside. (Stevenson had carved some of them himself at breakfast time.) The conversation wandered amiably from such subjects as Touré’s speaking style to the relationship between George Sand and Chopin.

Midway in the party, three unawed children dressed as witches and a black cat bounded in the door, demanded trick or treat. For a time, Touré and Stevenson were closeted in the study, talking about trade conditions in Guinea. The dinner party might have lasted longer had not Mrs. Touré’s dress Zipper broken. After temporary repairs with safety pins she collected her husband, headed home.

In Manhattan, Touré addressed the United Nations, repeating his pleas for understanding of Africa’s struggle against colonialism; was guest of honor at an official city luncheon in the Commodore Hotel and at a Waldorf-Astoria dinner given by the African-American Institute. At week’s end he canceled a proposed 48-hour visit to Canada, announced he would catch his breath in Manhattan before flying off this week for London and home.