Like an umpire stricken with palsy, Mr. Ian Macleod, Britian's Colonial Secretary, sits fluttering in his chair in London as the conference on federal constitutional review for Rhodesia and Nyasaland only continues to reveal the intransigeance of both sides.

Obsessed simply with the idea of secession from the federation, the nationalist leader of Nyasaland, Dr. Hastings Banda (who is respected perhaps above all Africans), has walked out of the conference twice. The second time he dragged the Northern and Southern Rhodesian leaders out the door as well, in an attempt to unite the Africans delegations against their most powerful enemies: Sir Roy Welensky, the Federal Prime Minister, and Sir Edgar Whitehead, the Prime Minister of Southern Rhodesia.

These two immovable knights have done a good deal of talking about the benefits of the Federation, and have tried their best to persuade the Africans that no sensible programs of revising ancient procedures of land cultivation and tenure can be carried out without it. There is much truth to this talk, but it would have a more convincing sound if Sir Roy especially had not so often proved himself so strong an opponent of increased African representation under a new federal constitution.

Of course it is unlikely that the Africans would settle for representation even if they could get it. The perpetual persecution of nationalists and the imprisonment of Dr. Banda two years ago have made a history in Rhodesia and Nyasaland too unhappy to be forgotten through such easy compromises. Yet as Dr. Banda himself has said, "There's absolutely no chance of conciliation or understanding between the Europeans and Africans in Central Africa" so long as Sir Edgar and Sir Roy are in power.

The tactics of the two ministers have left the mild Mr. Macleod helpless. It was hoped, when Mr. Macmillan chose him to replace Mr. Alan Lennox-Boyd (who was able to deny harshly the no doubt valid Devlin Commission report that found the imprisonment of Dr. Banda quite unnecessary) that some softer glances might be directed toward nationalism in Central Africa. But it is at least clear now that unless some official of very great authority removes Sir Roy and Sir Edgar, the Federation, in Dr. Banda's words, "is dead. All that remains now is to bury it."