RUSSELL IN GAY VEIN; HATES FISHING, TOO MANY MURDERS

Spick and span in grey suit, blue shirt and tie, and looking in the best of ruddy British spirits, Bertrand Russell came back to Harvard yesterday for his first long visit since 1914.

But in 1914, Lord Russell was a pacifist persecuted by his own countrymen because he opposed England's entrance into "an imperialist World War." Today he is heart and soul with beleaguered England in its battle against Nazi Germany.

"I thought all through the last war I was a pacifist," the white-haired philosopher stated at the Faculty Club. "Now I am not. Forces which threaten mankind are assailing England today."

Little Serious Talk

That and no more was his serious talk for the day, for "Mr." Russell, as he is addressed at Harvard, does not wish to dwell upon the subject of the war. And outside of the war, philosophy remained the only serious topic which could have been discussed. Philosophy was not discussed because Mr. Russell's philosophic realm is above the heads of the untutored proletariat.

Philosophy A and at least five additional courses are prerequisite to any attempts to wage intellectual combat with Mr. Russell on his home field of mathematical logic. His calm, waiting stare is enough to topple the confidence of the crassest bluffer that ever fooled a section man.

But Mr. Russell is unapproachable only in his special philosophical stratosphere. When the conversation moves to a mundane level, he loses his air of disconcerting coolness and begins to laugh, finger his horn-rimmed glasses and bite his pipe.

He boasts shamelessly about his appetite for detective stories, "good, bad, and indifferent--I read them all." He polishes off at least one of the thrillers a day.

Doducting the identify of the criminal provides the chief enjoyment he gets out of the stories, an indication that even in his leisure moments, Mr. Russell's logical powers remain in a perpetual state of activity.

"Only one thing--I don't like too many murders or too much action," he concluded on this point.

No Fisherman

Somehow philosophers and fishing seem to go together. There were Izaak Walton and Thoreau, for instance, who liked to be contemplative while seated in a boat, dangling a line overside. Was Mr. Russell an angler of any sort?

No, he was definitely not.

"In all my life I have never seen a man catch a fish, and I have watched hundreds of fishermen.

"You know Dr. Johnson's definition of the sport of fishing--a stick with a fish at one end and a fool at the other. Well, I'm not even optimistic about the fish."

The phone rang, and after a few words on the wire, Mr. Russell went downstairs. Mrs. Russell was waiting to go apartment-hunting