Radcliffe, Wellesley Maidens Hunt Men in Leap Year Rites

February 29 did not pass without casualties for Harvard students unwary enough to venture out of the Yard yesterday, as Radcliffe and Wellesley took advantage of their prerogatives to pounce upon Robert H. Davis '41 and R. Liewellyn Brill '42, chasing the one up a tree, and proposing to the other 47 times for a new intercollegiate record.

Davis, while inadvertently crossing the Radcliffe Quadrangle on his way to do some observing of heavenly bodies, found himself in the embarrasing position of being pursued by a dozen intellectual Amazons.

Tree Too Small

A ten second man in prep school, he sprinted to the nearest tree, which unfortunately for him was not large enough to provide him with a safe refuge from the excited women.

Pulled to earth he was forced to accompany his captors to a tea in their Shepard Street domicile. "Drinking tea is an unusual experience for me," Davis admitted last night before leaving his room to recover at the Folies Bergeres. "Thank goodness nothing of the kind is likely to happen to me again for four years."

Breaks Rinehart Record

Brill's record of 47 proposals received in one day breaks the former mark set 88 years ago by Nathaniel Abernathy Rinehart '54, who caused the first Yard riot by receiving 42 proposals of marriage from the students of the old Harvard Annex in front of the John Harvard statue in February, 1852.

Brill's recently reconnected telephone rang incessantly all morning with pleas from ardent suitresses asking "Lewellyn darling" to tear himself away from his study of Elizabethan music for a few hours in the afternoon.

Warmly Greeted

Finally consenting to go out to meet the more ardent of his admirers, Brill hitchhiked to his goal, wearing a borrowed buffalo-skin coat, only to find on his arrival that he was in the midst of the Wellesley branch of the Leap Year Club of Massachusetts Women's Colleges.

After a hard struggle he broke through the phalanx but not until he had been subjected to the rigorous ordeal of receiving the pleas of the 47 lovestruck maidens. Before starting on his homeward trek he addressed the girls in a few passionate but well-modulated phrases.

"I'm in the mood to be wooed, so I wed accept you all if you'd stake me to the license. Give me a ring sometime," he said with a licentious grin.