One week ago the Harvard correspondent of a Boston newspaper predicted that the reticence of F. D. Roosevelt, Jr. '37, however admirable, might prove disastrous. The prophet proved a very oracle, for Boston's press, from the saffron Post and Globe to the blue-nosed Transcript, have exhibited a record case of jaundice in their deliberate attempts to set the stage for a good, gaudy, front page streamer exploitation.

This was to be expected. The case of Captain Armstrong two years ago, innumerable cases since, have shown that the Harvard student is in a position which renders him fair game at all seasons. Obviously he cannot employ buzzer systems and secretaries, armed mobsters, expensive "public relations counsels," or any of the other trappings which are the conventional first line against the gentlemen of the fourth estate. James Joyce, as he was entering a hospital to undergo an operation which would determine whether he should irrevocably lose his sight, was offered two hundred pounds by a reporter for an article on "How it Feels To Be Going Blind"; Mr. Joyce exercised the pleasant privilege of having the man thrown out on his car. The Harvard student cannot do that. The Harvard student cannot even retreat to the Fijis or Manchonkuo. He is defenseless.

The particular newspapermen who conceived and executed yesterday's coup are beyond consure. No decent words ill them. The usual human instructs of decency, and the decent symbols by which they are expressed, have thus lost meaning and significance. The Transcript says, transparently enough: "The picture men were asked by Charles Whitesido...to limit themselves to pictures of young Roosevelt in a group ...."This agreement they inexcusably violated, and then turned their rebuff into copy quite as inexcusable. The temper of a nation which demands from its newspapers photographs of women in the electric chair presents a curious problem in psychology. Until it is solved, Harvard must assure those who enter its jurisdiction that they shall be not more than normally exposed to this smug and witless barbarism.