After a brief respite in which they were handed concentrated packages of learning in a variety of courses, the often-tested G.I. soldiers in the psychology branch of the AST unit advanced through barrage of questions this week, keeping their heads well down--and their noses shoved into books during the intervals between tests.

With the end of their fifth week of study approaching and Dean Paul H. Buck's office calling for ratings, the boys knew that something was bound to happen. And it did.

Men in the languages and foreign area phase of the training, whose knowledge has been more often sampled than that of some of the psychologists, also were aware that their professors were looking them over for the mid-term summaries.

Unit Inspected

In the military as well as the academic field, the students tried to hit their best strides. Leverett House was visited by Lieut, Col. Morton smith, former executive officer and adjutant of the Harvard R.O.T.C., now head of the Army Specialized Training Program in the First Service Command.

Coming up in the near future, the specialists heard; was the prospect of an inspection by Maj. Gen. Sherman Miles, head of the First Service Command.

Lieut Nelson T. Hoadley, who recently replaced Lieut. N. B. Sherry as one of the unit's officers, launched a course in map reading. Capt. Bernard A. Merriam, Company A commander, gave an examination in military law.

At a company meeting on Saturday, Captain Merriam outlined the future possibilities for AST men and discussed the wide range of jobs they would be doing--perhaps in a few weeks, perhaps in a few months. He declared each man's case would be reviewed by a board at the end of the tenth week of study, and added that the board had already been organized.

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Personal items: Staff Sgt. Herb Reininger's wife gave birth to their first child a few days ago, making Reininger the second man to become a father since the AST unit was formed here.

Morris Isacowitz, genial First Sergeant of the company, is away on a 1--day furlough,. visiting his old stamping grounds in Brooklyn.

Romance seems to have entered the lives of Pfc Bob Ward and Cpl. Sarrasin, from what we hear ... Sarrasin has been visiting a Cambridge hospital so often to see a nurse there that he's almost qualified for ward duty.

Professor Kelley, after drawing a complicated graph on a blackboard: "If you gentlemen don't see the logic of that immediately, I won't be surprised." Murmurs Dan Riordan after class, confronted with an "O, give curve suddenly: O, give me a home on the range."