The "new" Advocate is without a doubt heading in the right direction. In last month's issue, the editors attempted to deal with "The Jew at Harvard"; now, in the April issue, they present a pre-and-con discussion of the Club System. Both topics are serious and important ones, and it is a pity that the handling in each case has been so inadequate.

The argument for the Clubs has been written anonymously (and illogically) in a sprightly and rather witty tone. The author admits that Clubs "probably" have a bad effect on the academic efforts of their members, but claims that they "offer the undergraduate a congenial circle of friends that the college at large does not try to offer him." He considers his Club friends to be less stand-offish than "the average Harvard man," but fails to make it clear whether or not those genial Club men are genial only with other Club men or if they are just naturally "hail-fellows-well-met." Finally, the author draws an absurd parallel between the exclusiveness of political groups and that of the final Clubs. This little exercise in sophistry seems to be openly tongue-in-cheek as does the pompous argument that the Clubs are merely supplying what the Houses are supposed to give, but don't.

"The Club System Con" is hardly more enlightening. The writer (also anonymous) seems casual and tired of it all even at the beginning. He dallies with a few truisms (that the New England aristocracy isn't much of an aristocracy, and that much of Harvard's "apathy" is the fault of the Clubs), but his case is confused, contradictory in places, and concludes bitterly by comparing the System to "a roach on the wall."

Denis Fodor's short story, "The Fall of Barkutzan," is clearly the best piece of writing in the lot, and perhaps the best story the Advocate has published all year. Fodor manages to contrast effectively the earthy playfulness of a carnival crowd in a little Czechoslovakian village with the ominous arrival of the news of the Gottwald coup.

"Fish, Flesh, and Foul" is a sketchy treatment of a towering theme (the natural animal cruelty of the human species toward its young). Richard Webster's discussion of a Catholic scholar's views on the supernatural seems unnecessarily esoteric, especially the final note of doom that bids us all study the Churchman carefully against the day when goblins will once more roam the earth.

Yet Webster's article does give the April Advocate an interestingly medieval touch and is in agreeable contrast to the simplicity of Fodor's story and the topicality of the "arguments" over the Clubs. It is just this contrast and variety that the Advocate is evidently trying to foster. The editors should endeavor in the future to add depth of thought and clarity as well.