Roman Jakobson, Cross Professor of Slavic Languages and Literatures, quietly left the country on Monday morning for Moscow, where he will attend a meeting of the interim committee of the International Conference for Slavic Philology.

He flew from New York for Copenhagen, Helsinki, and Moscow, where he will arrive today. His meetings last until May 24, and he is expected to return to this country on the 29th or 30th, his secretary said yesterday.

Birkhoff Can't Go

The other professor invited to Russia, Garrett Birkhoff '32, professor of Pure and Applied Mathematics, said that he will not be able to accept his invitation to the Third Mathematical Congress of the U.S.S.R.

Birkhoff explained that the conference, sponsored by the Academy of Sciences, conflicted with previous commitments and it "didn't seem practical" for him to attend. "I am declining with regret. But Russia is a long distance away."

Jakobson's meeting in Moscow, also sponsored by the Academy of Sciences, will plan the agenda for a second philology conference, to be held in 1958.

He was elected to the committee along with his alternate, W. Lednicki, professor at the University of California, at a meeting in Belgrade last September. The members were chosen from the 200 at the Belgrade meeting on the basis of nationality.

His return to his native Russia will be his first trip in 37 years. His passport was validated, although he left Russia in 1920 as a known opponent of the Soviet regime.