A heated skirmish broke out yesterday in the Yard when an apparently mentally disturbed flautist struck a University policeman.

Laurence R. Golding '77, who witnessed the incident at about 4 p.m., said yesterday that the flautist had been playing his flute in front of Holworthy Hall for some time before he broke into loud cries, bringing about five, Harvard policemen to the scene.

Golding said that when one policeman asked the flautist if he were going to leave the Yard, he responded by striking another officer in the face.

A resident of Holworthy, who asked not to be named, added that the flautist repeatedly cried, "the sun, the moon."

He said he thought the flautist was in a disturbed mental state and was possibly under the influence of drugs.

Lt. Joseph Kenney of the University Police said yesterday that five policemen were able to restrain the flautist only by "surrounding and overwhelming" him, a "standard procedure" for dealing with deranged persons.

The flautist, described by one policeman as a "big man," was eventually subdued and handcuffed, and is now in the Cambridge Hospital, where Kenney says he is undergoing psychiatric tests.

Police said they do not think the flautist was a Harvard student.