At Cocos

Buried somewhere on the plump green slopes of Cocos Island are pieces of eight and gold moidores; somewhere off the ancient stone paths is a cache of jewel-studded, solid gold chalices, golden altars, diamond-crusted vestments, 273 jeweled swords, a life-size statue of the Blessed Virgin, wonderfully wrought in purest gold.

So, at least, runs the well-authenticated legend, well-known to Franklin Roosevelt, who slept and fished and yarned last week aboard the cruiser Tuscaloosa in Cocos' Chatham Bay, with the radioed permission of Costa Rica's President Leon Cortes Castro. On his fourth visit* to the peaceful blue waters that lick Cocos' shores the President was still only after fish; still had only meagre fisherman's luck. Back in Panama the natives were swearing by the Roosevelt luck (he arrived on Feb. 18; No. 18 turned up in the lottery); out in the Pacific he was most likely swearing at it. Score reported at week's end: one blue crevally, one amberjack, two small fish, one broken line, three bait-raiding sea gulls.

> Last week the President let pass the deadline for taking his name off Illinois' preferential primary ballot, thereby raising Third Term talk to its highest pitch yet.

> Vacationing in Massachusetts, the President's personal secretary, Miss Marguerite ("Missy") Le Hand, gave her reasons for wanting a Third Term: she likes 1) her $5,000-per-year job; 2) her White House apartment (bedroom, living room, bath).

> Son James last week went into the slot-machine business, reviving memories of his father's cropper in a kindred enterprise.

* Others: 1934, 1935-36, 1937.

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