Making plans for a four-generation family Christmas party, Mrs. Franklin D. Roosevelt resurrected her Yule Rule No. 1: no warlike toys on the family tree. Said she, gloomily: "From the looks of things, I am afraid refraining from warlike toys doesn't do much good."

In London, hairy old British Portraitist Augustus John, incorrigible bohemian, foe of the Royal Academy, glared at an exhibition of landscapes by his daughter, Vivien, then bought another artist's painting in the same show. Asked his opinion of his daughter's work, he snorted: "Rubbish!"

Shrewd, rufous Hubert Renfro" Knickerbocker, prize-seal of Hearst's International News Service, disembarked in Manhattan, gloomily prophesied that the present war will last for "six years or so ... after that the real war begins. . . . None of us will ever live to see peace again. . . . There'll be bloodshed, and enough to go around to satisfy everybody."

Probated in London was the will of the late Dr. Sigmund Freud, exiled Austrian father of psychoanalysis. Estate (to his two sons and daughter): -L-15,979 net ($63,916).

Glittering in a gold-sequined gown, her hair swept up, her feet in spun-glass slippers, Marva Trotter Louis, wife of Heavyweight Boxing Champion Joe Louis, officiated at the coronation of St. Louis' Negro society king and queen. Introduced as "leader of Chicago society . . . America's premier lady of fashion," Mrs. Louis was accompanied by a local physician, who informed all, "I am a personal friend of Joe Louis." Interviewed by newshawks, Mrs. Louis said of her husband: "He never gets rowdy in the home. I sure wish I had his poise and calm."

Author Ernest Hemingway and William Allan Neilson, president-emeritus of Smith College, were appointed co-chairmen of the sponsoring committee to arrange the conference for Protection of Foreign Born. Keynoted Co-Chairman Neilson: "Noncitizens are being denied jobs and are being threatened with registration. More than 70 so-called anti-alien bills pending in the 76th Congress indicate the manner in which the attacks upon the freedom of the noncitizen can be used. . . ."

Kurt George Wilhelm Ludecke, onetime friend and subordinate of Adolf Hitler, had his application for U. S. citizenship turned down in a Detroit court, pending a future hearing. Reason: The judge had read Ludecke's I Knew Hitler, declared Author Ludecke "a cheap politician . . . dumb as an oyster in the shell . . . anti-everything."

Like a band of embattled brothers, up rose the Philadelphia Chamber of Commerce because of an alleged slur on Philadelphia's hotels. Casus belli: A Fred Allen radio program in which he and Program Guest Jack Haley reminisced about a little troupers' hotel in Philadelphia. Mused Haley: "My room was so small, when anyone opened the door, the doorknob got in bed with me." Allen: "My room was so small the mice were hump-backed."

Chosen head of a U. S. committee to aid in sending comfort kits to French soldiers, Mrs. Harrison Williams, Manhattan socialite, "best-dressed woman in the world," began taking lessons in knitting from the committee's treasurer.

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