Marriage was a pretty trying business.

High-keyed, redhaired, green-eyed Cinemactress Greer Garson, pushing 40, told a judge that Actor Richard Ney, 28, had called her a "has-been." She got a quick divorce and left the courtroom sobbing as the flashbulbs popped.

Ripe-mouthed Hedy Lamarr found herself playing the understanding older woman. Back to his wife she sent 26-year-old Actor Mark Stevens (now appearing in I Wonder Who's Kissing Her Now), and freely told the press just how it went. "He is very young," explained Matron Lamarr, 32, "and I told him I thought he and Mrs. Stevens should try to make a go of their marriage. ... I talked to Mrs. Stevens . . . she sounds like a lovely person. . . ."

Burly-looking Actor Brian Donlevy's exwife, Marjorie, went to court to get his divorce from her set aside, and also to get a better property settlement this time, and $50,000 for her lawyer. One of her complaints was that Donlevy (now appearing in The Trouble with Women) had informed her "he had no energy for anything but his career."

Commentator Upton Close, whose fourth wife, Julia, lately sued him for divorce, complaining that he carried on with his secretary, sued back and made his own complaint. Julia was always interfering in his business affairs, said he, and, further, she had hit him a couple of times.

Sugar Heir John D. Spreckels Ill's wife, Lou Dell, was through with love. One month after the Spreckelses were jugged for whaling away at each other in the street (TIME, Sept. 1), Spreckels was picked up again, this time for going at Lou Dell hammer-&-tongs with a fireplace set. As soon as she got out of the hospital, disillusioned Lou Dell filed a suit for separation.

The Bended Knee

Awarded to stately Viscount Jowitt, 62, Britain's periwigged Lord Chancellor: an honorary LL.D., by New York University's School of Law.

Honored in Boston: Broadway Actress Ruth Gordon. On the Ritz-Carlton dessert list appeared a Coupe Rath Gordon.

Offered a friendly hand in Rome: Pius XII. But the air was so thick with ecclesiastical greetings when a camera clicked that the occasion came out bearing a remarkable resemblance to an unrehearsed square dance.

Camera-shy Albert Einstein was surrounded (from left to far left) by guests: grinning Editor Henry Agard Wallace, whose "courage and devotion" got Einstein's bravo; grinning Columnist Frank Kingdon, who got Wallace's endorsement for Senator from New Jersey; and grinning Singer Paul Robeson, who seconded Kingdon's nomination.

Staggered by the Artists League of America: Yankee Hitter Joe DiMaggio, who found himself on the league's list of "the ten most interesting faces in America." Long-jawed Joe's face, bubbled the artists, was "reminiscent of Modigliani's paintings." Among the other most interesting: Eleanor Roosevelt, Danny Kaye, Sinclair Lewis and Kate Smith. What made Singer Smith's face so interesting: its "simplicity, understanding and kindness."

The Furrowed Brow

"The shorter the skirt the better," was the feeling of shortage-minded Sir Stafford Cripps, Britain's Minister of Economic Affairs. But he added quickly that, of course, "there must be some limits."

"Cambridge houses," reported Hollywood Scenarist Donald Ogden Stewart after a visit to Boston's bluestocking suburb, "are different in many subtle ways, such as in the fact that the leaves of the editions of the classics in Cambridge homes have often been cut."

"I believe that those who can count more dogs among their friends than cats," wrote Actor James Mason in a felicitous thesis for the New York Times, "lean more also toward doglike characteristics in their human friends. They like hearty extraverts and children--people, in fact, who wag their tails and bark."

"I don't believe the atom bomb Is a good weapon," concluded Physicist Sir Charles Darwin (grandson of the original), after some thought. His feeling about it: too inconvenient against scattered troops--and nobody would use the thing anyway, for fear of getting one back.

The Calloused Hand

Secretary of Commerce W. Averell Harriman and brother Roland decided not to deliver any more milk. Dropped because of rising production costs (materials and labor) : deliveries to 2,000-odd rural doorsteps from the Harrimans' commercial dairy in Arden, N.Y.

Lieut. General Ira C. Eaker, recently retired as deputy commander of the U.S. Air Forces, got the first civilian job of his 51 years: vice president of storm-tossed Millionaire Howard Hughes's placid Hughes Tool Co.

Corinne Griffith, melting beauty ("The Orchid of the Screen") of silent movies, was ready for a new career as an authoress this week. Her literary work: a ten-year history of the Washington Redskins football team (owner: husband George Preston Marshall).

Albert E. Hays Jr., 27, a startling nine-day wonder in 1939, turned out to be turning out all right, despite his unpromising start. As a college boy he had won national fame by swallowing 42 goldfish (washed down with chocolate soda); he then dropped out of sight. This week he was looking for a house in West Hartford, Conn, to settle down as boss of emergency messages for the American Radio Relay League (radio "hams"). Nobody held his past against him, and he never touched the stuff any more.

Just Folks

Princess Elizabeth was assured a packed house for her wedding procession. Sold out a month in advance: all the window space in all the buildings along the route from Buckingham Palace to Westminster Abbey--three-quarters of a mile.

The Duchess of Kent, beauteous widowed sister-in-law of George VI, was assured transportation in fuel-short Britain, come what may. She bought herself a bicycle (and two more for her son and daughter).

Hamid Reza Pahlevi, the Shah of Persia's disappearing 16-year-old brother (TIME, July 7, Sept. 29), was at it again. A week after the student prince materialized in Hollywood (after vanishing from a Washington, D.C. school), he vanished again, this time with brother Mahmoud's Cadillac convertible. Police picked him up in nearby Burbank, Calif., quickly passed him back to Mahmoud, who quickly passed him back to Washington (by air) for a fresh start.

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