May 17, 1984

The House of Representatives adopted a compromise proposal tonight that would keep the MX missile in the nation's arsenal but in a significantly reduced and restricted form. The vote, on a major amendment, was 229 to 199. Earlier, in a test vote, the House defeated an attempt to eliminate all financing for the construction of new missiles in the fiscal year beginning Oct. 1 - $2.7 billion for 30 missiles. With the outcome in doubt until the final seconds, that amendment lost by 218 to 212. The winning tally in that vote included 146 Republicans and 72 Democrats. Only 18 Republicans defected from President Reagan and joined 194 Democrats in voting to knock out the entire amount.

It was exactly 100 years ago today - in the days when the streets of New York were filled with gas lamps and horse-drawn carriages - that a wealthy young woman named Elizabeth H. Cullum stood at the upper reaches of Central Park and unveiled the cornerstone for a structure that would change the direction of health care. On that day Mrs. Cullum, a cousin of Mr. and Mrs. John Jacob Astor, dedicated the foundation for the New York Cancer Hospital, the forerunner of the Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center and the first hospital in the country to be designed exclusively for the treatment and cure of cancer. To celebrate that event, a United States postage stamp is being issued today to honor health research. And at the precise moment - 4 P.M. - that the old cornerstone was unveiled. the institution will conduct academic ceremonies for this year's graduate students.

A GROWING number of small specialty shops have been springing up in Manhattan. These emporiums, with a sense of their own style, offer a new and enticing array of home furnishings, practical and fanciful, affordable and extravagant. The shops, several of which have opened in recent weeks, are situated around town from Madison Avenue to Chelsea. They provide browsers and shoppers with places in which to make discoveries. But each in its own way reflects a distinctive point of view and all are marked by the personal passions and longtime interests of their adventurous owners. Jehed Diamond practiced law; Andy Sichel was a painter. Both of them were interested in functional art. One day, the two friends came across a book on the early- 20th-century Omega Workshops in England. Omega had ''a painterly approach that was very concerned with showing the hand that made the piece,'' said Miss Diamond, who with Mr. Sichel decided to open a gallery and shop that would present objects that would ''break down the boundaries between crafts, architecture, fine art and design.''

The Reagan Administration has reportedly developed a plan to send some military equipment to El Salvador secretly through the Central Intelligence Agency. The plan, submitted this month, was blocked by the House Intelligence Committee, according to members of Congress and Administration officials. The lawmakers said the committee had objected on the ground that the plan appeared to circumvent aid limits set by Congress. The chairman, Representative Edward P. Boland, a Massachusetts Democrat, was reportedly angered and told William J. Casey, the Director of Central Intelligence, that the committee would not tolerate the shipments.

Senator Jesse Helms found himself in the center of a controversy among his Senate colleagues today as he vehemently denied that he had disclosed information from the Senate intelligence committee. The North Carolina Republican, a leading Senate conservative and an advocate of strong military forces, had been rebuked by Senator Barry Goldwater of Arizona, the chairman of the committee, and by Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan of New York, the vice chairman. They accused Mr. Helms of disclosing committee information about covert election aid the Central Intelligence Agency gave to Jose Napoleon Duarte, the President-elect of El Salvador. Rebukers Are Challenged Mr. Helms challenged Senators Goldwater and Moynihan to substantiate their charges that he had violated the Senate rules by disclosing information obtained from the committee. The two Senators had made their charges in a letter of rebuke, hand-delivered to the Senate majority and minority leaders. Mr. Helms said no one had spoken to him about the charges.