Letter from M. Carey Thomas to Mary Elizabeth Garrett, September 08, 1888

Dearest Mary, Lest you should think my letters are like uncontinued shilling dreadfuls I must write you a few lines about Bessie. When I saw her in the middle of my letter to you - the last one - she was in bed looking more ill than I have seen her for two years, scarcely able to breathe and frightened too (which was so hard to see). But the pneumonia has been arrested and she will be up tomorrow. Dr. Price has told the family that during this attack while she has been looking like a shadow her lung has made wonderful progress - and they believe him! Annie is about the house as usual but she cannot drive or walk at all. The most undisguised melancholy pervades the house; and Mrs. Hawley is in mourning for her husband who died a month ago; and the PricesG�� cottage is closed since old Mrs. Price died there two weeks ago. Today MotherG��s friend was Dr. Williams was buried - Poor Temperance work in Baltimore. Her daughter whom she loved so devotedly was in Europe too. I am ashamed of this catalogue. I have not been thinking of what I have been writing as they are all talking childrenG��s nonsense - for it is too cold to sit away from the open fires. I am a great deal better; for two days I have been free from backache for the first time since MotherG��s death, two months last Sunday. I am very much encouraged as yesterday I sat up all day and took a 3 hours horse back ride without bad effects. I have been reading your Shelley with the greatest attention; his letters are very far from being the letters of a Shelley and that unfortunate jarring throughout his and MaryG��s letters in regard to Claire appearing in a thousand Protean shapes ends by affecting oneG��s nerves painfully. How charming scientific books are. I wish to do a little such reading every week to enlarge my horizons. I have been re-reading Peres et Enfants and it recalls the time ten years ago when it affected me so that I could scarcely read it. Nellie knows nothing about the differences of 2 generations and reads it like a fairy tale. The children have seemed devoted to me this summer. I think unconsciously they have turned to me with a little of the love for which there is now no channel. I wonder where my channel will be found. I wish it could be found in being good, without a theology. Do you think love reabsorbs, the heartlessness of poets to the contrary - GǣThou are the grave where buried love doth live, hung with the trophies of my lovers goneGǥ and Mrs. BrowningG��s GǣI love thee with the love I seemed to lose with my lost saintsGǥ? We go down for good next Friday and today I wrote six letters to butchers bakers and candlestick makers about the school. Davis is to have the school house all cleaned by the 13th but I doubt if Miss Andrews arrives if she sails from Antwerp on the 1st. The enormous size of the classrooms is very discouraging - our present mathematics room is 15 x 20 and it is not large enough for 100 children. Of course it may be impossible to get the mere size of classrooms and school room in a $30,000 building. Since I have been at work with my 2 foot rule spaces look larger than I thought. 62 children are entered for next year. And I read Miss Andrews letter to Nellie I thought what a poor little creature our secretary was! What a dreary, inefficient little personage. How I wish we had not renewed her engagement. It was not your fault; it was our cowardice only. We do not deserve one new child. Alas, my shilling dreadful has turned into the merest prosing - Shelley is ever Mrs. Shelley (whose letters are even worse than his) would have acquitted himself better than this. I do not discover a Claire in my letter but the school at least merits the abusive name of Godwin. His name in a letter is always followed, or when he signs preceded by, a long array of figures. Horrid wretch! Goodnight dear Mary - their wrist is over and my fire is low. I think of you and wish to see you and hope that you are as well as could be expected and taking care of yourself. Please do. Yours in haste and cold, Minnie C. Th