Letter from M. Carey Thomas to Mary Elizabeth Garrett, January 05, 1892

Dearest Mary, I wonder what has happened to your letters; yesterday I received your note of Dec 13th, enclosing my letter with the Brown Shipley seal although it seems to have been in New York since Dec 24 and today your little scrap of a note on the 23rd saying you left Venice on the 26th, mainly about the Venice chromolithographs, so you see for over two weeks I have had nothing and it was a little provoking because even if you had time to do no more you might have sent a note to say happy Christmas or happy New Year, or many returns of the day on Jan 2nd. Of course your letter to Mamie came the day after Christmas and I was much pleased by that. Some roses came and your very sweet Christmas card and a darling little Dante which I shall do myself the honour of reading through next SUmmer but none of these was a letter and I made up my mind you were displeased about my GÇ£unopened and unreadGÇ¥ letter and did not intend to write. I was consequently dismayed to think of the avalanche you had received from me Christmas and New Years and photographic and concluded not to write myself so I let Dec 27th pass and Jan 2nd. Yesterday came your little note of Dec 13 and I am sorry - if it had arrived in time I should have written. I am very sorry you minded my note and very grateful to you forgiving me the chance of thinking twice. I enclose a part of the same letter - details you may wish to know and I may not have time to write out again out of date though they are I hope you will approve of sending the letter I sent you. If one thing now gives them a chance for a fight we shall lose and we cannot elect our Trustees Dixon and Laurie Riggs until after Feb 1st. Moreover Mr. Gilman has sent a formal letter demanding to be made a Trustee in such a way that it looks as if a refusal would mean his resignation. I spent at least -+ of my holidays over the horrid thing and it is dreadful to be involved in such backstairs politics. Your calculation seems to me based on land which does not yield 5% and to take no account of taxes but I will go over it later in more detail. I am writing in great haste to catch the mail and am so distressed you are wretched. Please move about till you find a place that suits you and try not to get blue and I will try to help not to hinder. I hope I usually do. Now goodnight and goodbye. I wish we were in that Christmas gondola tonight and that you could tell me you forgive everything as I forgive you. This is the merest scrawl. Lovingly yours Minnie C Th By the way my red wrapper would do charmingly for a photo - only I am afraid I shall not like any one except a Holyer or a Cox unless you can find an aesthetic photographer in Venice still if you are to be in Italy this winter you had better try and remember to send me my Holyer, too. But I do not believe you will be so anymore. All you say about your servants and your two establishments is of course true and your photos I like you to have. By the way you ought I think to have pho. albums for all your photo. for on Thanksgiving day I got Mamie to come with me and we looked over them to found the Braun numbers of some Michelangelo drawings I wished to order and also to find your Sistine Chapel photos I found that some of the loose photo had got wedged in the cracks of the flaps of your wooden divisions and were bent. However they will not be disturbed again I suppose till you return. The Sistine photos I could not find. If you can get Miss McDowell to find them I will have them catalogued. The case under the bookcase between the two Monument St windows at the end of the room I could not finish exploring so they may be there. Julia and your aunts had left long ago and the uninhabited gloom I prefer was regnant [sic] in your sitting room but all the exhaustion of those last two evenings I was in Baltimore before you sailed came back upon me and I thought of how we had lain at either end of the window seat that last night in utter exhaustion and if my surprise to find when I moved beside you and you laid your hand in mine that tired as I was - well that I was not too tired to care. I am growing more and more satisfied with your decision to stay away for if associations have such a power to lure me who am strong you could scarcely have failed to feel them much more strongly. Now I will first get over the details I want to touch on before I come to the chief part of my letter. I must remove the aspersion from Mr. Marshall. He answered my letter most politely by the next mail and told me what I wished, saying he had GÇ£misunderstoodGÇ¥. A woman from Pilsbury wrote to know about $15 subscription to Med Sch and if it too has been forwarded to Camilla. At the Freshman entertainment Katie Lueiman on very low evening dress danced adorably a minuet looking like a vision of beauty. Her head is set on her shoulders charmingly. Miss Fowler, a great friend of Miss Lueimans [sic] is here, a Virginian and Ra SzoldtGÇÖs daughter from Baltimore is here. Dr. Warren my Isle of Shoals physiologist is a very agreeable witty talker, a man of the world as well as the first physiological chemist - so Dr. Bowditch and Stanley Hall of Clark say - in this country - so for a prof. I like him GÇ£immenselyGÇ¥ Personally I do not like or know any prof. You may be absolutely sure of that. Dr. Loeb my German Jew is a genius, a gentleman, charming, and a physiological psychologist - just what I wanted - who admires JamesGÇÖ psychology as much as I do. His wife is also very intelligent and a lady. Our physicist, a Canadian, Dr. MacKensie is one of the best diners out I know any where and Dr. Fontaine our Romance prof is the most finished of Jesuits educated with the priests at St. Sulpice; he is not only so far a very successful teacher of French but a most well read intelligent talker on every subject. Every Thursday we give a dinner of 4 or 6 and in this way I am getting to know our new men. My efforts this year to get gentlemen as well as scholars have been so crowned with success that I am rather overwhelmed at having 8 agreeable well bred gentlemen added to the Faculty. Mamie HowardGÇÖs first cousin Morgan is most attractive too and our Semetic prof Barton is exactly what I longed for. His lectures on the Bible are a triumph to have delivered here. Altogether so far I am most pleased and consider they are at least something to show for my wasted Summer. Another $5000 to the lab. came in last week from Mr ______, a Philadelphian. Miss OslerGÇÖs engagement to Dr. Abbot who has accepted a call to Philadelphia is announced, and there is said to be another over there - prob Miss Hampton and Dr. Robb - not yet out. Bessie has been ill ever since Sunday, allowed to see no one till today when I saw her. It is grippe Osler says. When she is really ill in bed I cannot help loving her again. She is heart and soul with us in this med. matter and we have not had a ripple of disagreement. Anything that is proposed she will carry out. The building still blocks the way and this week Bessie Mamie and I have agreed on this and I have talked to Father and Cousin Frank and Mamie to Mr. Gwinn - to keep out Gilman from board of trustees for he is determined to be elected and abstractly of course should be and put in Dixon, to limit building to $150,000 including architectGÇÖs fees and everything. We have raised about 25,000. Then I have done what I can to stir up Mr. King on Med. Sch. and he is to meet hospital drs. Monday, but Gilman blocks all progress. He is [de]termined your 100,000 shall lapse. After the meeting Monday week we can try afresh. I enclose Mr. GwinnGÇÖs statement. It is strictly confidential. They will sell their B&O [illegible] and realise $60,000 in addition, but you see the misery of it is that their [sic] is a solid majority and all Mr. GilmanGÇÖs influence against opportunity any of this to the Med. Sch, and they have bound themselves by vows not to open without $500,000. After the next meeting we shall know where we stand better. At least one more vote will be secured for us when we know exactly what we wish. I had a long interview with Mr. Pennington and as Fergusons [sic] bid was $1000 lower than any one elseGÇÖs much to my regret that I had to accept it. It is $3500 to be paid when work accepted and I made Mr. Pennington put in a time clause. The work is to be done in 60 days and $10 a day forfeited for every day over that time I will send you the contract as soon as made out. We had decided to go ahead with our injunction and I have got George Carey to associate with himself Mr. Arthur George Brown who everyone says stands exceedingly well before the bar. The case will be tried before your drunkard of a former friend Judge Dennis and we are waiting now for Bruins opinion I told George we could not go in unless we were sure to win. I was afraid what you could about Dr. Ginter extended to his brother the real estate agent, although I can scarcely believe it. And so told George we wished Mr. Ball only asked whether he would go in with us. The large block of houses directly behind the mill is being erected by the brother not Mr. Goucher. The chimneys are capped and look fine and draw gloriously no soot, nothing except draft and blaze. My school accounts are not yet in order but I see that last year we cleared only a few hundred, if that, over the balance of $5000 and something we began the year with. This we can return to you of course but alas no rent. I am going to cut down expenses in every way this year and see if that was not an exceptional year. The yard is crowded with children all day long Lee tells me - they are there all day long and Sat. and every afternoon till it is dark. I completely lost my temper with my expert bookkeeper the other day and I trust the result will be the books at last. He is terrible slow - and never seems to arrive [cut off] [GarrettGÇÖs writing] Mem. In my last letter from Mr. Nitze (23 Nov) he says GÇ£Miss Thomas writes me that for certain reasons she prefers that her outlays of the SchoolGÇÖs Funds $1000 paid to Mr. Fraser, and the account of duty and charges me 3 cases ex. [B---illegible] should not be refunded now to her. She says she has written you why. When did you write about this? Yours M.E.G. [ThomasGÇÖs writing] I certainly did write you why - I cannot complicate my accounts and in a week or two we can have a grand settlement and I will return you the last deposits you have made - subtracting these amounts or if you prefer you can then give me cheques.