[Williston burned down on Sat Dec 22, 1917, and Jan 7 was a Monday in 1918, both of which help to date this letter.]Jan. 7 - Monday
Dear Dr. Clapp:-
I'm so sleepy that I've been asleep once, but yet I want to say I was glad to hear from you. I knew you wouldn't "fuss" over losing your belongings, I knew you'd mention what Sedgwick calls our "high opportunity" - but all the same I was glad to hear from you. I don't know what Ann may have written you, but you'll forgive repetitions.
We're getting on. I meet my classes in the art building where I can get a reflectoscope for two periods. The other hour I am there in another room when I talk plain, but tomorrow I go to Shattuck, chasing a reflectoscope further. That's the only way I have of getting ocular demonstration just now - can't get away from the idea that it's necessary to see something.
Ann had laboratory the first day, also Lu, both in Assembly Hall which makes a first rate place, with good-looking tables made by Mr. Stacey and with plenty of light from drop lights and daylight. I've had a little lab. today in Room 4 Mary Lyon - that big basement room. It's far from ideal, but it's better than nothing.
Most of my time seems to go to architects! Mr. Coxe of Skinner I wrote you about, I think. He was a godsend, even if irregular! He has spent another half day with me, in which he told me how he plays with Parker in Cambridge and lives in Asa Gray's old house. Ever hear of one Riddle before Asa Gray? He lived in the house, and there are still evidences of the arrangements he had to escape unwelcome visitors, also of Asa Gray's occupancy in mahogany herbarium cases &c. Mr. Coxe is a nice man. Today Mr. Price, architect of S.A.H. has been here most of the time, also anxious to work for us. We trotted around in an icy rain and sleet, deadly slippery, and surveyed sites. He's nice too - a cousin of the Arthur H. Thomas we have traded with in Phil. and cognizant of paraffin baths and such. But it does my soul good to have these men talk to us, not simply to Miss Woolley and Mr. Adams! 'Tis as it should be - but 'tisn't always so! We cultivate it carefully, for though this is all vague now, sometime it will not be so. The people (Mr. A-, Miss Woolley &c) have been very considerate and square. They tell us in detail about insurance &c. We're to mark all bills for "replacement fund" so these purchases will not get mixed up with others - which is fair. The insurance was based on that 1916 inventory we struggled so over. I get left on money for that was just the time of division and I tried to give Ann the full share every time. Consequently my stock was low then. I've added much since which wasn't insured at all. Also all the salvage came from mine - a real advantage though I get some stuff in greater abundance than I should buy just now. My insurance remainder is only $1100, but they've given me an extra 500.00 and I'll get on. Don't have to buy everything this minute even if I want to! I've urged my rich cousin to give me 5000.00 but he may not do it! He's getting richer off the war, being in steel stock. Ann and Miss Stokey and Miss Talbot get a lot on the museum - not more than they will need, goodness knows, but enough to make them freer now in buying. But I'll not have to buy as many chemicals or as much glassware as if it were earlier in the year. The Harv. app. will be my big bill. I only hope I can get the stuff! I'm going to buy microscopes, too, for they have to come soon and we can get the old price now. B. & L. is just rising from 34.80 to 42.60 - and I prefer the former price!
A Holyoke M.D. (woman) has given us a skeleton mounted and a head. (bones?). The former is female and is short a pair of ribs, by freak. Now if it were male - one might talk of Adam &c. There is also a heart model said to be broken. We await the arrival of these eagerly!
Ann had lots of things offered her - e.g. Britten offers 1500 insects all named. She can get stuff from the Smithsonian undoubtedly, and from the N.Y. museum. Mr. Hovey comes soon and we are eager to talk with him. I want some bones for my dep't! You know I'm fond of them! Oh, I found pictures of my cat and my sloth yesterday - and they looked charming to me! I thought pictures as well as bones were all gone. That's pure sentiment - but I was glad to see them all the same. You've no idea how crazy I am to begin on slides! And life is never going to be long enough to do it! It seems as if I had to make lots of things - I know I could, if only there were a few extra years somehow. But just now we're at other jobs.
Yes - some of the things you say are true - there's a tremendous stimulus in it all. We'll get out of it somehow - lots of things will be better, if only we sieze [sic] our opportunity - but I'm scared some, for there is so little time to reflect on what is the real opportunity, by reason of the necessity of doing things now, and by reason of such interruptions as Mr. Price's visit, very important but yet not of the immediately necessary. I want a few days to think and there ain't no days! Can't remember when I wrote you last, before or after Boston trip. I had a fine time with Mead at Providence, with Dr. Porter, with Bremer of med. school, with Bates of Tufts med., with Miss Robertson - I must have written you some I think. Oh yes, Sedgwick. He is a lordly creature! But very friendly.
These lights will go out in a minute. Good night, and lots of love to you. No - I'm not the only one who values your departed "stuff". Here's a letter from a girl. Don't know how well you knew her. The moderns aren't all like Helen Vincent - it may be "Good", but they appreciate what is lost, some of 'em at least. But if we can keep the spirit - the things don't matter.
Love to you -
Abby