London, May 15, 1928.Dear all of you, at 101,
There is a half hour before I toot into the city to see Thos. Cook & son about my ticket to Bombay & to dine with a nice English lady at her club! So here goes!
First - thank you all muchly for all you sent to the steamer, gifts & letters. I'm going to be perfectly honest & tell you the whole story, 'cause it's humorously tragic! The package from S. S. Pierce, arrived in excellent condition with pickled limes & salted nuts. But alas, I ate 2 nuts & nibbled 1 pickled lime the 1st night, at just the moment when stability was leaving me, with the result that I didn't want to look a lime in the face the whole voyage! I was sick the whole way, worse luck, & we didn't have particularly rough weather either. The nuts I brot [sic] ashore intact, & we've all been enjoying them in this household. The limes I gave to the steward who beamed up on them.
The other package arrived empty. It was labelled "book" & had 8 cents postage & was sure you had mailed "Red Rust" in it, but somebody reaped the benefit before it reached me. Isn't it maddening!
Your letters I could appreciate, & did, muchly. I loved all the family gossip & everything. What was the letter "from Skeezix"? I didn't get any. Do tell me what has happened to him & to Smitty. Do whatevery you like with the Examiner & Household Guest. I hope they won't flood you out of house & home. Poor Sandy, I do hope he is better.
We reached Plymouth on the 6th, took the train for London at 7.30 & reached the city at 1 A.M. My telegram had miscarried; at the place where I had been instructed to go in case of emergency I could rouse no one, & I finally went to a dingy old hotel sponsored by the taxi man! It wasn't so worse, but I woke next morning sick as a dog & was due to meet Miss Wiltshire at the London School of Medicine for Women at 11. It was a lovely warm day but I was fairly reeling on the street & thot [sic] I'd lose my last night's dinner at any moment. The dizziness & nausea hung on for days & I finally decided that it was a "touch of the sun" thru my eyes. Folks who've been in India are supposed to be much more sensitive but it does seem ridiculous when I never had it there. That last day nearing Plymouth, I was so keen to see some green land that I stood for hours on the top deck peering & peerking thru the glare which really was terrific over the water. I'm going to get some dark glasses at the first possible moment.
The letter Miss Wiltshire had sent, changing the meeting time hadn't reached me since I'd gone to a hotel instead of to the proper address & I found that she had already gone back to Bristol. I hope to spend next Sunday there with her.
May 19.
I must finish this & get it off or you'll think I'm dead & gone. One letter home & a bread-&-butter one to N.Y. are absolutely all that have gone to the U.S.A. since I left. And I had expected to do almost nothing else on shipboard!
Your letter of the 6th came last night, Conky, & I was most awfully glad to have it. Dear old Sandy, that was a shock. I am ever so sorry. Mrs. Kelly must be frightfully lonely daytimes. Do get her another - a wee one, & then he needn't be expected to live up to Sandy all at once.
Congratulations on your biochem practicals, both of you. Did you get A on your first one, too Madeleine? You'll be having gobs of spare time this month, with no physiol. lab & your biochem all done. And no final exam in biochem, I'll bet, for either of you! I hope you'll tell me the date of your prelims, Conky, when you know them, & Rufus's. If you don't get a letter from me you'll know I'm thinking of you heaps & wishing you the very best, and the same to you, Madeleine, for your physiology exam. If you can get hold of an extra copy from Miss Brackett, I'd love to see it.
I forgot completely where I am when I get onto all those things! Well, I sent my letter of introduction to Sherrington, Bancroft & Evans asking for dates. Sherrington has not deigned to reply! Bancroft set last Sat. & suggested that if I could be there for his lecture at 9. o'clock, I "would have the interesting experience of hearing Professor Pavlov talk for the last 15 minutes." You can bet I was there for the whole show! It was great fun. About 200 undergrads, mostly medics, including some 15-20 women packed the lecture room, & when Prof. Bancroft entered, in his gown, they all stamped him in. They also stamped every time anyone entered late! (Better start that at Harvard!)
Bancroft is a ripping lecturer. No notes, very informal (unlike Dr. Bremer!), clear & interesting. He was on respiration, referring frequently of course, to high altitudes. I should love to get his whole series. It was fun to have him refer to L. J. Henderson's nomograms in connection with respiration, & tell the tale of 2 physiologists who almost became estranged because one argued that Henderson's nomograms were very simple, the other that they were not! Henderson, by the way, is in this country right now, giving a series of 6 lectures at University College, London.
At 9.45 Bancroft stepped out & ushered in Pavlov & an interpreter who turned out to be Amep, now in the dept. at Cambridge. Pavlov is a dear little old man with snow white hair & beard, flashing blue eyes, a bit frail but full of spirit. He talked in Russian & it was maddening not to be able to understand him directly, for he got so "het up" & twinkly. Once the audience was so entranced by watching him & apparently looked so intelligent, that he forgot that we weren't understanding & went on & on & on, the poor interpreter growing more & more despairing he finally had to interrupt him. Whereupon, Pavlov threw up his hands & laughed & laughed & the class stamped & clapped & shook with mirth. He talked about the value of individual, continued experimental work to doctors & to teachers, & about the harm done by anti-vivisectionists to science. (They're much more vociferous & potent here & in Russia than in our country, I judge.) But he made it perfectly clear that work should be done without needless suffering to the animal.
There was a Philippino there who was at Harvard last year, Dr. Pascual. I hadn't known him well but it was fun to meet him there. Prof. Bancroft took me first to the physiol. lab, where I stayed sometime oting apparatus & methods, & getting a lot of information about the scheme of things from the "lady demonstrator" who was running the lab. Then to the Histology lab where I listened to a bit of a lecture on the spinal ganglia & got a lot more information from the man there. They do a good bit of technique. (Wish I had had time to get in that, too!) Then to biochem where I found Dr. Cole, the man in charge, in an inner room practicing golf strokes! They do a good lot more in biochem practical than we did at Harvard & they do not use Folin's methods. All three subjects (???) are run in together & called physiology & they give all their time for 2 years to that & anatomy. You can imagine I am trembling in my shoes already in anticipation of teaching it all!
On Wednesday at Evans' invitation, I went to University College, London, & got in on the demonstrations at the Harvey tercentenuary which is being celebrated this week. The best was a film prepared by Lewis & Dale, which, after a bit of an introduction presenting the "circulatory background" on which Harvey had to build, repeated his original experiments with lots from his own writing interpolated. It was being exhibited to the Royal Society of Physicians & there were many distinguished white-haired foreigners present. The film was most impressive & thrilling. I hoep it will reach the U.S.A. so that you all can see it. Sir Thomas Lewis, the capillary man, was to have given some demonstrations afterwards, but was absent on account of illness.
Afterwards, Evans put me on to Dr. D. T. Harris, who seems to be most responsible for the teaching end of things at Univ. College & he was most helpful, more so than any other one person.
In the afternoon I went ot the London School of Medicine for Women when friends of "Willie's" showed me around & I pumped them too. Oh, I forgot to say that I sat next to Dr. Winifred Cullis during the movie. She was quite jovial, but I could easily see how Miss Turner got her impression, & I felt that I would prefer to ask my question of the lesser lights! They emphasize Histology very much there.
I also got into touch with some scientific book sellers who, I am, sure [sic] will meet my needs much better than Broadbent can. It's a shame, after Broadbent went to all the trouble of giving me the prices on a huge list of books. I'll try to order soem American ones from him anyhow.
This week-end I was to have spent partly in Yorkshire, visiting a nice Scotch doctor friend from Madras, & partly at Bristol with Miss Wiltshire, but alas, it has all been cancelled because I developed a beastly cold (due to the beastly English climate!!) & Mrs. Leith called the doctor yesterday. Said doctor put me to bed & said I must stay till tomorrow anyway (that's why I'm writing such a long letter!) & that I cannot think of starting to Denmark before Wed. That is sad, for I had planned to go Mon., but I'm sure it's wise to be as fit as possible before tackling the sea again after the Atlantic experience. I wish you all were here to convince these folks who've seen me only in India or when I was here on my way home, that I really was fit in the U.S.A! They find it very hard to believe just now. Goodness knows how many of my precious lbs. I lost on (or in) the Atlantic! Isn't it maddening!
The two little girls in the house here are great company. Dorothy, aged 7, has read the whole of "When We Were Very Young" to me & reads it exquisitely. Kiddies get the rhythm better than grown-ups, I think.
Conky, will you tell Miss Ingalls that I got her letter & hope to answer it in the Red Sea or somewhere; & Betty Bright that I love the Boston etchings & her nice newsy letter & am going to write her soon. If you care to show her this, I shouldn't mind. I do mean to write Dr. Redfield about the places to which he introduced me but goodness knows when it will be done. Miss Turner is another to whom I want to write soon. Would you please share this with her? Ever so much love to each of you, & to Doorothy.