Correspondence and receipts for purchases made on Gertrude Bass Warner's behalf [f2] [010]
Item
Title
Correspondence and receipts for purchases made on Gertrude Bass Warner's behalf [f2] [010]
Author
Ferguson, John C. (John Calvin), 1866-1945
Recipient
Warner, Gertrude Bass, 1863-1951
Date
1932-05-14
Identifier
UA022_b005_f003_043_046
Description
Correspondence between Gertrude Bass Warner and John Calvin Ferguson
Transcript:
3 Hsi-Chiao Hutung
Peping, China
May 14, 1932.
My dear Gertrude,
It was a very great pleasure and relief to receive your letter written at Tucson April 13th. I had had no reply to the letter which I sent you on November 18th of last year telling you that I was forwarding a copy of my new book until I received from the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank on March 11th a statement that they had been instructed by their San Francisco Office to pay me the sum of $300 sent by your good self. I did not write you when I received this money for the reason that I expected every day to have a letter from you and now that your letter has arrived I quite understand the reasons of your delay. You have surely had a hard winter and I should wish that we were near at hand so that we could express our sympathy with you in a more real manner than we can do by writing. We had not heard of the fall which you had in Belmont. At our age such accidents are no longer trifle and they need careful attention. You are so good to your mother and to all the members of your family that you never spare yourself. In this instance you should have been attending to your own trouble occasioned by the fall instead of making your plans so as to be with your mother and sister-in-law. However, by the time this reaches you I hope that you will be fully recovered. If not, by all means go to some quiet place where you can have the benefit of medicinal baths or Violet-ray treatments. It depends upon the nature of your trouble as to which of these two methods, the dry or the wet, will suit you best but surely either one of the other will be of great benefit to you. Both of them are remedies provided by nature and I am sure that you will have no hesitation in using one or the other.
I am glad that you like my book. Laufer of Chicago, Yetts of London and Pelliot of Paris all spoke highly of it. In China it is considered to be the most beautiful book that has ever been produced. It was the ambition of Mr. Kuo and myself to make a book which would be a worthy record of the beauties of the wonderful porcelains of the Sung, Yüan and Ming periods. If we are to have colored illustrations they should be as perfect as possible and those in our book seem to me to do justice to the beauty of the original objects. One of my artistic Chinese friends told me that he would as soon have a copy of this book as a collection of the porcelains themselves, for the illustrations in the book represented the objects perfectly and furthermore he could handle the book more easily than the objects.
Last year I published the second part of a supplement to the Catalogue of Bronzes in the collection of the emperor Ch’ien Lung and by parcel post I am sending you a copy of it. This collection contains all of the bronzes that are shown in the Government Museum. You will remember seeing some of them on the raised dais in the main building and the rest in the small building on the left hand side as you enter the enclosure. The leaflet which I am sending you herewith explains the way in which the great catalogue was produced. You can leave this book in the Library of your Museum or present it to the Library of the University just as you choose.
China has been having very hard times lately and the end does not yet seem in sight. I continue to hope for the best in the political reconstruction of the country but even if that does not come there is plenty to keep me busy in my literary and artistic studies. The last four years since I have been free from governmental responsibilities have been delightful to me. Peking is an ideal place for working and I am able to spend most of my working hours without interruption.
We are all well. Mary Jr. stands up under her work better than ever before. Her vacation in America was exactly what she needed not only to cure her trouble but to give her a reserve of strength. The two Marys join me in dearest love to yourself and hoping that this letter will you quite well again.
As ever,
John
End of transcript.
Transcribed by Tom Fischer.
Transcript:
3 Hsi-Chiao Hutung
Peping, China
May 14, 1932.
My dear Gertrude,
It was a very great pleasure and relief to receive your letter written at Tucson April 13th. I had had no reply to the letter which I sent you on November 18th of last year telling you that I was forwarding a copy of my new book until I received from the Hongkong and Shanghai Bank on March 11th a statement that they had been instructed by their San Francisco Office to pay me the sum of $300 sent by your good self. I did not write you when I received this money for the reason that I expected every day to have a letter from you and now that your letter has arrived I quite understand the reasons of your delay. You have surely had a hard winter and I should wish that we were near at hand so that we could express our sympathy with you in a more real manner than we can do by writing. We had not heard of the fall which you had in Belmont. At our age such accidents are no longer trifle and they need careful attention. You are so good to your mother and to all the members of your family that you never spare yourself. In this instance you should have been attending to your own trouble occasioned by the fall instead of making your plans so as to be with your mother and sister-in-law. However, by the time this reaches you I hope that you will be fully recovered. If not, by all means go to some quiet place where you can have the benefit of medicinal baths or Violet-ray treatments. It depends upon the nature of your trouble as to which of these two methods, the dry or the wet, will suit you best but surely either one of the other will be of great benefit to you. Both of them are remedies provided by nature and I am sure that you will have no hesitation in using one or the other.
I am glad that you like my book. Laufer of Chicago, Yetts of London and Pelliot of Paris all spoke highly of it. In China it is considered to be the most beautiful book that has ever been produced. It was the ambition of Mr. Kuo and myself to make a book which would be a worthy record of the beauties of the wonderful porcelains of the Sung, Yüan and Ming periods. If we are to have colored illustrations they should be as perfect as possible and those in our book seem to me to do justice to the beauty of the original objects. One of my artistic Chinese friends told me that he would as soon have a copy of this book as a collection of the porcelains themselves, for the illustrations in the book represented the objects perfectly and furthermore he could handle the book more easily than the objects.
Last year I published the second part of a supplement to the Catalogue of Bronzes in the collection of the emperor Ch’ien Lung and by parcel post I am sending you a copy of it. This collection contains all of the bronzes that are shown in the Government Museum. You will remember seeing some of them on the raised dais in the main building and the rest in the small building on the left hand side as you enter the enclosure. The leaflet which I am sending you herewith explains the way in which the great catalogue was produced. You can leave this book in the Library of your Museum or present it to the Library of the University just as you choose.
China has been having very hard times lately and the end does not yet seem in sight. I continue to hope for the best in the political reconstruction of the country but even if that does not come there is plenty to keep me busy in my literary and artistic studies. The last four years since I have been free from governmental responsibilities have been delightful to me. Peking is an ideal place for working and I am able to spend most of my working hours without interruption.
We are all well. Mary Jr. stands up under her work better than ever before. Her vacation in America was exactly what she needed not only to cure her trouble but to give her a reserve of strength. The two Marys join me in dearest love to yourself and hoping that this letter will you quite well again.
As ever,
John
End of transcript.
Transcribed by Tom Fischer.
Source
Gertrude Bass Warner Papers, 1879-1954
Repository
University of Oregon Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives
Institution
University of Oregon
Type
Text
Format
application/pdf
Rights
Rights Reserved - Free Access
Rights Holder
University of Oregon Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives