Top Heavy with Rank
Tokyo, Japan
Mary dear:
Three cheers for you! I think the news of you in Sallie’s last letter1 perfectly fine. Is there any thing special I can get you for the grand occasion over here? And that reminds me – you know you can get such wonderful Irish lace in China, and do tell me if it will be out of style at home next year, for if so I’ll not get any, but if you say it will still be all right I’ll indulge, for it is certainly a temptation. I bought some not long ago, the inch wide insertion with roses and shamrocks every couple of inches, for 12 cents a yard.
I suppose the Angel has told you that I am contemplating entering the bonds of matrimony. Of course it is a deep, dark secret but I do hope you & Artie approve, and today I had my first blow! There’s been a naval officer who is pursuing me. He was an old bean of mine at Annapolis and now is in the Philippines, where I had rather strenuous times with him. He’s just been ordered to China and still seems to cling to the hope that I’ll marry him when we get to Shanghai. Well today I got a letter from him enclosing a perfectly beautiful Irish lace collar, the long, deep kind and wanting to know my next address here as he had just got me an Irish lace parasol cover, a hat, bag, collar and cuffs, and 37 piece luncheon set! And wanted to send them right on! I don’t know whether I like being engaged, for it breaks my heart to think of losing out on all those things.
Do you wonder? However I guess it’s worth it for my true love is really a dear and I’m anxious for you both to know him. He spends all spare time reading histories and Memoirs of Grant, Sherman, etc. You know my fondness for such studies, don’t you?
Oh! You would revel in the shops here. Never have I known a place where it is so easy to get clothes. The tailor comes to your room, say in the afternoon, you select your samples, give him a picture of how you want your dress made and presto – next morning you can wear it complete, even with hand embroidery over the whole thing. The best of all is the bill, which is so little sometimes I am ashamed not to give them more. I just had a white cotton voile made, elaborately embroidered, about ten yards of Irish lace and the making, cloth and everything included came to eight dollars!
We’ve been here only two weeks but are doing society rather strenuously. So far sight seeing is a mere side issue. The people are lovely. There are a good many foreigners, and the dinners, etc. are quite top heavy with rank – Barons and Baronesses, Imperial Princesses, admirals who won high honors in the J. Russian war, etc. etc. The next week we go into the interior – Kyoto, Nara, and all around there. Will be here about two months, then over to Korea and China. When we get to Tientsin my lover is going to get leave and come up to see me.
I haven’t told you much about the “interesting customs of Japan” have I, but I have to talk about that so much that now I felt I must ramble on just as I wanted to; will tell you that later in my next epistle. Am crazy to hear from you and don’t forget to write right away about the Irish lace or I’ll miss my chance. c/o U.S. Consul General, Hongkong, China from now on. Did you get the waist I sent you?
May 8, 1913 Alice
1 Mary must be pregnant with Sarah Stewart Hinckley
You mustn’t picture the missionary type
Yokohama, Japan
Sallie dearest:
Isn’t this paper fascinating? It comes by the bolt so you can write just as much as you choose and then simply tear it off. The Japanese have it this way because, as you know, they write up and down instead of across.
We stopped a day at Nagasaki and one at Kobe. We went ashore both places, but there was not any thing to do but take a ricksha and ride around. We got here Friday and I think will stay a couple of weeks. Your letter was here telling of your going to England. I think it is fine, and am anxious to hear all your plans about getting ready etc. Am going to risk sending this letter home, for the “Korea” leaves on the 3rd, so this ought to reach you by the 25th, and I thought you wouldn’t leave home before the first of June anyhow. When you do get to England, if you put “via Siberia” on my letters I think we’ll get them more quickly, and I’ll do the same on yours.
There was such a nice woman, Mrs. Chandler, on the steamer from Manila. We had the stateroom together and got quite chummy. She’s a Smith graduate, just Mary’s age1, and since her husband died three years ago she’s been teaching here in Japan. You mustn’t picture the missionary type for she is far from that – dresses beautifully and is heaps of fun. She spent the night with me and the next day after we got in and took me around to show me the best dress makers, shops etc. She lives in Tokyo and on Saturday I’m going up to go with her to a real Japanese dinner. She and I will be the only foreigners, and will have to eat with chopsticks.
Who has rented the house – is it Mr. Savage, and who is he? I have a hazy idea that he is a music teacher in Pittsburgh – is that right? It is very cool here now and it seems so good to be wearing a dark suit. I am in a chronic state of feeling dressed up. We got here just in time to see the cherry blossoms. They were wonderful, and now the purple and white wisteria are in their glory. I have been out to tea several times, and tomorrow father and I go out to a luncheon and a dinner. Things are about the same as they were when we were here nine years ago, although this place seems a little more foreign, more big stone buildings, etc. This is the nearest I can come to writing you and Shang a steamer letter, but I’ll be thinking of you and crazy to hear that you have landed safely in London town. With oceans of love for you both and all sorts of wishes for a good time and the best of trips.
Alice April 29 [1913]
1 Born 1883
Lovely Ideas and Fine Ambitions
Pacific Mail S.S. Co.
S.S. Persia
[April 18, 1913 – about]
Angel dearest:
At last I have made the fatal leap and have promised to marry for better or worse, for richer or poorer and Barton Garey is the one I’ve chosen for my soul mate. I really think I love him very seriously and expect to love him more every minute for he is such a dear and so strong and has such lovely ideas and fine ambitions. I’ll tell you more as time goes on, but am so crazy to know if you approve. Father was killing, and when he told me Barton had asked him and I asked how he felt – “Thunderation” he said “I’m not going to marry him – you’re the one that must settle that.” This of course so surprised me I hardly knew what to say, but father seemed to like him all the time we were at his house and gave us every possible opportunity to be alone together.
He is twenty nine, came from Denton Md. & went to St. John’s in Annapolis, then West Point – lived beside the Fishers in Denton (the man Nell G. married) and has five brothers and sisters and his mother living. Now I think you know it all. I guess I’m not properly excited, because it all seems so far off, for you see he finishes his tour out here a year from this coming October, so we can’t be married until a couple of months after that. He has been asked to take the detail of military instructor at St. John’s. That would be very nice to have three years at Annapolis, wouldn’t it, for then you and Shang could come often to see me, and even Mary and Arthur might be persuaded. I hope you get the little picture I sent you of him - I have two big ones that are fine – and that you like him and want me to marry him. You’ll tell me truly, won’t you.
We were just in Manila a day after coming down from Baguio and was dreadfully busy straightening out my trunks and clothes, etc. I sent another big mat to you to stow away somewhere. It will come it well for “our” porch at St. John’s. And am wondering if you ever get it for it was awfully heavy and I couldn’t find the right kind of paper to wrap it up in.
Oh! I must tell you about a letter I got the day we sailed. I hope it won’t sound conceited, but I must tell you just because you’re you and because this is so funny. It was from Mr. Spore, the naval officer whom I knew at Annapolis and have seen a good many times out here. He had come to Manila to see me, but I was at Batangas, so he left this letter for me as he was ordered to China & leaving the next day. I think he must have written it on bended knee, for I have never read a more beseeching, appealing epistle, begging me to come to Shanghai and marry him. He couldn’t live without me, had been perfectly serious in Olongapo when the same subject came up, and I had laughed it off etc. and wanting permission to write and ask father for me. I never cared a rap for him and certainly didn’t give him much encouragement. He really was in earnest though, I guess.
I think it would be fine for you and Shang to go to England this summer, but am selfish enough to be afraid you won’t meet us there then next year, and that is what I’ve been living for. However it probably would do you both worlds of good, and would be lovely, especially as Mrs. F. wants you so badly. When you get this I’ll have been away from you nearly a year, and the answer you will probably write from England. Oh! you’ll really be nearer, but seem farther away and do take good care of yourself, angel, for I love you so and to think that all my lovely day dreams of settling down with you in Clarion for the rest of my life - also of the hospital and of that bungalow I so carefully planned- to think they now are all fading away. It takes us eight days from Manila to Yokohama. The trip so far has been very peaceful, both the sea and the passengers. We hope to be there on the 26th. We can’t imagine anything important that the Navy department would want father for. I’ll be happy to get one of those bags for Shang from you.
An Ideal Husband
Camp John Hay
Baguio, P.I.
[Photo of E.B. Garey attached]
Angel dearest:
Before I forget it I want to tell you that that red thing in the last package I sent you is the Moro flag. Isn’t it a funny looking one? Yesterday I sent another basket registered with some wooden forks and spoons that the natives here make, and a cushion cover woven by the Igarotes. It was given to me. Also the shells from Samoa, and that silly looking kangaroo thing was a present in Australia. If it is dutiable they can keep it.
We have had such a good time up here. Barton’s house is lovely – has a most wonderful view from the front porch way down into the valley. He has shown such good taste too for a bachelor in the furnishings and everything is fine. It is so nice in the evenings to sit around a big crackling fire. Of course that doesn’t seem as queer to you for it is right cool at home now, isn’t it? I don’t believe anything could be more romantic that my present position and it has been loads of fun but, angel dear my heart says yes while my mind seems to be the unruly member and still has that hankering for the hospital. Not that I don’t want to marry sometime, but not till I have realized that dream. Here I’ve been riding, walking and driving a lot and making candy, welsh rarebit, etc. in the cute little kitchen. Father and Barton have awful capacities for such things, so I’m fussing around with something most of the time. We can’t get transportation on the “Thomas”, so don’t know when we’ll sail. Am sending a little picture of my lover. Will you send it back when you get through looking at it? Isn’t he a dear? He has the loveliest ideas and no doubt would make an ideal husband.
Alice
