Dear Girls of 1903-

It has been necessary to read thru your letters hurriedly as I am leaving for a Connecticut wedding on Saturday.

There is a lot of human nature beneath the feathers and under the wings of Robin. What you have achieved and in such a variety! Whatever else I am convinced at least Goucher did not turn out a cut and ready to wear pattern. Thyra Crawford buying her own home (yes, I certainly would like to see it.)

And altho Hattie Taylor is 'not yet president of anything' I have some idea, I believe of the place she fills. Only a short time back I would have said 'bobbed hair' in the same voice as Helen Hendrix. Now my hair is bobbed. The style is so general I have forgotten all about it. Yes, there are some silver threads.

Often I see dear Dr. Van Meter going to and fro on old Charles St., Balto.- and I know many of you girls far off from Balt. Would like to meet him too, on your walk.

Like Nellie Talley, I have made a world tour, and part of the voyage (from Kobe to Shanghai) on the same (now historical) S.S. 'Empress of Australia' mentioned by Mary Abercrombie. I left America with two married couples and at Chefoo in Shantung, China, where Mary's friends were to locate- I lost my party, two were ill and all turned back. I continued on alone as best I could (China being in the throes of factional war) to Peking on to the mountain passes north of Peking.

I have stood in the temples of Japan, watched the street scenes in Shanghai, Hongkong, and Singapore, witnessed strange sights in Peking and Cantau, hailed the stars and stripes from some pole in the Philippines, rubbed elbows with the thugs of Burma, had my fortune told in Calcutta, marveled at the Taj Mahal, wandered in Bombay, climbed the Pyramids, danced in Cairo and prayed in Jerusalem. Seven months! I have laid up some more wood I hope for the winter fire. There are different religions and games and everything, but they are all a tremendously human lot of ***.

In classical old Kyoto I met in a curious way Miss Matsuo, graduated from Goucher in 1923 and we had dinner together at the Moyako. In the heart of that Japanese girl there is a debt of gratitude to Dr. Thaddeus P. Thomas.

I do not want to stop without a personal word in memory of Anne Haslup.

Sincerely Yours,
Florence Carmine Bankard
(Mrs. Henry A.)