47 Lauriston Place, Edinburgh. - Is very sorry to think of 'Poor' Miss [Constance] Whishaw's orphanage [Sunnybank, Arnside] 'degenerating in that fashion'; it was at Christmas 1897 that she met her and Miss Cark [sic: Minna Karch?] at a hotel in Cap d'Antibes but she never saw them again; her aunt Jane [Anderson] is also upset at the news. Don is playing from an old edition of Cramer's studies. He has just been reading the full score of "Ariadne auf Naxos" by George [sic] Benda in an 'ancient book' he found in the class room library today; she is to tell Trevelyan that 'Benda's librettist's Ariadne is a very ordinary minx!'. The [Reid?] Orchestra has not started yet. Don has been busy writing his programme notes for his series of Beethoven recitals. Grettie kept him in bed and away from the class room on Monday and Tuesday because of a cold, but he is better now. The Reception at the Union went well: Sir Alfred and Lady Ewing are 'particularly unostentatious little people' and 'gave a homely air to the proceedings'; Professor Barlka sang to Don's accompaniment and 'tried hard' to follow his suggestions for improvement. She has indeed seen Don conduct, in the Mozart concerts: he 'looked perfectly splendid, and so purposelike'. Hopes Bessie's 'invalids' have recovered: colds are going around, Mrs [Christina] Niecks has been ill, and Grettie's sister Isabel is currently in bed ill. Bessie should tell Julian he needs to come and inspect 'the Waverley' himself, as she only saw half of it. Mr [Edward] Speyer has sent the Toveys 'the most beautiful little work of an Old Master' which they are charmed with.
Merton College, Oxford. - Notes in the address that he is at the Congress of Universities, 'all incontrovertible talk & academic millinery'; his hired gown is 'a most appetising strawberries-&-cream affair'. Is 'very unsettled in plans and mind'. Unlikely that he will be able to get to the Shiffolds again this summer, and is going to try to organise time abroad from which he could come back at once if necessary. Dr Haydn Brown is sure he can cure Grettie if she will see him, and Tovey must do what he can to accomplish this; her relatives are 'quietly behaving in the most abominable way'. Has got a letter from her aunt Mary which will justify him 'in the most drastic measures which may be necessary' to keep the family away if Grettie ever returns. They deny she has been ill, except as a consequence of Tovey 'being impossible to live with' and claim that he is trying to 'get her shut up on false imputation of insanity'. However, all documentary evidence shows only his 'loyalty and care for her reputation as well as her health'. They support 'poor G.'s ravings', which alarmed the Principal's wife so much that she did not invite him to a recent lunch of Deans of Faculties, and told Mrs Morley Fletcher why. Tovey feels the 'only salvation' for his wife is to spread the story that what she says is 'the delusions of a fever' so it will be forgotten when she is cured, whether she comes back to Tovey or not. Asks if Johannes [Röntgen] has gone to Switzerland; he may possibly go there himself, and if so hopes to see Johannes and 'the future Mrs J.R.'.
16 Moray Place, Edinburgh and University of Edinburgh - One manuscript and two typed letters making arrangements for the timing of the Gifford Lectures during the 1924-1925 academic year; are happy with his plans to deliver them in the October term, warns against Monday afternoons as already full of meetings of University business; acknowledges that they will be given twice a week on the topic of 'The Worship of Nature'; his wife has written to Lady Frazer about rooms. Accompanied by the envelope.