I am sorry indeed that the part of your letter to which I looked anxiously contained such bad news—and having said that I think that I won't say more—it is so useless.
The Spaniard ends his letter with S.S.S.Q.B.S.M. and I understand this to mean su seguro servidor que besa sus manos—but he puts it in even when he writes to the papers and there is no thought of any real kissing in the case. I send you two little bits of English for (!) decipherment. They appear day by day and month by month in the Diario de Las Palmas and I hope that they are intelligible to its non-English readers. The said newspaper is one of some half dozen daily rags published in our "ciudad"—I am surprised by their number. They seem largely to live upon ancient English papers—I mean papers which have taken a week to get here and have then been lying about in the hotels for another week or more. Hence queer snips from Tit Bits, etc.
Which makes me think of Acton. (His professed admiration of Tit Bits has some basis in fact: at least I once entered a railway carriage and found him deep in said paper.) What a prodigious catechism he addressed to you! I should like to have seen your reply.... Many thanks for news of the History. I hope that all will go well now: I think that the team looks strong. I hear that I am to serve on the Press Syndicate: I doubt I shall do much good there—still I am quite willing to hear others talk and shall be interested in all that concerns the big book.
These last weeks I have been doing splendidly and have got through a spell of copying which would never have been done had I stayed in England—as you say, life in Cambridge is an interruption. Buckland is a good companion and I think that we have taken our cycles where cycles have not been before—a crowd of ragged boys pursues—"chiquillos" convinced of our insanity.
If you have good news to give, give it.
To John C. Gray.
Downing College,
Cambridge.
19 April, 1902.
I returned yesterday from a winter spent in the Canaries where I am compelled to take refuge. Already I have read your article about gifts for non-charitable purposes and have been delighted by it. It puts an accent on what I think a matter of great historical importance—namely the extreme liberality of our law about charitable trusts. It seems to me that our people slid unconsciously from the enforcement of the rights of a c.q.t. to the establishment of trusts without a c.q.t.—the so-called charitable trusts: and I think that continental law shows that this was a step that would not and could not be taken by men whose heads were full of Roman Law. Practically the private man who creates a charitable trust does something that is very like the creation of an artificial person, and does it without asking leave of the State.
I only saw Thayer for a few hours, but I feel his death as the death of a friend. The loss must be deeply felt at Harvard.