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Royall Tyler to Robert Woods Bliss, March 15, 1938

15.III.38

Dear Robert.

I have your letter of the 25Only a partial draft is preserved of this letter. inst., and am delighted to read what you say about the marriage girdle.BZ.1937.33. I felt sure you’d like it—I was bowled over by its splendor myself.

Yes, you’ll have to have the spoonsBZ.1937.35–42. cleaned a bit. I think you’ll like the lovely little ladleBZ.1938.32. from BustrosElias (Elie) Bustros, an antiquities dealer in Beirut, Lebanon. which is now on its way to you. Both that lot of silver,BZ.1938.31, BZ.1938.32, and BZ.1938.33–34. and the 3 pieces of jewelry & the alabaster casketBZ.1938.27, BZ.1938.28, BZ.1938.29, and BZ.1938.30. are aboard the “City of Norfolk” which sailed from Hamburg March 11th. I was able to insure them here with Lloyds. The boat is due at Baltimore on March 24th.

The jewels were the lot referred to in the cable of 31 Jan.

Thanks for information on Doro Levi’s lecture.In November 1937, Doro Levi delivered the lecture “Arkades and the Dawn of Greek Art,” first at Dumbarton Oaks and then for the Municipal Art Society of New York and the Art and Archaeology Journal Club of Princeton University. A copy of the lecture is in the Doro Levi Papers, ca. 1937, Dumbarton Oaks Archives. I hope for more from Mildred.

Also for the photos of the Himyarite horse.BZ.1938.12. He is a fine object, indeed, & I greatly look forward to seeing him.

The Virgin reliefBZ.1938.62. is supposed to be arriving at Fiedler’s these days, and I hope to see it on my way from here to Geneva, via Italy, in about 12 or 14 days. I’ll bear in mind what you say about price. I’m trying to keep an unprejudicial view about her till I see her, & not be too much swayed by her beauty as suggested by the photo.

You’ll cable me, won’t you (address League of Nations Geneva as from March 30), the moment you receive Juritzky’s columns,BZ.1940.78–79. as I must pay him. That makes me think, will there be an Austr. schilling by that time?Austria was annexed into the German Third Reich on March 12, 1938. I won’t start on that subject, or else there’d be no ending.

I hear from Bustros that he has dispatched the marble tabernacleBZ.1938.56. to Delarancheraye,De La Rancheraye et Cie., a shipping company in Paris. & I’ve informed the latter what he is to do with it. It will probably be slow in coming.

About our chaliceBZ.1955.18.—I can’t blame you, dear Robert, for not feeling able to put a price on it, as I myself failed to do so. But I’ve not been able to do as you asked & cable you a figure, because I’m at a loss how to arrive at one. The idea that my figure—if I could settle on one—might seem too big to you, & that you might accept it out of kindness to us, constitutes a further difficulty. I’ve had so much on my mind of late that I haven’t been able to give the matter much thought. Anyway, we want you to have the object, & we certainly don’t mean to offer it elsewhere. I’ll see whether I can hammer out a figure.

It’s very dear of you to want me to come to the Oaks, & come I will. I rather think I shall take the Queen Mary,RMS Queen Mary, an ocean liner that sailed primarily in the North Atlantic Ocean between 1936 and 1967 for the Cunard Line (known as Cunard-White Star Line when the vessel entered service). sailing May 18. There’s no quick boat between the 15th & 18. That gets me to N.Y. the 23d, & I’d like to come straight on to you. I expect I’ll have to take the same boat back on June 22.

Your plans for Antioch, Greece etc are most exciting. I only hope & pray I may be able to do at least part of the journey with you.

I’m being killed with kindness these days—dinners every night, lunches every day, & between times the very painful task of clearing up the accumulated papers, books, etc of 6 years, & deciding what to keep & where to send it.

I must be in Geneva from end March to the end of the Council May 9–15. A friend has lent me a very nice little house there, & I hope Elisina will join me for a bit. I fear I shall afterwards have to take a little flat there, for I can’t go 200 km. to Antigny everytime I want a change of clothes, as it were, and I must have somewhere to keep my Byz. & private papers. Also, as time wears on, I find myself less & less tolerant of hotel & restaurant food. I expect I shall be away from Geneva most of the time, but I shall have to be there for various Ctees & the Council meetings. I have much to tell you about all sorts of things, including my prospective work.

It has been a great pleasure to see Herbert StablerJordan Herbert Stabler (1885–1938), an American diplomat, merchant, and author. again.

Elisina sends you both her fondest love, to which I add mine.

Yrs

R. T.

I’m sending you my last ReportRoyall Tyler, Financial Position of Hungary: Twenty-Fifth Quarterly Report by Mr. Royall Tyler, Representative in Hungary of the Financial Committee, Regarding the Financial Position of Hungary in the Last Quarter of 1937 (Geneva: League of Nations, 1938).—Do please read the first few pages, giving a summary of what has happened here these 6 years. Immodest as it may sound, I think they are interesting.

I’ll try to see Kalebs’Kalebdjian Frères. Romanesque lambBZ.1938.35. in Paris. He writes that the owner comes down Frs. 5000—at that, I think the object is pretty cheap.

 
Associated Things: Kalebdjian Frères