25 
the Chinese do on a few cents a day and how they 
can get along without meat, eggs, railk, cheese, 
butter, and wheat, the things which seem to 
every man quite essential for the maintenance of 
health. 
Trusting that your health remains good and 
that I will hear from you shortly that you have 
escaped from the isolation of Ichang, I remain, 
with kindest regards. 
• Mr. Meyer wrote us on May 18, 1918, from Hankow, as follows 
At last I have been able to break thru the 
lines of soldiers around Ichang and walked to 
Kingmen, got the stored seeds and baggage there 
■ and settled the payments for the pear seeds;. 
then we marched down to Shasi and took a steamer 
from there and arrived here on the l^th. We 
were held up by soldiers a fev/ times and some 
unpleasantries were indulged in, but on the whole 
we could have fared far worse. — Of course we 
•Dassed thru villages that had been looted and 
burned and food was hard to obtain, but to an 
old hand out here, like myself, these things 
have so- often been encountered that one is used 
to them. 
I did not write you from Ichang of late 
because I was not sure that I really could make 
the trip. --The whole country is so fearfully 
upset that travel has become a perfect gamble. 
Sometimes travellers get thru, but often they 
have been held up for days and v/eeks. From 
Ichang westward all traffic is stopped and 
products from Szechuan do not come thru any 
longer for months and months . The losses the 
people at large suffer must be gigantic; right 
now^ tung oil does not reach Plankov/ any longer, 
neither do hides, drugs, silks, etc. Tf tung 
oil should not be able to get thru at all 
then some industries in America will soon feel 
the effects. 
Well, personally I am awfully glad that I 
got away from Ichang; the situation began to 
depress me. One cannot live for months in 
an' atmosphere of suspension without feeling the 
effects. And as I had cheerless, uncomfortable 
quarters and lacdof substantial food at times, 
one had both mental and physical discomforts. 
September ?1, 1918. 
