During labour, when they had told my sister that the child would be there before morning, she had exclaimed, “It isn’t so--it can’t be so--Genie can’t get here--I won’t have my baby till Genie gets here!” They laughed at us both for our disappointment over the precipitate outcome. I stayed with them two weeks--a strenuous, anxious time--and, the very day I left, was taken with what later proved to be gastric fever. Stopping over in Concord a day and a night to see Laidlaw, and have dinner with him and two other class-mates living near, I was so ill that evening that I had to leave the dining room, and that night Laidlaw and his landlady were up with me most of the night. Journeying next day as far as Worcester, I was detained there for two weeks at Dr. Carson’s, where she and Fenton (of the hospital days) took excellent care of me. It was the first time since childhood that I had been “down sick,” but, soon recuperating, I went back to my work in U----. From that time onward my interests widened--two centres now--Home, and Sister’s home; everything that happened in that New England home was of great moment to me. The baby’s growth and development were topics of never-failing interest. When they came home the next year, how infinitely richer life was with that baby in our midst! How much more wonderful than ordinary babies--his winsome smile, his soft pansy eyes, and that first tooth! I suspect that for the next three years, at least, I taxed to the limit the tolerance of my friends with numerous little stories about my sister’s phenomenal child. The most intimate, and certainly the most far-reaching, influence which came to me during my life in U---- came through the Randolphs--a physician and his wife who had their home, and the Doctor his office, on the same floor of the building where I had mine. Perhaps a little slow in making friends, they made up for that in steadfastness and helpfulness as time passed. The Doctor was then probably forty years of age--a tall, large-framed man, with a superb head, a fine brow, a firm mouth and chin, a face always pale, but eloquent with the determination to rise above suffering. Neurasthenic, crippled since youth from an injury to one knee, he was subject to frequent breakdowns, was seldom free from pain, and his work, confined to an office practice, was done under great disadvantage. I think he has the kindest eyes I have ever seen--eyes that look deep into the soul, seeing all its frailties and struggles, its triumphs and defeats. To the needs of all who came his comprehension and ready help were assured.