Arthur Allan GILES [7483]

  General Notes:

John Allen Giles Diary and Memoirs.
Page 404
Tuesday, September 26, 1871. Received the annexed letter from Herbert in China about the birth of his little boy.
Tientsin 20 July 1871.
My dear Father,
Of course you weren't taken by surprise last mail, that is if you ever received a small piece of dog latinity I enclosed to you a few mails ago, referring to the expected arrival of someone in the baby line. Everything went off well and Kate is now strong again. She sat up first on the 16th and came to meals on the 17th, though no walking about was allowed. Your grandson has already displayed certain peculiarities which call for a separate notice. He lost his baby redness in two or three days and assumed a beautiful white, which has however become tarnished during the last few days by "prickly heat". Seven or eight days after he was born he could hear distinctly, and started violently at every noise. Kate suckles him herself, and he thrives like a sunflower. Now for his credentials with posterity. Had she, or rather it, being a girl, the names of the two best grandmothers in history would have been perpetuated by the pleasing and not inharmonious combination of Anna Maria; but being a boy, Wisdom and Success, were the best names I could devise, as being all that is most desirable in the sublunary state. As however he may some day say his Catechism to the Master of the 1st Form at Charter House, other boys might laugh at his answering the first question "Success Wisdom Giles", and therefore we have determined to bestow on him the names of two living people who best represents in their own persons and lives those gifts we wish him some day to be possessed of. I write it as entered in the Register of Births in the Tientsin Consulate "Arthur Allen Giles" born 6th July 1871. Those sponsors elect being: Arthur Henry Giles, Theodore G. Fenn, Lucy V. Fenn, Martha Lockhart Forbes. Entered in due form in the big 3 Vol. Family Bible I brought out, that is to say if they all consent, Mrs Forbes being the only one who has as yet had the opportunity of signifying her approval. Her kindness to us since we have been here has been great and uninterrupted, so that the least Kate could do was to pay her the mild complement of giving her a godson. Talking of godson's, Miss Saunders enquirys about the development of my character were amusing in the extreme. I hope she was satisfied upon that point. We have had the most fearful rain imaginable for the last 10 days, more than the oldest Chinese remembers to have seen. It doesn't seem to come down in drops but in layers about an inch thick and only quarter of an inch apart! This followed by great heat has made us all the worse for wear, and unfit for doing anything, more especially for writing letters, with which excuse I will pull up till next mail.
Your affectionate son.
H. A. Giles.

Page 412
Saturday, January 6, 1872.
Tientsin 15 October 1871.
My dear Father,
The contents of this letter will concern you more than anyone else, and moreover it will leave Shanghai on your birthday. . . . . We are having lovely weather and are all in No 1 health, especially your grandson and namesake, whose legs are now as big as my arms, and arms in proportion. He has a chest like a small buffalo and lungs like screech owl, promising to be a very strong man. As soon as he is old enough (say 4) I shall send him home by himself, so as to open his eyes early to the wickedness of his neighbours. . . . . . I had just got a note saying the long lost box is on a steamer which arrived today, so that it will be delivered tomorrow. . . . . .
16 October. The box is already unpacked and Kate is very pleased with the contents, except that every thing is much too small for the person intended to wear them. Dozens of woollen socks came out, but amusingly unfit for the leg and a half there was to go into them. . . . . .
Your loving son
H. A. Giles.

Page 422.
Sunday June 30, 1872.
Saw with much sorrow in the London and China Telegraph this notice:
"Deaths - On the 20th of April at Tientsin, Arthur Allen, son of H. A. Giles of HBM's Consulate, aged nine months."