Transliteration:

Teheran, Persia. Dec. 3 / 1923

Beloved and Dear One:

My pen has been silent for some time but my hands have been more than full. I wrote in my note to Jessie our Dr. M. had been ill with rheumatism & all the office work fell to my hands besides the care of Dr. & doing all the cooking as the boy we have now cannot cook anything so letter writing had [the?] go by for over six weeks. Now Dr. M. is able to dress herself & is doing some light office work but not able yet to go out. We are also busy getting Dr. Coy off for America. She will [page 2, left side of image 004] be back in New York if all goes well by the middle or late January. She expects to leave within a week by automobile for Baghdad from there by auto across the desert to Damascus & hence to Haifa then home to America. Her health is not good and her school work is [pretty?] restricted by the Board of Education. She is prepared for larger work than they are able to take at the present time. While she has been here the school has progressed just as far as the Board of Education would permit her to go, and the teachers & scholars are all very fond of her. They are all sorry to part with her but we know since her fall from the horse last Aug. Dr. Coy has not been as robust & she needs the change.

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Dec. 6 / 1923 – I got this far & had to stop. Dr. Coy left us on Tuesday AM about 9 o’clock in auto with a nice Bahai boy who will take her into Baghdad til he can make arrangements[,] he wants to take her through to Haifa he has never been there. We were very sorry to part with Dr. Coy only wish Dr. M & I were coming along with her. I know the change would do Dr. Moody lots of good ever since the passing of Dr. Clock she has felt the shock & she passed her 69th birthday two weeks ago. Every one says now a man & wife must come out[,] the man for the boys school & the woman for the girls. Dr. M. is pressing the collection for funds for the school & has now on hand over seven thousand & prospects of getting property soon. The present guarantees are far too small the school has grown since Dr. C. came. Within the last year until now they have over three hundred girls & many prominent Musselman children. Every one like[s] Dr. C & all [illegible] at her going but if she had remained Dr. M. & I saw she would be ill. [“From Baghdad” crossed out]. Dr. Lotfullah Hakim brother of Dr. Arastu is on his way up from Baghdad now we are looking for him every day. Dr. Coy will meet him at Hamadan or Kermanshah. Dr. Coy expects to reach America the middle of January or the last of the month. I wrote Uncle James to go & see her he [page 4, right side of image 006] can reach her through Roy. I am sending the illumined book back for you that you may have all the original tablets bound if you so desire or just what you like. Dr. Moody has all of hers most beautifully bound in the same kind of a book & made by the same man. He is dead now, passed away five or six years ago he was the husband of Fawza [sp?] Khanum & the man who sent a blank paper & our Lord testing him. You remember the story. Dr. Coy’s trunk was so full that my package had [love?] small [but?] book Dr M. & I [illegible] put our love in for you all. We would like to have put ourselves into the trunk & come over to see you all for a bit. We love you all very much & are constantly talking of you. I do hope that you all may get to see Dr. Coy someday. Three days before she left she had all [page 5, left side of image 006] the teachers here & entertained them in the afternoon. They sent a lovely piece of embroidery to Roy Wilhelm who has done so much for the school & told Dr. Coy when she got back to America she must dress up in her Abba which was given her & her Persian shoes use the little samovar [illegible] glasses & have a real Persian time for Roy & present him with his gift. The spiritual assembly gave her a rug small silk one with the head of Abdul Baha woven in it it was a very beautiful piece [illegible] we do not care for our Beloveds face woven into a rug they all love anything like that here. The School Committee gave her a lovely Kashan rug which she is taking to Haifa to have The Greatest Holy Leaf & [illegible – Shoghi?] walk on it & also take up to the shrine of Abdul Baha. The overland route to Haifa makes it very close to us here. Dr. C. expects to reach Haifa if all is well in 14 or 15 days from here.

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Now dearest I want to try & answer all [illegible] those things that were in the trunk. Thank you so very much for all the trouble it has put you to. I cannot sell the silver as Maggie has park [?] rights to them I think they had better send to her. I have gone all over every thing & checked them off giving instructions. The only thing I would like to have would be the picture of myself when I was a child & the blue locket with the gold palm leaf on it. If you would put a small piece of cotton around it & enclose it in one of your letters in a cloth lined envelope & register I think it would come O.K. as they don’t make one open registered letters but packages as they do. A few months ago I sent back to Elda Apal her mothers diamond ring & fixed it this way she received it O.K. & had nothing to pay on it. Dearest I don’t want you to see or write to Maggie, so if you will let Jessie do it I think it will save her being insulting to you. I will write a letter to Maggie which Jessie may take to her & if Maggie does not know you are doing it I am sure it will be better. Jessie had better write to her asking [page 7, right side of image 008] when she might see her at the address I will give. Maggie gets her mail at 1318 North Robinson St but boards at another address which I have forgotten. Will & Mary Stewart live at 1318 North Robinson St & for five or six years Maggie has had all her mail going there because she was always moving here & there. I don’t know how to thank for you all this fixing up of these things it has been an awful tax on you I little dreamed so many years would pass before that trunk would be emptied, & the dear [page 8, left side of image 008] Revells had to cart it all around. If they can make any use of the trunk do so or if you need it, & if Maggie should say anything about it tell her I have given it to them. I do hope she will not make any trouble. Most all of the papers you sent me are of no account now. My personal things are [gone? fun? fur?] & the older I get the less I like to have to look after there are so many many things that are of greater importance that all those things have gone out of my mind & until see these papers they bring back my remembrance. [page 9] Dearest dearest love from us both for each & every one of you dear ones at 2531 & all the lovely friends of the Assembly who sent Dr. M. & myself that glorious book the Bahai scriptures. Yah Baha ol ABAH.

[illegible],

Elizabeth H. Stewart

I am leaving the letter to Maggie open. Please read & let Jessie take it when she gets the paper from her signed by her as I have asked her to do. E.H.S.