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March 10, 1924.

Mr. W. de C. Ravenel, 
Administrative Assistant 
to the Secretary.

My dear Mr. Ravenel:-

Inasmuch as the subcommittee which considered my application for the Walter Rathbone Bacon Scholarship has made unfavorable recommendation, I appeal to you for a favorable decision.

Learning from Mr. Dorsey that mine, so far as he was aware, was the only application submitted in response to the published announcement, I had hoped to be called by the committee to furnish any additional information they night desire. This consideration was not vouchsafed me.

The subcommittee seems to be of the mind that the income should be used now! This is discriminatory, to say the least. No action has been taken with regard to the fund since it became available, more than four years ago. Now, after my application has been filed in the regular way prescribed in the published announcement in "Science", the committee suddenly feels that within the less than sixteen months' interval before my application is dated to take effect, something more should be done.

I am "acutally ready" to undertake the scholarship on July 1, 1925, as stated in my application. The intervening period is no more than necessary for adequate preparation for the South American research contemplated, and to satisfactorily arrange my official and personal affairs. It is not an expedition to be undertaken on a week's notice, nor did the announcement of the Scholarship in "Science" indicate that it was necessary to have one's suitcase ready, packed at the time of filing applications. The alternative date of July 1, 1926, was but added in case a prior grant, which did not materialize, should conflict with my earlier and preferred date of July 1, 1925.

After all, the dates set were but tentative as appears in my application, though the earlier one given is preferred; nevertheless, if the time element may result in the declination of the application, it could be arranged to advance the date.

I beg to remind you that this scholarship was first announced in "Local Notes" May 29, 1919, published in the Washington newspapers, if not elsewhere, and carried in the Annual Report for 1919.

On June 1, 1922, in my "research memorandum" submitted to the Secretary, at his request, I included this project of a South American carcinological study and mentioned the Purdy Bacon bequest as the source from which it was hoped to obtain funds.