16-5-57

Dear Mamma,

I think you are home again and so I shall write. This week a wonderful box arrived full of jams and some lovely pyjamas. Thank you for them. We have not yet begun to eat the jams, but shall soon. They look lovely. I like the pyjamas, and Julia does too.

We are getting along well. Thomas has been somewhat unwell, having some bug to give him loose bowels, but otherwise is fine. One tooth has made an appearance. He is a fine and lovely boy. He cannot crawl yet or sit up.

I bought some bookshelves that fit in our hall and so we are getting neater and fitted in. We shall soon be tidy.

I hope you are coming to stay with us for a while this summer. I am looking forward to your doing so. There is sufficient room for all.

I should not be upset that Anita does not write and say she is passing through but cannot visit. I should think it is embarrassing to people who write only seldom to use their rare letters to advise that they cannot stop. The check was to pay the shipping charges on the Porsche as I remember, though I can look it up. It was in exchange for some Sterling that I gave Anita when she was there, so it really should be collected, I suppose.

Thank you for the Audios. I have asked for some commercial leaflets be sent to me and would appreciate your collecting them during the next few months and then sending them on in a bunch.

Love, Peter XXX

OOO

16 May 1957

Dear Daddy,

Thank you for the letter.

I have abandoned the ReCl₄ structures, I think. I have looked at Rb, Cs, and NH₄ and they have rather large cells. I have crystalized (CH₃)NReCl₄ -nH₂O, which is hexagonal bipyramids but expect a complicated structure, though I have not taken data. The xtals dry up.

I started to collect data on NI(NO₃)₂•2(ethylene)₃P, but Jack Dunitz had made an error and the cell was doubled.

That Co₂(CO)₈ you gave me has chiefly decomposed, leaving a disordered Co structure which I mentioned to you before. There are some small undecomposed xtals of Co₂(CO)₈ in the bottle. However, the structure has been done in 1953 by some Italians, rather poorly, but still enough to give the arrangement.

We have rounded up some xtals of dehydrated metal sulphates, and I have started work on CoSO₄. It is [orthorhombic] 8 x 6 x 5 Å. I shall take the projections on the Weissenberg at the Royal Institution, starting tomorrow. I shall try to crystallize large crystals of other sulphates, Cu, Ni, etc. / at present these are powders and do some work on them. Hack and I are pleased to find a short edge at last. Perhaps I can do one of the ReCl₄ ^- later.

We hope you will come stay with us this summer. You should have some time, between the glue conference and Paris. You should see [Haldane] before he leaves the 15^th.

We are well, more or less: Thomas is a little sick.

Much love from,

Peter