Abscess

Returning from an official visit to Japan (TIME, May 13), King George's third son, Henry, slender Duke of Gloucester, stepped ashore at Vancouver, B. C., last week.

"How is my father?" were his first words, cutting short Canada's official welcome. Reassuring cablegrams from Windsor were handed him, but for days the British Empire had shared his worry.

On Queen Mary's birthday the royal family was so encouraged at King George's apparent recovery that they celebrated quietly by having a picnic at Frogmore. The sun was shining, but the air was chilly. Watchful attendants noted that His Majesty occasionally snuffled.

Lord Dawson of Penn, King George's chief physician, was enjoying a quiet luncheon in Paris in the assumption that the royal patient whom he had tended for 29 weeks was fully convalescent. Came an urgent telephone call from Windsor. Swallowing his coffee hastily Lord Dawson rushed to Le Bourget Field and hurtled through the air to England.

At Windsor he discovered that an abscess had formed under the wound through which King George's lung had been drained. The abscess broke naturally and was draining successfully--not a serious matter ordinarily, but grave indeed to anyone who had been as sick as King George.

News of the King's illness was known in the U. S. hours before British papers printed it. Scrupulously careful not to prejudice the General Election, Royalty forbade publication of the report in England until after the polls closed.

Late bulletins were encouraging. The King was able to sit up in bed, to attend to important business. The people of Windsor were glad to notice that the band continued to play at guard mount, a sure sign that the King was not yet dangerously ill.

Even so King George passed a melancholy birthday. He lay in his rubber-tired bed by the window of his room in Victoria Tower, looking out at the white blossoms of the hawthorn trees in Windsor Great Park.

All the king's doctors and all the king's nurses who had attended during his illness received recognition in the birthday honors list. Elevated to peerages were onetime First Lord of the Admiralty William C. Bridgeman, Col. Sir Edward A. Brotherton, Sir Robert Sanders, Sir William Tyrell, Newspaper Owner Sir William Ewert Berry. The Order of Merit was conferred upon Poet Laureate Robert Bridges, Novelist-Dramatist John Galsworthy. An earldom was granted to Viscount Inch-cape of Strathnaver (shipping).