20 MAY 139 DAYS PAST Tuesday 226 DAYS TO COME Finished reading Willa Cathers Sapphria and the Salve Girl a very interesting story of the South. It rather elevates the moral standards of the negro of 1860 etc. Have taken more ease today than for some time. ALUM- ANCIENT MYSTERY Ancient chemists knew alum but were mystified by its composition. John de Castro, a native of Padua, first manufactured album. First to employ it as a styptic in uterine hemorrhage was Jean Baptiste van Helmont. Other well-known names connected with the metal are: Vauquelin, who clearly proved the composition of alum; Lavoisier, who suggested that alumina was the acid of a metal; Wohler, who isolated aluminum in 1827. JEAN VAN HELMONT (1577-1644) Wednesday 140 DAYS PAST MAY 21 225 DAYS TO COME Attended a luncheon today but prepared a nice lunch for Dr, Glider- Borne Germans strike at Crete. First time in history of Warfare soilders are carried by gliders. Germans were landed on the Greek Mediterranean Island of Crete and worged a furious attack on British & Greek defenders. Fame sometimes hath created something of nothing- THOMAS FULLER WARNERS CALENDAR OF MEDICAL HISTORY