May 15th 1919
Kiwi Club
London
Dear Mary
I had just come in to Town yesterday to fix up in regard to discharge & etc but, after making enquiries re boat passage I decided to let the authorities cancel my discharge; it seems that there has been a tremendous rush for passages to all parts of the world during the last two or three months & it would be three months yet before I could get over to America
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& about another four months before I could get from there to N.Z. &, besides all that delay the fares both on land & sea have risen so enormously high that I would have to pay nearly half as much again now as I would, about 3 months ago & so in order to carry out my former plans I would have to cable for a good deal more hoot, and, as your know, I am not quite a millionaire yet, – I must draw the line somewhere
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I am a little disappointed now, after looking forward to the trip for so long, but now I will just have to make the most of my N.Z. trip when I get back & try and get as much leave in this country as possible before leaving it; I have no idea yet when I will be going back, I hear it said that they expect to have us all away before the end of Aug. I have to report back to the “depot” at Codford on Sat. I dont expect
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to have any trouble about getting at least 14 days leave sometime as we are all entitled to boat-leave. I got your two letters 1 & 2 from Uncle Willie he sent them on to me. I dont know if it would be any use you writing any more after you get this letter, unless there was anything special to tell me & I could get Uncle Willie to return it if I should be away. You might ask Bill when you see him if he could send a Photo of Bob’s as Uncle says he
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would very much like to have one, I thought perhaps he may be able to let him have an enlarged one & if he could send any others which would be of interest Uncle Willie would be very pleased. We have had a very long winter up to the end of March, but now, the summer has set in in real earnest & the days are lengthening very rapidly, it has been very warm here for the last three or four days, goodbye at present. Jack
