France
11-6-18
Dear May,
After a rather long interval a N.Z. mail has just arrived & my share of it was one letter – your No 47 written on March 20th. I am glad to hear that you are all keeping well; but it is sad news to hear of old Billy’s sudden death. He must have been about 23 so he had a pretty fair innings & would soon have been a burden to himself. You haven’t said anything about the new horse lately so I suppose he is quite up to expectations. Poor old Gore seems to be having a rough time just now. You say they nearly had another big flood, & I have just seen in the “New Zealander” that Holland’s buildings were burnt down last week, but so far we have not got the details. If the war lasts much
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longer some of the N.Z. towns will resemble those of Flanders. By the way you will notice that our N.Z. news is fairly up-to-date. A little paper called the New Zealander gives us most of the important news. I might be able to send a copy, it is a ‘buckshee’ affair & is distributed fairly freely among the members of the N.Z.E.F . I notice Miss Looney’s name in this week, also old Hassings. I thought the latter had gone west long ago but he evidently has a bit of life in him yet. I am glad to see that you have got going with the photography. You will find the film much more portable than the old one. I think you would be wise to deal as much as possible with Sucklings of Chch. They know their job & their material is always fresh. Dealing with Prain you run a big risk of getting old &
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& more or less unsatisfactory goods . Am not surprised to hear that you have given up Seltona, the next thing to give up is the combined toning & fixing bath. It’s no good. It spoils the halftones. The lighter parts of the photo are toned & sort of bleached before the shadows are done, & what is worse the prints are very liable to fade. With the separate baths it only takes 1/4 of an hour longer, & as a batch of proofs represents a good deal of printing at this time of the year it is well worth a little extra trouble to make a success of them. Last letter I had from Dorrie she said she had just had a camera given to her & had been hard at work but so far I have not seen any of the results. I think I’ll have to borrow it when I go over on leave. She says she will send you an album full when she gets going.
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I was rather surprised to hear that Dick Hume was severely wounded, for as I have already told you I met him in Con. Camp out here & he is away up the line long ago. I think he was only a week or two in Hospital. Mark Collins is still here, & last week Joe Bagrie passed through here on his way up to the line. He was here for a couple of days so I had a good long yarn with him. I don’t think there is much more news. I suppose you saw all about the Hospital raids a week or so back. It was rather exciting while it lasted & we don’t want any more encores.
Goodbye
Love to All
Len
