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[Page 17]
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spoken to most of them. Some of them reckognized me from my likeness to Arthur and spoke to me. All have a good word to say for him and one sergeant told me I would find the name was good over there. Arthur's belongings have not turned up yet They can tell me nothing at Headquarters and I have not received any answer to my note to the Batt.Q.M.. The letter must have gone astray and I will write again today.
The King inspected all the Australian troops at Bulford last Wednesday. There were between forty five and fifty thousand troops present, and it would have been a grand sight if we hadn't been taking part. Needless to say it rained as if nothing else in all the world mattered. Reveille at 5.30 am. cold as charity. Marched the six odd miles to Bulford where we got into position and waited till 11.30. Inspection in a persistent drizzle, march past in a drenching rain, and a driving deluge while we splashed home. All right when you are used to it.
Nobody has approached me about a staff job yet, and I don't think I ought to take it. Men who have been over and done their bit have a claim prior to mine,and, though this seems a cruel way of putting it, war is not a personal matter.
Please don't think me selfish, dad. I wouldn't do anything to hurt you or mother for all the world; but I think it would be a cowardly act to take a job which otherwise would go to a man who had earned it, and to whom it rightly belongs. It is a very difficult thing to decide and