Series 01 Part 02: Hughes family correspondence, 3 April 1917-22 September 1918 - Page 492
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[Page 492]
2.
to be done, I wandered off to Manly for the day with Mother and we looked at our blessed land in the St Patrick's College estate. I should like to build on some of it in order to get rid of it when the houses were built, but building costs are so frightfully high that most people hesitate to pay them. The same thing is happening next door to us here. No houses have yet been begun. There are about half a dozen built on the Manly estate. I think I should have decided all the same to do something if I had not read in this morning's papers that Watt the Acting Prime Minister promises us a heavy increase in direct taxation (Land & Income Taxes principally) in August to pay for current war expenses, & I think I shall wait to see where I am going to be hit before commencing speculation in building. Besides this, there are more War Loan to be subscribed for & if Australia doesn't "part up" willingly, she will be made to subscribe, as in New Zealand so that on the whole this is no time for speculation and I had better look cheerful & go on dropping the ground rent & taxes for a while longer. News from Italy of the failure of the great Austrian attack is more cheerful every day, & the condition of Austria – Hungary internally seems far from gay. America also seems to be "getting a move on" at last.