France.

May 30^th 1916.

My dear Harry

I am writing this letter and wondering at the same time when I shall be able to send it and when you will receive it as we shall be up to all sorts of things before I can send it even.  Thank you for your letter of the 24^th.  I have written you a letter about ten days ago I should think.  I don’t remember the date of course.  Most likely you will have had it.  I have read the most interesting facts from the paper.  Thank you for your offer but there is nothing that I really require.  At times I fancy all sorts of things but it is as well we can’t get them.  Mother sends me parcels from time to time and I think the excitement of receiving them is the chief pleasure.  I am afraid one is turning up today but I hope to goodness it doesn’t as it would be very inconvenient for a reason which I am not allowed to tell you.  Now, what am I to tell you that will interest you?  Nothing unusual seems to have happened lately except that we have been having rather an easy time.  No night affairs have disturbed our slumbers lately.  It is all right to wake up at three a.m. and feel that you are certain to be safe now.  The weather here is very remarkable.  One day it is terribly hot and the next day (as today) it is bitterly cold.  It was raining heavily till about ten o’clock.  We are rather glad it is cold today.  We had our sports the other day and I came into some money.  I won a franc.  I was a competitor in the three-legged and the Company (40 runners) relay race.  Our Company won & each of the forty had a franc.  I intended coming home first in the mile and had my name down but after three shots (practices) had it crossed out.  I was very glad for it was hot and the runners went off with a terrible pace.  Somehow or other you can’t get away from a cold day especially when we have nothing to do.  You don’t know what you want or what to do.  The letters have come in and of course it is on such a day that there are none for you.  One minute I feel as though I should like to be seeing Faust.  Why on earth it should be Faust I don’t know.  Then I want to be sitting near a fire in the dark after tea.  All sorts of wishes seem to float through my head and there always seems to be a great desire, the desire to be home for a little time even, at the back of everything.  Little things that were nor regarded as pleasures seem to be enormous delights now that they cannot be experienced.  Anyway I must stop being “sloppy”.  In my section I have the reputation of always being the most cheerful and I must keep it.  As you remark there is an opportunity of studying the French peasant class.  Yet I am astonished to what a degree we are all alike, English and French, rich and poor.  You find peasants who are grateful when you help shove their pig into a cart; you find them who kick up a terrible row when you come down the side of their field; you find they are very civil when they are selling you anything and you see they are very keen on receiving money as they are in England.  As a rule they are slovenly to the greatest extent.  Their homes have no comfort about them whatever.  The woman on our farm always looks filthy but she was a terrible howler one day when they had some function or other.  The men look very unkempt and but for a lazy appearance almost wild.  They don’t speak French amongst themselves but a very evil sounding tongue.  Thriftiness is one of their virtues.  Dogs are used to work treadmills for churning butter five hours a day chained up for the remainder of the day.  they also pull small carts about the place.  They never seem to be roaming about the streets as in England.  Another thing I always notice is the ugliness of their cemeteries.  English cemeteries are not, I suppose, things of beauty, but those in this part are hideous to the extreme.  The grass is never cut.  In some places there are monuments as big as summer houses.  In others the monuments are wooden crosses with roofs on them and bearing tin crucifixes with a skull and crossbones beneath.  They don’t have flowers on the graves.  You know those wreaths in glass cases.  Well, the French equivalent is absolutely frightful.  I can’t describe them in a letter.  In the churches there are always a number of altars and you would be surprised at the poorness and tawdriness of the ornaments and things upon them.  All sorts of Virgin Maries exist.  None of them are flattering and most clothed in very uncomfortable garments.  They never seem to think of having what I call the simple Christ and the simple Virgin Mary.  They attempt the gorgeous and it is always a wretched failure.  Wayside shrines exist in great numbers and at most unexpected places.  But for the sentiment they are nothing but collections of rubbish.  I wish I could see you and tell you all about this place.  The names of the people are not French but – I should think – Dutch.  The people do not seem to be perturbed at our arrival at the big towns.  We have experienced none of the mad welcomes that others are supposed to have had and we jog along quite as though we owned the place.  I think I will stop now and add a little bit on tomorrow as we can’t post till then.  I am afraid I shall be too busy though.  I have to clean my rifle now.  Behold tomorrow.  We had a long march last night, a four hour’s rest and a terrific march again this morning.  The last decent meal was yesterday at 3.30 (most of us didn’t eat it) & it was rather difficult marching on an empty stomach.  We arrive here (of course I can’t tell you the name of the place as this will go with others in a green envelope) and found it a delightful little spot.  The first thing to happen was a fellow being hit but not injured by a piece of shrapnel.  The second was a pal and I being about four yards off a hail of shrapnel.  Every second or so our guns fire & startle me to death.  Our dug-out is very snug & has four residents.  The weather is superb.  I found a huge parcel from home.  We are having a well earned rest so everything is all rosy.  I don’t think there is anything more to tell you.  On the march I thought of heaps of things which I have evidently forgotten.  So with best wishes I remain.

Yours

Alan.

June 1^st 1916 this part of the letter has been heavily crossed through.