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Transcription

[Page] 43
[continued from page 42]

the north of Ypres. It has begun successfully
but bad weather has stayed progress.
The U boat campaign still continues to
be serious but the number of ships sunk
decreases slowly, and the country is fast
becoming self supporting – Potatoes which
a few weeks ago sold at 2/- the lb. [pound] are
now to be had for 1/- the stone! Sugar is
a commodity which continues scarce;
& often in the summer I have seen long
queus of women regulated by police awaiting
their turns to enter a grocer’s who had sugar
for sale. We have greatly reduced our con:
:sumption but have had enough for ordinary
purposes. Eggs now sell at 3/4d a doz. [dozen]!
The prices of beef & mutton are being controlled.
One no longer hears people predicting the
end of the war in a few weeks or months
as one did formerly. We are all quite satisfied
that victory is assured and determined to
hold on grimly till Germany has had
enough.

12th Augt. 1917
We had a great thrill while out on police duty
this afternoon through the visit of one of our
new airships of the Zeppelin type. It flew
over a considerable part of the town

and created a great excitement among the
populace. It looked enormous and the rumour
was that it was over 500 feet in length. Beneath
were two gondolas, and there were vertical
steering planes at the stern. There were heavy
masses of [drawing of airship inserted] cloud on the
sky, and [drawing of airship inserted] and as it sailed in
front of them, bright aliminium in colour, it
it looked very beautiful.
Jocelyn & the children are all in rooms at
Melrose and I follow on the 25th. Sandy
has now, I hope, attained his full height as he
is 6 ft 1½ ins. He goes up for his exam for Sandhurst
in November. My allorment has been
so prolific that I have great difficulty in con:
:suming the vegetables. I have had cauliflowers,
peas, beans, lettuce, potatoes, onions & turnips in abun:
:dance and the french beans are just com:
:mencing. One evening in the
spring of the year as I returned home I saw in
a dealer’s window in George St. two magnificent
goblets of glass commemorating naval events. Each
was some 15 inches or more in height. the bowl
more nearly hemispherical than usually is the
case. I entered the shop & examined them. One
bore the date of Nelson’s death and “England
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