Witley Jan. 20th /17

 Dear Ollie:-

We got your letters today noon and as we are under quarantine we are doing some writing tonight.  We was put in quarantine last night.  One of our boys went to the hospital the first of this week and just come on with the mumps yesterday so if nobody else goes sick we will only be shut up for nine days and I hope they or we won’t for it is just as liable to be us as them in this case.  But I suppose it would be a good thing to have them now for we would be in a good place.  But we stand a chance of not having them and I was never fond of being sick.      

What In the name of God does Daddy think he is going to do at the Sunday camp?  They cut everything that would make saw dust when O’Brien logged there.  But I suppose he will find some hoop poles by this time.  But they will be damn crooked.

Well Ollie, I would like to have been home New Year’s.  I bet we would have made short work of old Enos if we could have got at him.  But we are too far away this winter to get home whenever we want to.  Has Creamer got home yet?  I suppose he has if not he is in Halifax anyway.

Well it’s hard to tell when we will get away for we can’t go as long as we have the mumps in the camp.  We thought we would be in France before now and we would have been too if it had not been for the damn mumps.  But I suppose we had not out to be in any hurry for it will soon be getting warm weather again and likely we will get enough of it before we get through anyway.

This is the paper that you sent to us in them writing cases and I run out of paper so it came in handy for I couldn’t get out to buy any.

Well I suppose Jack will tell you all the news for he is a better hand to write than I am so will say good bye for now.

Major