13 April, 1915

My dear Father:

Yesterday morning I had the pleasure of writing you. I hope I do not weary you and the others with too much detail. We cannot discuss the war as a whole or the plan of operations, – partly because these are not revealed to us, – so we are limited to personal incident and detail. Our division that seemed such a big thing when it mustered at Valcartier, is only one small fraction of the fighting forces, and I might tell you all the division did and yet give very little information about the course of this many-sided fight. At this moment, as you probably know, we are miles from the firing line, waiting for orders to “go forward”, trying in the meantime to keep ourselves fit by route marches and drill. Yesterday afternoon I joined the parade for an hour's walk, and after that fell in with Huntly and went with him for a still gentler and more leisurely stroll up the hill near our village. It has many points of interest, but I must not catalogue these. It was certainly a charmingly idle way of spending an afternoon on active service, yet it was a chance that comes seldom and I think it was well used.

John writes me gleefully that he has been gazetted as assistant paymaster in the R.N.V.R. Possibly his work may be in the Crystal Palace, more probably in the Dardenelles. So we may or may not see him this summer. In any case he asks us to make Fassiefern our base in England, as the house will go on as usual.

This morning I had my horse clipped, and afterwards thoroughly washed with warm water containing tobacco and kerosene. He was suffering from one of the plagues of Egypt. Now I think he is free. I shall ride him a few miles this afternoon, probably over our next line of march. It seems that we shall move again this week, but whether nearer to the scene of action or not we are not told.

I hope that if either Prof. Morgan’s or Prof. Scott’s reported book is published I may get a copy soon. I should gladly order it from Great Britain, if it is being published in the old land. Will you kindly let me know.

With warmest love to each one,
Ever your loving son,
A.M.G.