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My dearest,

To-morrow is your birthday ,and soon after that it will be the War's. It is a year of anniversaries. They say that savages and women do not observe birthdays, but I'm writing on spec for all that.

But after all , what shall one say ? We have known each other for a score of years and more; one feels a little more every year, but I think perhaps one says (and needs to say ) a little less .

It's true that in these days anniversaries acquire a certain poignant significance; but to resolve to appreciate that significance is as futile as to clutch desperately at a fleeting moment on a summer's evening and say, " l will enjoy this hour to the full, simply because it will never happen again." Efforts at complete realization and the attempt to ensnare an emotion are destined to failure, I think.

The sun is sinking early in clear green skies, and far away to westward over the hills a singing west-wind is crying the heartache of the expiring day, and I'm just feeling that it's not much good trying to do anything, after all. Work all wrong, misunderstood by one's best friend-toute la boutique. Hence this decadent letter. Hence also the "Pill. Cascarata" which I have just taken - this being, as usual, the root of the matter?

The Divisional Signal Company of the R.E. has just been ordered France, so we are left without any professional signalers. To fill the gap they are going to make a temporary 'coalition company' selected from the battalion signalers of each regiment. This they have ordered me to take charge of. It's a compliments from headquarters there's a lot of extra work" in the heel of it."

Write and cheer me up. I'm a bit out of sorts.

All my love.