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  • #7328

    A place where glamour meets enchantment, said the brochure when she found what would become her cottage ten years ago. But tonight, Jeezel didn’t see the whimsical, neither did she hear the trees whispering secrets. And the moon… don’t let me start with the moon. The vines had started to cover the main door. It was painted in the richest shade of midnight blue, which was stunning when daylight splashed all over it, but there were no outside lights and at night, she always had difficulties finding the keyhole.

    Jeezel took her phone out to turn on the torch and the pop of a champagne cork told her she had received an e-mail. Such a technological marvel dipped in fabulousness. It was shimmering and radiant, she had adorned it with crystals that would catch the light with every moment, casting rainbows across. But the only light it cast was an anxious message from Roland whose workplace had gone berserk.

    “Please, do something quick!” was the content of the message.

    The witch had never been good under pressure. She touched her forehead lightly with the back of her hand. She didn’t want to mess with her carefully applied makeup. Then lip synched her moto : “Shine bright, darling, and let the world bask in your glow.”

    “That’s it!” she said. She took her key in her left hand and with a graceful and intricate swipe of her right hand she said: “Glowry”. Then she waved toward the door and added: “Hole”, and the key and the hole started to glow and attract each other. The door creeked open. Something else she’d have to attend to, later.

    “At last,” she said when the door finally shut.

    “Well, I could have grown a whole new tail in the time it took you to grace us with your presence at the door. What were you doing, love? Perfecting your grand entrance, or did you just get lost in the reflection of your own fabulousness again?,” said a warm and teasing voice.

    #7254
    TracyTracy
    Participant

      “Oh!” exclaimed Liz, who had heretofore been struggling to stay abreast of recent developments.  “You mean Mr Du Grat!  Honestly Finnley, your pronunciation leaves much to be desired.  I have it from the horses mouth that the charming Mr Du Grat has gone on an adventure.  More’s the pity,” she added, “As I was just starting to take a shine to him.”

      “But what about Walter Melon?” Roberto chimed in nervously.

      “What’s it got to do with you?” Liz narrowed her eyes.  “Turning the garden into a wildlife haven was a mistake, it’s left you with far too much time on your hands, my boy!  See if there’s anything you can do to help Finnley, it might stop her screaming.”

      “Why not help her with the baby faced cookies, Roberto?” Godfrey said mildly, peering over the top of his spectacles.

      “What was that you said? I can’t hear over that racket.”

      “I SAID..” Godfrey shouted, but was prevented from continuing when the corner of Liz’s desk landed on his gouty toe, which left him momentarily speechless.

      “Well that shut you all up, didn’t it!” With a triumphant smile, Liz surveyed the room. Her sudden urge to upend her desk, sending papers, books, ashtrays, peanuts and coffee cups scattering all over the room had been surprisingly therapeutic.  “I must do that more often,” she said quietly to herself.

      “I heard that,” retorted Finnley. “Let’s see how therapeutic it is to clean it all up.”  And with that, Finnley marched out of the room, tossing her toilet plunger over her shoulder which hit Godfrey on the side of his head knocking his glasses off.

      “Not so fast, Finnely! Godfrey shouted.  The pain in his big toe had enraged him.  But it was too late, the insubordinate wench slammed the door behind her and thundered up the stairs.

      “Ah, Roberto!  You can clean all this mess up.   I’m off to the dentist for a bit of peace and quiet.  I’ll expect it all to be tip top and Bristol fashion when I get back.”

      Thundering back down the stairs, Finnley flung the door open. “You use far too many cliches!” and then slammed back out again.

      #7243
      EricEric
      Keymaster

        Using a random generator for the next challenge with 5 objects.

        • straw
        • pop can
        • pencil holder
        • Christmas ornament
        • turtle

        🐋

        In the dreary town of Ravenwood, where shadows loomed and the wind howled through the empty streets, there was one house that stood out above the rest. It was the old mansion at the end of the road, shrouded in mystery and secrets. No one had lived there for years, but whispers of strange happenings and eerie lights could be heard wafting through the air.

        One stormy night, a young writer named Edgar arrived in Ravenwood seeking inspiration for his latest story. Drawn to the mansion by a strange force, he ventured inside, and found himself face to face with a peculiar sight. A straw sat on the table, next to a pop can and a pencil holder, and a Christmas ornament hung from a cobweb in the corner. But it was the turtle, a giant terrapin that seemed to be staring back at him with knowing eyes, that caught his attention.

        Edgar couldn’t shake the feeling that something was amiss, that the objects in the room were connected in some strange way. As he looked closer, he noticed that a thick layer of dust had settled on everything, as if no one had been there in years. And yet, the pop can still seemed to be fizzing, the straw stirred as if someone had just taken a sip, and the turtle’s eyes seemed to glow in the dim light.

        Suddenly, a voice from behind him made Edgar jump. It was the ghost of the previous owner, who had died under mysterious circumstances years ago. The ghost revealed that the objects in the room had been cursed by a vengeful witch who had once lived in the nearby forest. Each object was imbued with a terrible power, and whoever possessed them would be consumed by darkness.

        Edgar knew he had to escape, but as he turned to run, he felt a strange force pulling him towards the turtle. He tried to resist, but the turtle’s eyes seemed to hypnotize him, drawing him in closer and closer. Just as he was about to touch it, the turtle suddenly snapped its jaws shut, and Edgar woke up back in his own bed, drenched in sweat.

        He realized it had all been a nightmare, but as he looked down at his feet, he saw the turtle from his dream, sitting innocently at the end of his bed. Suddenly, he remembered the words of the ghost, and knew he had to destroy the cursed objects before it was too late. With trembling hands, he picked up the turtle, and opened his window to cast it out into the night. But as he did so, he caught a glimpse of his own reflection in the glass, and saw that his eyes had turned a bright shade of red. The curse had already taken hold, and Edgar knew he was doomed to a life of darkness and despair.

        Bit dark, Whale!
        :yahoo_worried: :yahoo_nailbiting: :yahoo_dontwannasee:   :yahoo_rofl:

        #7224
        AvatarJib
        Participant

          Georges was following an orange line on the floor of Jorid’s corridor with Barney on his left shoulder. The man was talking to the creature and listening to the occasional chirps Barney made as if they were part of a normal conversation.

          “You see, Barney,” said Georges. “Salomé gave us this checklist.” He tapped on the clipboard with his index finger. “I have to conduct all those experiments with you in the lab while she’s doing whatever she’s doing with the maps. Salomé loves maps, I can tell you. Always trying to invent new ones that would help us navigate all those dimensions. But they confuse me, so I’m glad to leave that to her and Jorid.”

          The two of them stopped in front of an orange door with a tag on it.

          “So you’ll ask me: ‘Georges, why are we going to the kitchen instead of going into the lab?’ —which is the blue door.”

          Georges waited for Barney’s chirp before continuing.

          “You’re right! She forgot the most important. What do you like to eat? You can’t do that in a lab with instruments stuck onto your head and tummy. It’s best done in the warm and cozy atmosphere of a kitchen.”

          The door swooshed open and they entered a bland, sanitised kitchen.

          “Jorid, morph the kitchen into a 19th century style pub, with greasy smells and a cozy atmosphere.”

          “Shouldn’t you be into the lab?” asked Jorid.

          “Let’s call it a kitchen lab,” answered Georges. “So you can tell Salomé I’m in the lab if she asks you.”

          “Most certainly.”

          The bland rooms started wobbling and becoming darker. Gas wall lamps were coming out of the walls, and a Chandeliers bloomed from the ceiling. The kitchen island turned into a mahogany pub counter behind which the cupboards turned into glass shelves with a collection of colourful liquor bottles. Right beside the beer pumps was the cornucopia, the source of all things edible, the replicator. It was simple and looked like a silver tray.

          “That’s more like it,” said Georges. He put Barney on the counter and the creature chirped contentedly to show his agreement.

          “Now, You don’t look like the kind of guy who eat salad”, said Georges. “What do you want to try?”

          Barney shook his head and launched into a series of chirps and squeals.

          “I know! Let’s try something you certainly can’t find where you come from… outer space. Jorid, make us some good pickles in a jar.”

          The replicator made a buzzing sound and a big jar full of pickles materialised on the silver tray. Barney chirped in awe and Georges frowned.

          “Why did you make a Roman jar?” he asked. “We’re in a 19th century pub. And the pickles are so huge! Aubergine size.”

          “My apologies,” said Jorid. “I’m confused. As you know, my database is a bit scrambled at the moment…”

          “It’s ok,” said Georges who feared the ship would launch into some unsolicited confidences and self deprecating moment. “A pickle is a pickle anyway.” He picked a pickle in the jar and turned towards Barney with a big grin. “Let’s try some.”

          Barney’s eyes widened. He put his hands in front of him and shook his head. The door swooshed open.

          “What have you done with the kitchen?” asked Léonard. “And what are you trying to feed this rat with?”

          “This rat has a name. It’s Barney. What are you doing here?” asked Georges.

          “Well, Isn’t it a kitchen? I’m hungry.”

          “I mean, shouldn’t you go check your vitals first in med bay?”

          “When you feel hungry, it’s enough to tell a man he’s alive and well,” said Léonard. “Nice roman jar, Jorid. Depicting naked roman fighters, archaeological finding of 2nd century BC, good state of conservation.” He looked closer. “Intricate details between the legs… You surpassed yourself on that one Jorid.”

          “Thanks for the compliment Léonard. It’s reassuring to know I’m still doing great at some things when others think I’m losing it.”

          “I never said…” started Georges.

          “You thought it.”

          Léonard took a pickle from the jar and smelled it. He winced.

          “Sure, smells like pickles enough,” he said, putting it back in the jar and licking his finger. “Disgusting.” He looked at Georges. “I was thinking of taking a shuttle and doing a little tour, while you solve the navigational array problem with Salomé.”

          “Why are you asking me? Why don’t you just take a shuttle and go there by yourself?”

          “Jorid won’t let me take one.”

          “Jorid? Why don’t you let Léonard take a shuttle?”

          Salomé said he’s not to be left out of the ship without supervision.”

          “Oh! Right,” said Georges. “We just rescued you from a sand prison egg where you’ve been kept in stasis for several weeks and you can’t remember anything that led you there. Why don’t we let you pilot a shuttle and wander about on your own?”

          Léonard looked at Georges, annoyed. He picked a pickle from the jar and took a bite. Barney squealed. As Léonard chewed and made crunching sounds, the creature hit its head with its paw.

          “Then why don’t you come with me?” asked Léonard.

          “I can’t believe it.”

          “What? You go with me. You can supervise me wherever I go. Problem solved.”

          “No. I mean. You eating one of Barney’s pickles.”

          Léonard took another bite and chewed noisily. Barney chirped and squealed. He put his hands to its throat and spat on the counter.

          “I’m sure he won’t mind. Look at him. Doesn’t seem it likes pickles that much.”

          You hate pickles, Léonard.”

          “I know. That’s disgusting.”

          “Why do you eat them if you find it disgusting?”

          “That’s the sound of it. It’s melodious. And for some reason those pickles are particularly good.”

          Barney jumped on Georges arm and ran to his neck where he planted his little claws in.

          “Ouch!” said Georges. He slapped Léonard’s hand before the man could take one more pickle bite. “What the f*ck?”

          “Hey! Why did you do that?”

          “It’s not me,” said Georges. Barney squealed and Georges’s hands pushed the jar on the floor. It crashed and a flood of pickle and vinegar juice spread on the floor.

          “Haven’t your mother told you not to play with food?” asked Léonard diving on the floor to catch some more pickles. Barney chirped and squealed while Georges’s body jumped on Léonard and they both rolled over in the pickles.

          The door swooshed open.

          “Guys, we need to…” started Salomé. She had a set of maps in her hands. “What’s that smell? What… did you do to the kitchen? ”

          Georges made me do it,” said Jorid.

          Georges broke a 2nd century BC jar,” said Léonard.

          “Barney’s controlling me,” said Georges.

          The creature shrugged and removed its claws from Georges’ neck.

          “Squeak!”

          “Ouch! Thank you,” said Georges, licking the pickle juice he got on his lips during the fight.

          “I can’t believe it. Georges, you had a checklist. And it did not include the words kitchen or pickles or making a mess. And Léonard, you hate pickles.”

          “I know,” said Léonard who took a bite in the pickle he was holding. “That’s disgusting, but I can’t help it they taste so good.”

          Georges stole the pickle from Léonard’s hand and took a bite.

          “Pick your own pickle,” said Léonard, stealing it back.

          “Stop guys! That smell… Jorid what did you put in those pickles?”

          “I took the liberty to change the recipe and added some cinnamon.”

          “It doesn’t smell like cinnamon,” said Georges smelling his hands full of pickle juice. He took a bite in one and said: “Doesn’t taste like cinnamon either. I would know. I hate cinnamon since the time I was turned into an Asari.”

          “That’s it,” said Salomé. “What kind of cinnamon did you put in the brew, Jorid?”

          “I’ve heard it’s best to use local ingredients. I put cinnamon from Langurdy,” said the ship.

          “Quick! Guys, spit it out,” she said, kneeling and putting her fingers into Georges’ throat to make him puke. “Jorid, make away with the pickles,” said Salomé.

          “Nooo,” said the men.

          “Cinnamon from Langurdy is very addictive,” Salomé snapped. “You don’t want to OD on pickles, do you?”

          After they got the mess cleaned up and the kitchen went back to its normal blank state. Georges and Léonard took some pills to counter the effects of withdrawal. Salomé had them sit at the kitchen table. Georges kept blinking as if the white light on the white walls were hurting his eyes.

          “You can thank Barney if you didn’t eat more pickles,” said Salomé. “You could have had a relapse, and you know how bad it was the first time you had to flush cinnamon from your body.”

          Georges groaned.

          “Anyway. I checked the maps with Jorid and I came upon an anomaly in the Southern Deserts. Something there is causing Jorid’s confusion. We’ll have to go down there if we ever want to leave this place and time.”

          #6613

          In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

          Despite the old man’s endless flow of words, Youssef couldn’t get him to explain what he meant about the abandoned mine and why the town’s people didn’t like people sneaking around and asking questions.

          Not wanting to waste more time, Youssef walked to the brick building where the twins had disappeared. It was crammed between the telegraph station and a grocery store. The door had been walled with red bricks. They were covered in faded graffitis and layers of torn-up posters. It seemed obvious the wall had been there for quite some time already.

          The old man was sticking to Youssef like glue, talking about that time when his now dead brother took in an old cat he called Phineas. Youssef tried to growl him away, but the man always came back, persistent as a cloud of mosquitoes over the promise of a blood feast.

          Youssef tried not to pay attention to him. What did AL said about that quest ? Go ask questions around to town’s people about odd things happening ? Well there were plenty of those things happening. Maybe the clerk at the telegraph station would know something, especially how to get rid of that old man.

          Youssef pushed the door and entered the telegraph station, leaving the old man outside. The interior was lit with a collection of old style tungsten lamps hanging in a random pattern from the ceiling. 

          The clerk was busy sorting out a pile of telegrams. Clickety-clack. Clickety-clack. He lifted his head up. The noise stopped and Youssef realised the young man had mechanical hands.

          “Welcome, welcome, welcome! What can I do for you today, my friend?” asked the clerk.

          “I just wanted to…” started Youssef.

          “Wait! Don’t tell me. I’m a bit of a psychic myself and I already know what you’re here for.”

          “Really?”

          The man foraged through his pile of telegram with his mechanical hands and picked one. He looked at it for a few seconds.

          “My friend, you’re in luck today!” he said, looking intently at Youssef. “I just received this telegram that I think might interest you. Here, take a look!”

          Youssef took the paper and started to read aloud : “Words spoken by the talkative will unlock the path. Seek those who chatter and unravel the clue. What the…?” 

          “Interesting, isn’t it? That’s a real head-scratcher, if you ask me!”

          The door bell rang and the old man entered, holding his sore ribs. 

          “Get out, Phineas. You’re not welcome here.” said the clerk with a frown.

          The old man looked at the clerk with an air of confusion before turning to Youssef. “What did he say? Who’s Phineas?” he asked.

          Ignoring the question, Youssef tried to steer the conversation back to the telegram. “What does this mean?” he asked the clerk.

          The clerk stroked his chin, looking thoughtful. “Hmm, well, it seems to me that you have a certain magnetism for talkative people. Perhaps that’s the key to unlocking this riddle.”

          Youssef’s eyes widened in surprise. “What do you mean, magnetism?”

          The old man interjected, “For sure! You’re like a magnet, my boy. I can’t seem to stop talking when I’m around you.”

          Youssef rolled his eyes. “So, what do I do? Just wander around town and wait for someone to start talking?”

          The clerk nodded. “That could be a good start. But if you’re looking for something specific, you might want to try Betsy when you wake up. She’s got a boutique of Gems and Rocks. You seem to like them rocks,” he said pointing at the black obsidian. “Found it in a mine?”

          The old man’s eyes lit up. “Ah, the old mine! I’ve been there before, you know. My brother used to work there before he died. Strange things happening there.”

          Youssef’s interest was piqued. “What kind of strange things?”

          The old man leaned in conspiratorially. “There’s a magnetar hidden in that mine, my boy.”

          “Shut up! Phineas,” interrupted the clerk. “If you want my advice, stranger, don’t go near the old mine. ‘Curiosity killed the cat’ if you know what I mean.”

          The telegraph receiver started to make clicketing sounds. The clerk read it and looked at Youssef.

          “You’ve got a message man. Time to wake up.”

          “Wake up?”

          :fleuron2:

          Youssef opened his eyes and looked at a black mass in front of his eyes. He had been sleeping with the stone just beside his head on the pillow. No wonder he had had weird dreams. He heard his phone buzz. He sat up reluctantly and looked at his phone. 8am. A notification that his game progression had been saved and several messages from Miss Tartiflate, the last one saying :

          Don’t think you can dodge work. I’m still expecting the last blog post you’ve been paid to write!!!”

          He groaned as reality was starting to catch up.

          #6612

          In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

          Two young women, identical to the purple lock of hair hiding their left eye, entered the room. They moved as one person to the table, balancing their arms and bouncing on the floor like little girls. Youssef couldn’t help a shiver as he remembered The Shining.

          “We are the twins,” they said, looking at him from behind their purple lock of hair. “Don’t mind us.”

          One spoke a few milliseconds after the other, giving their combined voice an otherworldly touch that wasn’t reassuring. One took the sheets of paper from under the obsidian stone and the other the notebooks. After an hesitation they left the stone on the table and went back to the door.

          “Wait,” said Youssef as they were about to leave, “What was on that paper? It looked like a map.”

          “We leave you the stone,” they said without looking at him. “You might need it.”

          As they shut the door, Youssef jumped out of his bed and tried to catch up with them. People couldn’t just enter his room like that. But when he flung the door open, the corridor was empty. He had the impression echoes of a combined laugh remained in the air and, tired as he was, decided not to look for them. Better not break the veil between dream and reality.

          Intrigued by what the girls said, he took the black stone from the table and the last snicker bar from his backpack. He noted he would have to go to the grocery store tomorrow to buy some. Once he was back on his bed, he engulfed the snack and, while chewing, turned the stone around, trying to figure out what the girls meant by “You might need it”. The stone was cold to the touch and his reflection kept changing but nothing particular happened. Disappointed, he put the stone on his pillow and resumed the game on his phone.

          Youssef finds himself in a small ghost town in what looks like the middle of the Australian outback. He’s standing in the town square, surrounded by an old post office, a saloon, and a few other ramshackle buildings.

          He had a hard time focusing on the game. He started to feel the fatigue from the day. He yawned and started to doze off.

          :fleuron:

          Youssef is standing in the town square, surrounded by an old post office, a saloon, and a few other ramshackle buildings. Scraps of mist are floating towards him. A ghostly laugh resounds from behind. He turns swiftly only to see a flash of purple disappear in a dark alleyway. He starts to run to catch them but a man, thrown out of the saloon, stumbles in front of him and they roll together on the dust.

          “It’s not that I don’t like you,” said the man, “but you’re heavy.”

          Youssef rolls on the side, mumbling some excuses and looks at where the twins had disappeared but the alleyway was gone. 

          “I think you broke one of my rib with your stone,” says the man, feeling his chest.

          He looks as old as the town itself and quite harmless in his clothes, too big for him.

          “What stone?” asks Youssef

          The old man points at a fragment of black obsidian between them on the ground. 

          “Don’t show them,” he says, “or they’ll take it from you.”

          “What did you do?”

          “They don’t like it when you ask questions about the old mines.”

          #6507

          In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

          To Youssef’s standards, a plane was never big and Flight AL357 was even smaller. When he found his seat, he had to ask a sweaty Chinese man and a snorting woman in a suit with a bowl cut and pink almond shaped glasses to move out so he could squeeze himself in the small space allotted to economy class passengers. On his right, an old lady looked at the size of his arms and almost lost her teeth. She snapped her mouth shut just in time and returned quickly to her magazine. Her hands were trembling and Youssef couldn’t tell if she was annoyed or something else.

          The pilote announced they were ready to leave and Youssef sighed with relief. Which was short lived when he got the first bump on the back of his seat. He looked back, apologising to the woman with the bowl cut on his left. Behind him was a kid wearing a false moustache and chewing like a cow. He was swinging his tiny legs, hitting the back of Youssef’s seat with the regularity of a metronome. The kid blew his gum until the bubble exploded. The mother looked ready to open fire if Youssef started to complain. He turned back again and tried to imagine he was getting a massage in one of those Japanese shiatsu chairs you find in some airports.

          The woman in front of him had thrown her very blond hair atop her seat and it was all over his screen. The old lady looked at him and offered him a gum. He wondered how she could chew gums with her false teeth, and kindly declined. The woman with the bowl cut and pink glasses started to talk to her sweaty neighbour in Chinese. The man looked at Youssef as if he had been caught by a tiger and was going to get eaten alive. His eyes were begging for help.

          As the plane started to move, the old woman started to talk.

          « Hi, I’m Gladys. I am afraid of flying, she said. Can I hold your hand during take off ? »

          After another bump on his back, Youssef sighed. It was going to be a long flight for everyone.

          As soon as they had gained altitude, Youssef let go of the old woman’s hand. She hadn’t stopped talking about her daughter and how she was going to be happy to see her again. The flight attendant passed by with a trolley and offered them a drink and a bag of peanuts. The old woman took a glass of red wine. Youssef was tempted to take a coke and dip the hair of the woman in front of him in it. He had seen a video on LooTube recently with a girl in a similar situation. She had stuck gum and lollypops in the hair of her nemesis, dipped a few strands in her soda and clipped strands randomly with her nail cutter. He could ask the old woman one of her gums, but thought that if a girl could do it, it would certainly not go well for him if he tried.

          Instead he asked the flight attendant if there was wifi on board. Sadly there was none. He had hoped at least the could play the game and catch up with his friends during that long flight to Sydney.

          :fleuron:

          When the doors opened, Youssef thought he was free of them all. He was tired, his back hurt, and he couldn’t sleep because the kid behind him kept crying and kicking, the food looked like it had been regurgitated twice by a yak, and the old chatty woman had drained his batteries. She said she wouldn’t sleep on a plane because she had to put her dentures in a glass for hygiene reasons and feared someone would steal them while she had her eyes closed.

          He walked with long strides in the corridors up to the custom counters and picked a line, eager to put as much distance between him and the other passengers. Xavier had sent him a message saying he was arriving in Sydney in a few hours. Youssef thought it would be nice to change his flight so that they could go together to Alice Spring. He could do some time with a friend for a change.

          His bushy hair stood on end when he heard the voice of the old woman just behind him. He wondered how she had managed to catch up so fast. He saw a small cart driving away.

          « I wanted to tell, Gladys said, it was such a nice flight in your company. How long have you before your flight to Alice? We can have a coffee together. »

          Youssef mentally said sorry to his friend. He couldn’t wait for the next flight.

          #6505
          prUneprUne
          Participant

            I told Devan in no ambiguous terms to solve his own funny riddle.

            I did try to make an effort, but that seemed a rather desperate way to catch our attention after not really caring about the family for so long.
            It was good to see him though.

            With all the activity around the coming guests at the Inn, it’s easy getting lost in the wind of activities, like the motes of dust hiding in Dido’s hair.
            The twins did a good effort though, with all the decorating and stuff. I was sincerely impressed. Been a long time since I’ve been impressed by them. Seems they may actually grow up fine. Who would have known really.

            Hormonal growth be damned, I’m feeling all sort of contradictory feelings about this.

            Like, what about hearing about our funny father after all this time.

            And Devan, who’d shut us all off, now back for a little make-over time… Or something else maybe. He doesn’t seem to realize the emotional landscape and baggage here. He’s a nice brother though.

            It’s horrible. So much contradiction – I feel some rage on the surface, lots of… and underneath so much caring it’s painful.

            So what happened to our father? Still alive? Quite possibly. I’ve had my suspicious when this strange guy posed as a friend to the twins on the social network some years back.
            I was young when he left without a note; hadn’t started to write my journals yet, so my memories of him are very little. But I remember the chaos left after him; Mater wasn’t really the same after. I think she’s burned all pictures of him, and somehow pretends they never existed.
            Idle plays it as if she doesn’t care, but I’m sure she does. She doesn’t want to let it be known, but she probably doesn’t want to hurt Mater more with this.

            God, what a family drama. Why would Devan want to unearth all of this now, at a moment we were all quiet and settled like a decent respectable family.

            It was maybe just keeping up with appearances, and the veneer was thin to start with.

            That’s in the middle of all this angst mixed with puberty that it hit me.

            Acrostic. Or ἀκροστιχίς in Greek. First verse, or first letter.

            My dad was a writer, so he liked word riddles. And the little sign was a pointer.

            >A mine, a tile, dust piled high,
            Together they rest, yet always outside.
            One misstep, and you’ll surely fall,
            Into the depths, where danger lies all.

            ATOI didn’t seem to make much sense, but I remembered how small “l” sometimes looked like a capital “I”.
            Atoll was the clue I’m sure of it. Where to disappear if not to islands.
            The letters at the end of the verses are spelling HELL. So it’s opposite.

            Basically, Atoll Paradise.

            A little Gugu search with AI, and that was it. That was our father here, with a number to call.

            Atoll Paradise
            Boat rentals – Island tours
            Copywriter, biographer
            Call FRED @ (+679) 215-7644

            Now it’ll be fair if Devan is calling me crazy. We’ll have to call and check before saying anything to Idle or even Mater for now.

            #6491

            Sophie was glad she could help that young guy Youssef get out of this mess with that false ingenue. She was clearly not for him, he needed someone more mature who would know how to handle his big body. She looked at Miss Bossy Pants’ office. Ricardo was there again and they seem to be in another of their grand discussions. When Miss Bossy saw Sophie watching, she moved to the big window and shut the venetian blind. What were they all about, always plotting things in the back of their journalists. If Sophie didn’t have an ounce of ethic, she would have RVed them long ago, but she made a point to only use her abilities for good, and at times good gossip with friends.

            She went out to the elevator and called it. While she waited, she started writing a message : “The boy is on his way. I did like you asked. Now book me a place to that Akashic Record training as promised.”

            The answer came only a few seconds later : “consider it done”

            The elevator bell rang and the door opened. Sophie got in with a big satisfied smile on her face.”

            #6470

            In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

            Put your thoughts to sleep. Do not let them cast a shadow over the moon of your heart. Let go of thinking.
            ~ Rumi

            Tired from not having any sleep, Zara had found the suburb of Camden unattractive and boring, and her cousin Bertie, although cheerful and kind and eager to show her around, had become increasingly irritating to her.  She found herself wishing he’d shut up and take her back to the house so she could play the game again.  And then felt even more cranky at how uncomfortable she felt about being so ungrateful.  She wondered if she was going to get addicted and spent the rest of her life with her head bent over a gadget and never look up at the real word again, like boring people moaned about on social media.

            Maybe she should leave tomorrow, even if it meant arriving first at the Flying Fish Inn.  But what about the ghost of Isaac in the church, would she regret later not following that up.  On the other hand, if she went straight to the Inn and had a few days on her own, she could spend as long as she wanted in the game with nobody pestering her.   Zara squirmed mentally when she realized she was translating Berties best efforts at hospitality as pestering.

            Bertie stopped the car at a traffic light and was chatting to the passenger in the next car through his open window.  Zara picked her phone up and checked her daily Call The Whale app for some inspiration.

            Let go of thinking.

            A ragged sigh escaped Zara’s lips, causing Bertie to glance over. She adjusted her facial expression quickly and rustled up a cheery smile and Bertie continued his conversation with the occupants of the other car until the lights changed.

            “I thought you’d like to meet the folks down at the library, they know all the history of Camden,” Bertie said, but Zara interrupted him.

            “Oh Bertie, how kind of you!  But I’ve just had a message and I have to leave tomorrow morning for the rendezvous with my friends. There’s been a change of plans.”  Zara astonished herself that she blurted that out without thinking it through first.   But there. It was said. It was decided.

            #6468

            In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

            At the former Chinggis Khaan International Airport which was now called the New Ulaanbaatar International Airport, the young intern sat next to Youssef, making the seats tremble like a frail suspended bridge in the Andes. Youssef had been considering connecting to the game and start his quest to meet with his grumpy quirk, but the girl seemed pissed, almost on the brink of crying. So Youssef turned off his phone and asked her what had happened, without thinking about the consequences, and because he thought it was a nice opportunity to engage the conversation with her at last, and in doing so appear to be nice to care so that she might like him in return.

            Natalie, because he had finally learned her name, started with all the bullying she had to endure from Miss Tartiflate during the trip, all the dismissal about her brilliant ideas, and how the Yeti only needed her to bring her coffee and pencils, and go fetch someone her boss needed to talk to, and how many time she would get no thanks, just a short: “you’re still here?”

            After some time, Youssef even knew more about her parents and her sisters and their broken family dynamics than he would have cared to ask, even to be polite. At some point he was starting to feel grumpy and realised he hadn’t eaten since they arrived at the airport. But if he told Natalie he wanted to go get some food, she might follow him and get some too. His stomach growled like an angry bear. He stood more quickly than he wanted and his phone fell on the ground. The screen lit up and he could just catch a glimpse of a desert emoji in a notification before Natalie let out a squeal. Youssef looked around, people were glancing at him as if he might have been torturing her.

            “Oh! Sorry, said Youssef. I just need to go to the bathroom before we board.”

            “But the boarding is only in one hour!”

            “Well I can’t wait one hour.”

            “In that case I’m coming with you, I need to go there too anyway.”

            “But someone needs to stay here for our bags,” said Youssef. He could have carried his own bag easily, but she had a small suitcase, a handbag and a backpack, and a few paper bags of products she bought at one of the two the duty free shops.

            Natalie called Kyle and asked him to keep a close watch on her precious things. She might have been complaining about the boss, but she certainly had caught on a few traits of her.

            Youssef was glad when the men’s bathroom door shut behind him and his ears could have some respite. A small Chinese business man was washing his hands at one of the sinks. He looked up at Youssef and seemed impressed by his height and muscles. The man asked for a selfie together so that he could show his friends how cool he was to have met such a big stranger in the airport bathroom. Youssef had learned it was easier to oblige them than having them follow him and insist.

            When the man left, Youssef saw Natalie standing outside waiting for him. He thought it would have taken her longer. He only wanted to go get some food. Maybe if he took his time, she would go.

            He remembered the game notification and turned on his phone. The icon was odd and kept shifting between four different landscapes, each barren and empty, with sand dunes stretching as far as the eye could see. One with a six legged camel was already intriguing, in the second one a strange arrowhead that seemed to be getting out of the desert sand reminded him of something that he couldn’t quite remember. The fourth one intrigued him the most, with that car in the middle of the desert and a boat coming out of a giant dune.

            Still hungrumpy he nonetheless clicked on the shapeshifting icon and was taken to a new area in the game, where the ground was covered in sand and the sky was a deep orange, as if the sun was setting. He could see a mysterious figure in the distance, standing at the top of a sand dune.

            The bell at the top right of the screen wobbled, signalling a message from the game. There were two. He opened the first one.

            We’re excited to hear about your real-life parallel quest. It sounds like you’re getting close to uncovering the mystery of the grumpy shaman. Keep working on your blog website and keep an eye out for any clues that Xavier and the Snoot may send your way. We believe that you’re on the right path.

            What on earth was that ? How did the game know about his life and the shaman at the oasis ? After the Thi Gang mess with THE BLOG he was becoming suspicious of those strange occurrences. He thought he could wonder for a long time or just enjoy the benefits. Apparently he had been granted a substantial reward in gold coins for successfully managing his first quest, along with a green potion.

            He looked at his avatar who was roaming the desert with his pet bear (quite hungrumpy too). The avatar’s body was perfect, even the hands looked normal for once, but the outfit had those two silver disks that made him look like he was wearing an iron bra.

            He opened the second message.

            Clue unlocked It sounds like you’re in a remote location and disconnected from the game. But, your real-life experiences seem to be converging with your quest. The grumpy shaman you met at the food booth may hold the key to unlocking the next steps in the game. Remember, the desert represents your ability to adapt and navigate through difficult situations.

            🏜️🧭🧙‍♂️ Explore the desert and see if the grumpy shaman’s clues lead you to the next steps in the game. Keep an open mind and pay attention to any symbols or clues that may help you in your quest. Remember, the desert represents your ability to adapt and navigate through difficult situations.

            Youssef recalled that strange paper given by the lama shaman, was it another of the clues he needed to solve that game? He didn’t have time to think about it because a message bumped onto his screen.

            “Need help? Contact me 👉”

            Sands_of_time is trying to make contact : ➡️ACCEPT <> ➡️DENY ❓
            #6416

            In reply to: Orbs of Madjourneys

            The team had to stop when a sandstorm hit them in the middle of the desert. They only had an hour drive left to reach the oasis where Lama Yoneze had been seen last and Miss Tartiflate insisted, like she always did, against the guides advice that they kept on going. She feared the last shaman would be lost in the storm, maybe croak stuffed with that damn dust. But when they lost the satellite dish and a jeep almost rolled down a sand dune, she finally listened to the guides. They had them park the cars close to each other, then checked the straps and urged everyone to stay in their cars until the storm was over.

            Youssef at first thought he was lucky. He managed to get into the same car as Tiff, the young intern he had discussed with the other day. But despite all their precautions, they couldn’t stop the dust to come in. It was everywhere and you had to kept your mouth and eyes shut if you didn’t want to grind your teeth with fine sand. So instead he enjoyed this unexpected respite from his trying to save THE BLOG from the evil Thi Gang, and from Miss Tartiflate’s continuous flow of criticism.

            The storm blew off the dish just after Xavier had sent him AL’s answer to the strange glyphs he had received on his phone. When Youssef read the message, he sighed. He had forgotten hope was an illusion. AL was in its infancy and was not a dead language expert. He gave them something fitting Youssef’s current location and the questions about famous alien dishes they asked him last week. It was just an old pot luck recipe from when the Silk Road was passing through the Gobi desert. He just hoped Xavier would have some luck until Youssef found a way to restore the connexion.

            #6365
            matermater
            Participant

              Prune has got me into this AI stuff… It sounds like gibberish to me, but Idle sounded amazed at the stuff it spewed out.

              With some info on our family story, Prune got it to try and predict the future…

              Sounds like a big plate of bog, but we’ll see how it goes.

              Sure, here are a few possible events that could occur between Mater’s 100th birthday and her death in the Flying Fish Inn story:

              1. Mater decides to throw herself a grand birthday party, inviting all of her friends and family from the small outback town. However, things take a turn for the strange when a group of extraterrestrial beings crash the party and reveal themselves to be long-time fans of Mater’s famous bush tucker cuisine.
              2. Mater begins to experience vivid dreams and hallucinations, in which she is visited by the ghost of her late husband. As the dreams become more frequent, the family begins to suspect that there may be something more to them than just Mater’s mind playing tricks on her.
              3. Mater’s granddaughter Prune becomes increasingly obsessed with her dream of traveling to Mars, and begins to notice strange occurrences happening around the inn that seem to be connected to her aspiration.
              4. A group of eccentric scientists arrive at the inn, conducting research on the local flora and fauna. They eventually discover a species of sentient plants living in the area, and Mater becomes convinced that the plants are communicating with her in her dreams.
              5. With her health declining, Mater begins to spend more and more time tending to her garden, where she is visited by an old kookaburra who seems to possess an otherworldly intelligence. The bird becomes Mater’s companion and confidant in the final days of her life.
              6. As the Great Fires ravage the Australian bush, Mater makes the difficult decision to shut down the inn and evacuate the guests. But as they flee, they realize that the fire is not just a natural disaster, but something far more sinister and mystical.
              7. In her final days, Mater begins to remember strange and vivid details of her life that she never could have known, as if she lived a previous life in another time and place. As she dies, she whispers something to Prune, which opens her eyes to a new reality that may have been hidden from her all along
              8. It turns out the family had a lot of secrets, and the only way to escape it, was to leave the inn, but it was not an escape for all. Through the series of events, secrets are revealed, and some truths cannot be undone.Note that these events are fictional and whimsical in nature, but as they keeps it grounded to a sense of doldrums in the Australian bush and occasionally guests help to unravel some of the overarching mysteries it could make a fitting storyline for the story.
              #6350
              TracyTracy
              Participant

                Transportation

                Isaac Stokes 1804-1877

                 

                Isaac was born in Churchill, Oxfordshire in 1804, and was the youngest brother of my 4X great grandfather Thomas Stokes. The Stokes family were stone masons for generations in Oxfordshire and Gloucestershire, and Isaac’s occupation was a mason’s labourer in 1834 when he was sentenced at the Lent Assizes in Oxford to fourteen years transportation for stealing tools.

                Churchill where the Stokes stonemasons came from: on 31 July 1684 a fire destroyed 20 houses and many other buildings, and killed four people. The village was rebuilt higher up the hill, with stone houses instead of the old timber-framed and thatched cottages. The fire was apparently caused by a baker who, to avoid chimney tax, had knocked through the wall from her oven to her neighbour’s chimney.

                Isaac stole a pick axe, the value of 2 shillings and the property of Thomas Joyner of Churchill; a kibbeaux and a trowel value 3 shillings the property of Thomas Symms; a hammer and axe value 5 shillings, property of John Keen of Sarsden.

                (The word kibbeaux seems to only exists in relation to Isaac Stokes sentence and whoever was the first to write it was perhaps being creative with the spelling of a kibbo, a miners or a metal bucket. This spelling is repeated in the criminal reports and the newspaper articles about Isaac, but nowhere else).

                In March 1834 the Removal of Convicts was announced in the Oxford University and City Herald: Isaac Stokes and several other prisoners were removed from the Oxford county gaol to the Justitia hulk at Woolwich “persuant to their sentences of transportation at our Lent Assizes”.

                via digitalpanopticon:

                Hulks were decommissioned (and often unseaworthy) ships that were moored in rivers and estuaries and refitted to become floating prisons. The outbreak of war in America in 1775 meant that it was no longer possible to transport British convicts there. Transportation as a form of punishment had started in the late seventeenth century, and following the Transportation Act of 1718, some 44,000 British convicts were sent to the American colonies. The end of this punishment presented a major problem for the authorities in London, since in the decade before 1775, two-thirds of convicts at the Old Bailey received a sentence of transportation – on average 283 convicts a year. As a result, London’s prisons quickly filled to overflowing with convicted prisoners who were sentenced to transportation but had no place to go.

                To increase London’s prison capacity, in 1776 Parliament passed the “Hulks Act” (16 Geo III, c.43). Although overseen by local justices of the peace, the hulks were to be directly managed and maintained by private contractors. The first contract to run a hulk was awarded to Duncan Campbell, a former transportation contractor. In August 1776, the Justicia, a former transportation ship moored in the River Thames, became the first prison hulk. This ship soon became full and Campbell quickly introduced a number of other hulks in London; by 1778 the fleet of hulks on the Thames held 510 prisoners.
                Demand was so great that new hulks were introduced across the country. There were hulks located at Deptford, Chatham, Woolwich, Gosport, Plymouth, Portsmouth, Sheerness and Cork.

                The Justitia via rmg collections:

                Justitia

                Convicts perform hard labour at the Woolwich Warren. The hulk on the river is the ‘Justitia’. Prisoners were kept on board such ships for months awaiting deportation to Australia. The ‘Justitia’ was a 260 ton prison hulk that had been originally moored in the Thames when the American War of Independence put a stop to the transportation of criminals to the former colonies. The ‘Justitia’ belonged to the shipowner Duncan Campbell, who was the Government contractor who organized the prison-hulk system at that time. Campbell was subsequently involved in the shipping of convicts to the penal colony at Botany Bay (in fact Port Jackson, later Sydney, just to the north) in New South Wales, the ‘first fleet’ going out in 1788.

                 

                While searching for records for Isaac Stokes I discovered that another Isaac Stokes was transported to New South Wales in 1835 as well. The other one was a butcher born in 1809, sentenced in London for seven years, and he sailed on the Mary Ann. Our Isaac Stokes sailed on the Lady Nugent, arriving in NSW in April 1835, having set sail from England in December 1834.

                Lady Nugent was built at Bombay in 1813. She made four voyages under contract to the British East India Company (EIC). She then made two voyages transporting convicts to Australia, one to New South Wales and one to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania). (via Wikipedia)

                via freesettlerorfelon website:

                On 20 November 1834, 100 male convicts were transferred to the Lady Nugent from the Justitia Hulk and 60 from the Ganymede Hulk at Woolwich, all in apparent good health. The Lady Nugent departed Sheerness on 4 December 1834.

                SURGEON OLIVER SPROULE

                Oliver Sproule kept a Medical Journal from 7 November 1834 to 27 April 1835. He recorded in his journal the weather conditions they experienced in the first two weeks:

                ‘In the course of the first week or ten days at sea, there were eight or nine on the sick list with catarrhal affections and one with dropsy which I attribute to the cold and wet we experienced during that period beating down channel. Indeed the foremost berths in the prison at this time were so wet from leaking in that part of the ship, that I was obliged to issue dry beds and bedding to a great many of the prisoners to preserve their health, but after crossing the Bay of Biscay the weather became fine and we got the damp beds and blankets dried, the leaks partially stopped and the prison well aired and ventilated which, I am happy to say soon manifested a favourable change in the health and appearance of the men.

                Besides the cases given in the journal I had a great many others to treat, some of them similar to those mentioned but the greater part consisted of boils, scalds, and contusions which would not only be too tedious to enter but I fear would be irksome to the reader. There were four births on board during the passage which did well, therefore I did not consider it necessary to give a detailed account of them in my journal the more especially as they were all favourable cases.

                Regularity and cleanliness in the prison, free ventilation and as far as possible dry decks turning all the prisoners up in fine weather as we were lucky enough to have two musicians amongst the convicts, dancing was tolerated every afternoon, strict attention to personal cleanliness and also to the cooking of their victuals with regular hours for their meals, were the only prophylactic means used on this occasion, which I found to answer my expectations to the utmost extent in as much as there was not a single case of contagious or infectious nature during the whole passage with the exception of a few cases of psora which soon yielded to the usual treatment. A few cases of scurvy however appeared on board at rather an early period which I can attribute to nothing else but the wet and hardships the prisoners endured during the first three or four weeks of the passage. I was prompt in my treatment of these cases and they got well, but before we arrived at Sydney I had about thirty others to treat.’

                The Lady Nugent arrived in Port Jackson on 9 April 1835 with 284 male prisoners. Two men had died at sea. The prisoners were landed on 27th April 1835 and marched to Hyde Park Barracks prior to being assigned. Ten were under the age of 14 years.

                The Lady Nugent:

                Lady Nugent

                 

                Isaac’s distinguishing marks are noted on various criminal registers and record books:

                “Height in feet & inches: 5 4; Complexion: Ruddy; Hair: Light brown; Eyes: Hazel; Marks or Scars: Yes [including] DEVIL on lower left arm, TSIS back of left hand, WS lower right arm, MHDW back of right hand.”

                Another includes more detail about Isaac’s tattoos:

                “Two slight scars right side of mouth, 2 moles above right breast, figure of the devil and DEVIL and raised mole, lower left arm; anchor, seven dots half moon, TSIS and cross, back of left hand; a mallet, door post, A, mans bust, sun, WS, lower right arm; woman, MHDW and shut knife, back of right hand.”

                 

                Lady Nugent record book

                 

                From How tattoos became fashionable in Victorian England (2019 article in TheConversation by Robert Shoemaker and Zoe Alkar):

                “Historical tattooing was not restricted to sailors, soldiers and convicts, but was a growing and accepted phenomenon in Victorian England. Tattoos provide an important window into the lives of those who typically left no written records of their own. As a form of “history from below”, they give us a fleeting but intriguing understanding of the identities and emotions of ordinary people in the past.
                As a practice for which typically the only record is the body itself, few systematic records survive before the advent of photography. One exception to this is the written descriptions of tattoos (and even the occasional sketch) that were kept of institutionalised people forced to submit to the recording of information about their bodies as a means of identifying them. This particularly applies to three groups – criminal convicts, soldiers and sailors. Of these, the convict records are the most voluminous and systematic.
                Such records were first kept in large numbers for those who were transported to Australia from 1788 (since Australia was then an open prison) as the authorities needed some means of keeping track of them.”

                On the 1837 census Isaac was working for the government at Illiwarra, New South Wales. This record states that he arrived on the Lady Nugent in 1835. There are three other indent records for an Isaac Stokes in the following years, but the transcriptions don’t provide enough information to determine which Isaac Stokes it was. In April 1837 there was an abscondment, and an arrest/apprehension in May of that year, and in 1843 there was a record of convict indulgences.

                From the Australian government website regarding “convict indulgences”:

                “By the mid-1830s only six per cent of convicts were locked up. The vast majority worked for the government or free settlers and, with good behaviour, could earn a ticket of leave, conditional pardon or and even an absolute pardon. While under such orders convicts could earn their own living.”

                 

                In 1856 in Camden, NSW, Isaac Stokes married Catherine Daly. With no further information on this record it would be impossible to know for sure if this was the right Isaac Stokes. This couple had six children, all in the Camden area, but none of the records provided enough information. No occupation or place or date of birth recorded for Isaac Stokes.

                I wrote to the National Library of Australia about the marriage record, and their reply was a surprise! Issac and Catherine were married on 30 September 1856, at the house of the Rev. Charles William Rigg, a Methodist minister, and it was recorded that Isaac was born in Edinburgh in 1821, to parents James Stokes and Sarah Ellis!  The age at the time of the marriage doesn’t match Isaac’s age at death in 1877, and clearly the place of birth and parents didn’t match either. Only his fathers occupation of stone mason was correct.  I wrote back to the helpful people at the library and they replied that the register was in a very poor condition and that only two and a half entries had survived at all, and that Isaac and Catherines marriage was recorded over two pages.

                I searched for an Isaac Stokes born in 1821 in Edinburgh on the Scotland government website (and on all the other genealogy records sites) and didn’t find it. In fact Stokes was a very uncommon name in Scotland at the time. I also searched Australian immigration and other records for another Isaac Stokes born in Scotland or born in 1821, and found nothing.  I was unable to find a single record to corroborate this mysterious other Isaac Stokes.

                As the age at death in 1877 was correct, I assume that either Isaac was lying, or that some mistake was made either on the register at the home of the Methodist minster, or a subsequent mistranscription or muddle on the remnants of the surviving register.  Therefore I remain convinced that the Camden stonemason Isaac Stokes was indeed our Isaac from Oxfordshire.

                 

                I found a history society newsletter article that mentioned Isaac Stokes, stone mason, had built the Glenmore church, near Camden, in 1859.

                Glenmore Church

                 

                From the Wollondilly museum April 2020 newsletter:

                Glenmore Church Stokes

                 

                From the Camden History website:

                “The stone set over the porch of Glenmore Church gives the date of 1860. The church was begun in 1859 on land given by Joseph Moore. James Rogers of Picton was given the contract to build and local builder, Mr. Stokes, carried out the work. Elizabeth Moore, wife of Edward, laid the foundation stone. The first service was held on 19th March 1860. The cemetery alongside the church contains the headstones and memorials of the areas early pioneers.”

                 

                Isaac died on the 3rd September 1877. The inquest report puts his place of death as Bagdelly, near to Camden, and another death register has put Cambelltown, also very close to Camden.  His age was recorded as 71 and the inquest report states his cause of death was “rupture of one of the large pulmonary vessels of the lung”.  His wife Catherine died in childbirth in 1870 at the age of 43.

                 

                Isaac and Catherine’s children:

                William Stokes 1857-1928

                Catherine Stokes 1859-1846

                Sarah Josephine Stokes 1861-1931

                Ellen Stokes 1863-1932

                Rosanna Stokes 1865-1919

                Louisa Stokes 1868-1844.

                 

                It’s possible that Catherine Daly was a transported convict from Ireland.

                 

                Some time later I unexpectedly received a follow up email from The Oaks Heritage Centre in Australia.

                “The Gaudry papers which we have in our archive record him (Isaac Stokes) as having built: the church, the school and the teachers residence.  Isaac is recorded in the General return of convicts: 1837 and in Grevilles Post Office directory 1872 as a mason in Glenmore.”

                Isaac Stokes directory

                #6344
                TracyTracy
                Participant

                  The Tetbury Riots

                   

                  While researching the Tetbury riots  (I had found some Browning names in the newspaper archives in association with the uprisings) I came across an article called Elizabeth Parker, the Swing Riots, and the Tetbury parish clerk” by Jill Evans.

                  I noted the name of the parish clerk, Daniel Cole, because I know someone else of that name. The incident in the article was 1830.

                  I found the 1826 marriage in the Tetbury parish registers (where Daniel was the parish clerk) of my 4x great grandmothers sister Hesther Lock. One of the witnesses was her brother Charles, and the other was Daniel Cole, the parish clerk.

                  Marriage of Lewin Chandler and Hesther Lock in 1826:

                  Daniel Cole witness

                   

                  from the article:

                  “The Swing Riots were disturbances which took place in 1830 and 1831, mostly in the southern counties of England. Agricultural labourers, who were already suffering due to low wages and a lack of work after several years of bad harvests, rose up when their employers introduced threshing machines into their workplaces. The riots got their name from the threatening letters which were sent to farmers and other employers, which were signed “Captain Swing.”

                  The riots spread into Gloucestershire in November 1830, with the Tetbury area seeing the worst of the disturbances. Amongst the many people arrested afterwards was one woman, Elizabeth Parker. She has sometimes been cited as one of only two females who were transported for taking part in the Swing Riots. In fact, she was sentenced to be transported for this crime, but never sailed, as she was pardoned a few months after being convicted. However, less than a year after being released from Gloucester Gaol, she was back, awaiting trial for another offence. The circumstances in both of the cases she was tried for reveal an intriguing relationship with one Daniel Cole, parish clerk and assistant poor law officer in Tetbury….

                  ….Elizabeth Parker was committed to Gloucester Gaol on 4 December 1830. In the Gaol Registers, she was described as being 23 and a “labourer”. She was in fact a prostitute, and she was unusual for the time in that she could read and write. She was charged on the oaths of Daniel Cole and others with having been among a mob which destroyed a threshing machine belonging to Jacob Hayward, at his farm in Beverstone, on 26 November.

                  …..Elizabeth Parker was granted royal clemency in July 1831 and was released from prison. She returned to Tetbury and presumably continued in her usual occupation, but on 27 March 1832, she was committed to Gloucester Gaol again. This time, she was charged with stealing 2 five pound notes, 5 sovereigns and 5 half sovereigns, from the person of Daniel Cole.

                  Elizabeth was tried at the Lent Assizes which began on 28 March, 1832. The details of her trial were reported in the Morning Post. Daniel Cole was in the “Boat Inn” (meaning the Boot Inn, I think) in Tetbury, when Elizabeth Parker came in. Cole “accompanied her down the yard”, where he stayed with her for about half an hour. The next morning, he realised that all his money was gone. One of his five pound notes was identified by him in a shop, where Parker had bought some items.

                  Under cross-examination, Cole said he was the assistant overseer of the poor and collector of public taxes of the parish of Tetbury. He was married with one child. He went in to the inn at about 9 pm, and stayed about 2 hours, drinking in the parlour, with the landlord, Elizabeth Parker, and two others. He was not drunk, but he was “rather fresh.” He gave the prisoner no money. He saw Elizabeth Parker next morning at the Prince and Princess public house. He didn’t drink with her or give her any money. He did give her a shilling after she was committed. He never said that he would not have prosecuted her “if it was not for her own tongue”. (Presumably meaning he couldn’t trust her to keep her mouth shut.)”

                  Contemporary illustration of the Swing riots:

                  Swing Riots

                   

                  Captain Swing was the imaginary leader agricultural labourers who set fire to barns and haystacks in the southern and eastern counties of England from 1830. Although the riots were ruthlessly put down (19 hanged, 644 imprisoned and 481 transported), the rural agitation led the new Whig government to establish a Royal Commission on the Poor Laws and its report provided the basis for the 1834 New Poor Law enacted after the Great Reform Bills of 1833.

                  An original portrait of Captain Swing hand coloured lithograph circa 1830:

                  Captain Swing

                  #6333
                  TracyTracy
                  Participant

                    The Grattidge Family

                     

                    The first Grattidge to appear in our tree was Emma Grattidge (1853-1911) who married Charles Tomlinson (1847-1907) in 1872.

                    Charles Tomlinson (1873-1929) was their son and he married my great grandmother Nellie Fisher. Their daughter Margaret (later Peggy Edwards) was my grandmother on my fathers side.

                    Emma Grattidge was born in Wolverhampton, the daughter and youngest child of William Grattidge (1820-1887) born in Foston, Derbyshire, and Mary Stubbs, born in Burton on Trent, daughter of Solomon Stubbs, a land carrier. William and Mary married at St Modwens church, Burton on Trent, in 1839. It’s unclear why they moved to Wolverhampton. On the 1841 census William was employed as an agent, and their first son William was nine months old. Thereafter, William was a licensed victuallar or innkeeper.

                    William Grattidge was born in Foston, Derbyshire in 1820. His parents were Thomas Grattidge, farmer (1779-1843) and Ann Gerrard (1789-1822) from Ellastone. Thomas and Ann married in 1813 in Ellastone. They had five children before Ann died at the age of 25:

                    Bessy was born in 1815, Thomas in 1818, William in 1820, and Daniel Augustus and Frederick were twins born in 1822. They were all born in Foston. (records say Foston, Foston and Scropton, or Scropton)

                    On the 1841 census Thomas had nine people additional to family living at the farm in Foston, presumably agricultural labourers and help.

                    After Ann died, Thomas had three children with Kezia Gibbs (30 years his junior) before marrying her in 1836, then had a further four with her before dying in 1843. Then Kezia married Thomas’s nephew Frederick Augustus Grattidge (born in 1816 in Stafford) in London in 1847 and had two more!

                     

                    The siblings of William Grattidge (my 3x great grandfather):

                     

                    Frederick Grattidge (1822-1872) was a schoolmaster and never married. He died at the age of 49 in Tamworth at his twin brother Daniels address.

                    Daniel Augustus Grattidge (1822-1903) was a grocer at Gungate in Tamworth.

                    Thomas Grattidge (1818-1871) married in Derby, and then emigrated to Illinois, USA.

                    Bessy Grattidge  (1815-1840) married John Buxton, farmer, in Ellastone in January 1838. They had three children before Bessy died in December 1840 at the age of 25: Henry in 1838, John in 1839, and Bessy Buxton in 1840. Bessy was baptised in January 1841. Presumably the birth of Bessy caused the death of Bessy the mother.

                    Bessy Buxton’s gravestone:

                    “Sacred to the memory of Bessy Buxton, the affectionate wife of John Buxton of Stanton She departed this life December 20th 1840, aged 25 years. “Husband, Farewell my life is Past, I loved you while life did last. Think on my children for my sake, And ever of them with I take.”

                    20 Dec 1840, Ellastone, Staffordshire

                    Bessy Buxton

                     

                    In the 1843 will of Thomas Grattidge, farmer of Foston, he leaves fifth shares of his estate, including freehold real estate at Findern,  to his wife Kezia, and sons William, Daniel, Frederick and Thomas. He mentions that the children of his late daughter Bessy, wife of John Buxton, will be taken care of by their father.  He leaves the farm to Keziah in confidence that she will maintain, support and educate his children with her.

                    An excerpt from the will:

                    I give and bequeath unto my dear wife Keziah Grattidge all my household goods and furniture, wearing apparel and plate and plated articles, linen, books, china, glass, and other household effects whatsoever, and also all my implements of husbandry, horses, cattle, hay, corn, crops and live and dead stock whatsoever, and also all the ready money that may be about my person or in my dwelling house at the time of my decease, …I also give my said wife the tenant right and possession of the farm in my occupation….

                    A page from the 1843 will of Thomas Grattidge:

                    1843 Thomas Grattidge

                     

                    William Grattidges half siblings (the offspring of Thomas Grattidge and Kezia Gibbs):

                     

                    Albert Grattidge (1842-1914) was a railway engine driver in Derby. In 1884 he was driving the train when an unfortunate accident occured outside Ambergate. Three children were blackberrying and crossed the rails in front of the train, and one little girl died.

                    Albert Grattidge:

                    Albert Grattidge

                     

                    George Grattidge (1826-1876) was baptised Gibbs as this was before Thomas married Kezia. He was a police inspector in Derby.

                    George Grattidge:

                    George Grattidge

                     

                    Edwin Grattidge (1837-1852) died at just 15 years old.

                    Ann Grattidge (1835-) married Charles Fletcher, stone mason, and lived in Derby.

                    Louisa Victoria Grattidge (1840-1869) was sadly another Grattidge woman who died young. Louisa married Emmanuel Brunt Cheesborough in 1860 in Derby. In 1861 Louisa and Emmanuel were living with her mother Kezia in Derby, with their two children Frederick and Ann Louisa. Emmanuel’s occupation was sawyer. (Kezia Gibbs second husband Frederick Augustus Grattidge was a timber merchant in Derby)

                    At the time of her death in 1869, Emmanuel was the landlord of the White Hart public house at Bridgegate in Derby.

                    The Derby Mercury of 17th November 1869:

                    “On Wednesday morning Mr Coroner Vallack held an inquest in the Grand
                    Jury-room, Town-hall, on the body of Louisa Victoria Cheeseborough, aged
                    33, the wife of the landlord of the White Hart, Bridge-gate, who committed
                    suicide by poisoning at an early hour on Sunday morning. The following
                    evidence was taken:

                    Mr Frederick Borough, surgeon, practising in Derby, deposed that he was
                    called in to see the deceased about four o’clock on Sunday morning last. He
                    accordingly examined the deceased and found the body quite warm, but dead.
                    He afterwards made enquiries of the husband, who said that he was afraid
                    that his wife had taken poison, also giving him at the same time the
                    remains of some blue material in a cup. The aunt of the deceased’s husband
                    told him that she had seen Mrs Cheeseborough put down a cup in the
                    club-room, as though she had just taken it from her mouth. The witness took
                    the liquid home with him, and informed them that an inquest would
                    necessarily have to be held on Monday. He had made a post mortem
                    examination of the body, and found that in the stomach there was a great
                    deal of congestion. There were remains of food in the stomach and, having
                    put the contents into a bottle, he took the stomach away. He also examined
                    the heart and found it very pale and flabby. All the other organs were
                    comparatively healthy; the liver was friable.

                    Hannah Stone, aunt of the deceased’s husband, said she acted as a servant
                    in the house. On Saturday evening, while they were going to bed and whilst
                    witness was undressing, the deceased came into the room, went up to the
                    bedside, awoke her daughter, and whispered to her. but what she said the
                    witness did not know. The child jumped out of bed, but the deceased closed
                    the door and went away. The child followed her mother, and she also
                    followed them to the deceased’s bed-room, but the door being closed, they
                    then went to the club-room door and opening it they saw the deceased
                    standing with a candle in one hand. The daughter stayed with her in the
                    room whilst the witness went downstairs to fetch a candle for herself, and
                    as she was returning up again she saw the deceased put a teacup on the
                    table. The little girl began to scream, saying “Oh aunt, my mother is
                    going, but don’t let her go”. The deceased then walked into her bed-room,
                    and they went and stood at the door whilst the deceased undressed herself.
                    The daughter and the witness then returned to their bed-room. Presently
                    they went to see if the deceased was in bed, but she was sitting on the
                    floor her arms on the bedside. Her husband was sitting in a chair fast
                    asleep. The witness pulled her on the bed as well as she could.
                    Ann Louisa Cheesborough, a little girl, said that the deceased was her
                    mother. On Saturday evening last, about twenty minutes before eleven
                    o’clock, she went to bed, leaving her mother and aunt downstairs. Her aunt
                    came to bed as usual. By and bye, her mother came into her room – before
                    the aunt had retired to rest – and awoke her. She told the witness, in a
                    low voice, ‘that she should have all that she had got, adding that she
                    should also leave her her watch, as she was going to die’. She did not tell
                    her aunt what her mother had said, but followed her directly into the
                    club-room, where she saw her drink something from a cup, which she
                    afterwards placed on the table. Her mother then went into her own room and
                    shut the door. She screamed and called her father, who was downstairs. He
                    came up and went into her room. The witness then went to bed and fell
                    asleep. She did not hear any noise or quarrelling in the house after going
                    to bed.

                    Police-constable Webster was on duty in Bridge-gate on Saturday evening
                    last, about twenty minutes to one o’clock. He knew the White Hart
                    public-house in Bridge-gate, and as he was approaching that place, he heard
                    a woman scream as though at the back side of the house. The witness went to
                    the door and heard the deceased keep saying ‘Will you be quiet and go to
                    bed’. The reply was most disgusting, and the language which the
                    police-constable said was uttered by the husband of the deceased, was
                    immoral in the extreme. He heard the poor woman keep pressing her husband
                    to go to bed quietly, and eventually he saw him through the keyhole of the
                    door pass and go upstairs. his wife having gone up a minute or so before.
                    Inspector Fearn deposed that on Sunday morning last, after he had heard of
                    the deceased’s death from supposed poisoning, he went to Cheeseborough’s
                    public house, and found in the club-room two nearly empty packets of
                    Battie’s Lincoln Vermin Killer – each labelled poison.

                    Several of the Jury here intimated that they had seen some marks on the
                    deceased’s neck, as of blows, and expressing a desire that the surgeon
                    should return, and re-examine the body. This was accordingly done, after
                    which the following evidence was taken:

                    Mr Borough said that he had examined the body of the deceased and observed
                    a mark on the left side of the neck, which he considered had come on since
                    death. He thought it was the commencement of decomposition.
                    This was the evidence, after which the jury returned a verdict “that the
                    deceased took poison whilst of unsound mind” and requested the Coroner to
                    censure the deceased’s husband.

                    The Coroner told Cheeseborough that he was a disgusting brute and that the
                    jury only regretted that the law could not reach his brutal conduct.
                    However he had had a narrow escape. It was their belief that his poor
                    wife, who was driven to her own destruction by his brutal treatment, would
                    have been a living woman that day except for his cowardly conduct towards
                    her.

                    The inquiry, which had lasted a considerable time, then closed.”

                     

                    In this article it says:

                    “it was the “fourth or fifth remarkable and tragical event – some of which were of the worst description – that has taken place within the last twelve years at the White Hart and in the very room in which the unfortunate Louisa Cheesborough drew her last breath.”

                    Sheffield Independent – Friday 12 November 1869:

                    Louisa Cheesborough

                    #6268
                    TracyTracy
                    Participant

                      From Tanganyika with Love

                      continued part 9

                      With thanks to Mike Rushby.

                      Lyamungu 3rd January 1945

                      Dearest Family.

                      We had a novel Christmas this year. We decided to avoid the expense of
                      entertaining and being entertained at Lyamungu, and went off to spend Christmas
                      camping in a forest on the Western slopes of Kilimanjaro. George decided to combine
                      business with pleasure and in this way we were able to use Government transport.
                      We set out the day before Christmas day and drove along the road which skirts
                      the slopes of Kilimanjaro and first visited a beautiful farm where Philip Teare, the ex
                      Game Warden, and his wife Mary are staying. We had afternoon tea with them and then
                      drove on in to the natural forest above the estate and pitched our tent beside a small
                      clear mountain stream. We decorated the tent with paper streamers and a few small
                      balloons and John found a small tree of the traditional shape which we decorated where
                      it stood with tinsel and small ornaments.

                      We put our beer, cool drinks for the children and bottles of fresh milk from Simba
                      Estate, in the stream and on Christmas morning they were as cold as if they had been in
                      the refrigerator all night. There were not many presents for the children, there never are,
                      but they do not seem to mind and are well satisfied with a couple of balloons apiece,
                      sweets, tin whistles and a book each.

                      George entertain the children before breakfast. He can make a magical thing out
                      of the most ordinary balloon. The children watched entranced as he drew on his pipe
                      and then blew the smoke into the balloon. He then pinched the neck of the balloon
                      between thumb and forefinger and released the smoke in little puffs. Occasionally the
                      balloon ejected a perfect smoke ring and the forest rang with shouts of “Do it again
                      Daddy.” Another trick was to blow up the balloon to maximum size and then twist the
                      neck tightly before releasing. Before subsiding the balloon darted about in a crazy
                      fashion causing great hilarity. Such fun, at the cost of a few pence.

                      After breakfast George went off to fish for trout. John and Jim decided that they
                      also wished to fish so we made rods out of sticks and string and bent pins and they
                      fished happily, but of course quite unsuccessfully, for hours. Both of course fell into the
                      stream and got soaked, but I was prepared for this, and the little stream was so shallow
                      that they could not come to any harm. Henry played happily in the sand and I had a
                      most peaceful morning.

                      Hamisi roasted a chicken in a pot over the camp fire and the jelly set beautifully in the
                      stream. So we had grilled trout and chicken for our Christmas dinner. I had of course
                      taken an iced cake for the occasion and, all in all, it was a very successful Christmas day.
                      On Boxing day we drove down to the plains where George was to investigate a
                      report of game poaching near the Ngassari Furrow. This is a very long ditch which has
                      been dug by the Government for watering the Masai stock in the area. It is also used by
                      game and we saw herds of zebra and wildebeest, and some Grant’s Gazelle and
                      giraffe, all comparatively tame. At one point a small herd of zebra raced beside the lorry
                      apparently enjoying the fun of a gallop. They were all sleek and fat and looked wild and
                      beautiful in action.

                      We camped a considerable distance from the water but this precaution did not
                      save us from the mosquitoes which launched a vicious attack on us after sunset, so that
                      we took to our beds unusually early. They were on the job again when we got up at
                      sunrise so I was very glad when we were once more on our way home.

                      “I like Christmas safari. Much nicer that silly old party,” said John. I agree but I think
                      it is time that our children learned to play happily with others. There are no other young
                      children at Lyamungu though there are two older boys and a girl who go to boarding
                      school in Nairobi.

                      On New Years Day two Army Officers from the military camp at Moshi, came for
                      tea and to talk game hunting with George. I think they rather enjoy visiting a home and
                      seeing children and pets around.

                      Eleanor.

                      Lyamungu 14 May 1945

                      Dearest Family.

                      So the war in Europe is over at last. It is such marvellous news that I can hardly
                      believe it. To think that as soon as George can get leave we will go to England and
                      bring Ann and George home with us to Tanganyika. When we know when this leave can
                      be arranged we will want Kate to join us here as of course she must go with us to
                      England to meet George’s family. She has become so much a part of your lives that I
                      know it will be a wrench for you to give her up but I know that you will all be happy to
                      think that soon our family will be reunited.

                      The V.E. celebrations passed off quietly here. We all went to Moshi to see the
                      Victory Parade of the King’s African Rifles and in the evening we went to a celebration
                      dinner at the Game Warden’s house. Besides ourselves the Moores had invited the
                      Commanding Officer from Moshi and a junior officer. We had a very good dinner and
                      many toasts including one to Mrs Moore’s brother, Oliver Milton who is fighting in Burma
                      and has recently been awarded the Military Cross.

                      There was also a celebration party for the children in the grounds of the Moshi
                      Club. Such a spread! I think John and Jim sampled everything. We mothers were
                      having our tea separately and a friend laughingly told me to turn around and have a look.
                      I did, and saw the long tea tables now deserted by all the children but my two sons who
                      were still eating steadily, and finding the party more exciting than the game of Musical
                      Bumps into which all the other children had entered with enthusiasm.

                      There was also an extremely good puppet show put on by the Italian prisoners
                      of war from the camp at Moshi. They had made all the puppets which included well
                      loved characters like Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs and the Babes in the Wood as
                      well as more sophisticated ones like an irritable pianist and a would be prima donna. The
                      most popular puppets with the children were a native askari and his family – a very
                      happy little scene. I have never before seen a puppet show and was as entranced as
                      the children. It is amazing what clever manipulation and lighting can do. I believe that the
                      Italians mean to take their puppets to Nairobi and am glad to think that there, they will
                      have larger audiences to appreciate their art.

                      George has just come in, and I paused in my writing to ask him for the hundredth
                      time when he thinks we will get leave. He says I must be patient because it may be a
                      year before our turn comes. Shipping will be disorganised for months to come and we
                      cannot expect priority simply because we have been separated so long from our
                      children. The same situation applies to scores of other Government Officials.
                      I have decided to write the story of my childhood in South Africa and about our
                      life together in Tanganyika up to the time Ann and George left the country. I know you
                      will have told Kate these stories, but Ann and George were so very little when they left
                      home that I fear that they cannot remember much.

                      My Mother-in-law will have told them about their father but she can tell them little
                      about me. I shall send them one chapter of my story each month in the hope that they
                      may be interested and not feel that I am a stranger when at last we meet again.

                      Eleanor.

                      Lyamungu 19th September 1945

                      Dearest Family.

                      In a months time we will be saying good-bye to Lyamungu. George is to be
                      transferred to Mbeya and I am delighted, not only as I look upon Mbeya as home, but
                      because there is now a primary school there which John can attend. I feel he will make
                      much better progress in his lessons when he realises that all children of his age attend
                      school. At present he is putting up a strong resistance to learning to read and spell, but
                      he writes very neatly, does his sums accurately and shows a real talent for drawing. If
                      only he had the will to learn I feel he would do very well.

                      Jim now just four, is too young for lessons but too intelligent to be interested in
                      the ayah’s attempts at entertainment. Yes I’ve had to engage a native girl to look after
                      Henry from 9 am to 12.30 when I supervise John’s Correspondence Course. She is
                      clean and amiable, but like most African women she has no initiative at all when it comes
                      to entertaining children. Most African men and youths are good at this.

                      I don’t regret our stay at Lyamungu. It is a beautiful spot and the change to the
                      cooler climate after the heat of Morogoro has been good for all the children. John is still
                      tall for his age but not so thin as he was and much less pale. He is a handsome little lad
                      with his large brown eyes in striking contrast to his fair hair. He is wary of strangers but
                      very observant and quite uncanny in the way he sums up people. He seldom gets up
                      to mischief but I have a feeling he eggs Jim on. Not that Jim needs egging.

                      Jim has an absolute flair for mischief but it is all done in such an artless manner that
                      it is not easy to punish him. He is a very sturdy child with a cap of almost black silky hair,
                      eyes brown, like mine, and a large mouth which is quick to smile and show most beautiful
                      white and even teeth. He is most popular with all the native servants and the Game
                      Scouts. The servants call Jim, ‘Bwana Tembo’ (Mr Elephant) because of his sturdy
                      build.

                      Henry, now nearly two years old, is quite different from the other two in
                      appearance. He is fair complexioned and fair haired like Ann and Kate, with large, black
                      lashed, light grey eyes. He is a good child, not so merry as Jim was at his age, nor as
                      shy as John was. He seldom cries, does not care to be cuddled and is independent and
                      strong willed. The servants call Henry, ‘Bwana Ndizi’ (Mr Banana) because he has an
                      inexhaustible appetite for this fruit. Fortunately they are very inexpensive here. We buy
                      an entire bunch which hangs from a beam on the back verandah, and pluck off the
                      bananas as they ripen. This way there is no waste and the fruit never gets bruised as it
                      does in greengrocers shops in South Africa. Our three boys make a delightful and
                      interesting trio and I do wish you could see them for yourselves.

                      We are delighted with the really beautiful photograph of Kate. She is an
                      extraordinarily pretty child and looks so happy and healthy and a great credit to you.
                      Now that we will be living in Mbeya with a school on the doorstep I hope that we will
                      soon be able to arrange for her return home.

                      Eleanor.

                      c/o Game Dept. Mbeya. 30th October 1945

                      Dearest Family.

                      How nice to be able to write c/o Game Dept. Mbeya at the head of my letters.
                      We arrived here safely after a rather tiresome journey and are installed in a tiny house on
                      the edge of the township.

                      We left Lyamungu early on the morning of the 22nd. Most of our goods had
                      been packed on the big Ford lorry the previous evening, but there were the usual
                      delays and farewells. Of our servants, only the cook, Hamisi, accompanied us to
                      Mbeya. Japhet, Tovelo and the ayah had to be paid off and largesse handed out.
                      Tovelo’s granny had come, bringing a gift of bananas, and she also brought her little
                      granddaughter to present a bunch of flowers. The child’s little scolded behind is now
                      completely healed. Gifts had to be found for them too.

                      At last we were all aboard and what a squash it was! Our few pieces of furniture
                      and packing cases and trunks, the cook, his wife, the driver and the turney boy, who
                      were to take the truck back to Lyamungu, and all their bits and pieces, bunches of
                      bananas and Fanny the dog were all crammed into the body of the lorry. George, the
                      children and I were jammed together in the cab. Before we left George looked
                      dubiously at the tyres which were very worn and said gloomily that he thought it most
                      unlikely that we would make our destination, Dodoma.

                      Too true! Shortly after midday, near Kwakachinja, we blew a back tyre and there
                      was a tedious delay in the heat whilst the wheel was changed. We were now without a
                      spare tyre and George said that he would not risk taking the Ford further than Babati,
                      which is less than half way to Dodoma. He drove very slowly and cautiously to Babati
                      where he arranged with Sher Mohammed, an Indian trader, for a lorry to take us to
                      Dodoma the next morning.

                      It had been our intention to spend the night at the furnished Government
                      Resthouse at Babati but when we got there we found that it was already occupied by
                      several District Officers who had assembled for a conference. So, feeling rather
                      disgruntled, we all piled back into the lorry and drove on to a place called Bereku where
                      we spent an uncomfortable night in a tumbledown hut.

                      Before dawn next morning Sher Mohammed’s lorry drove up, and there was a
                      scramble to dress by the light of a storm lamp. The lorry was a very dilapidated one and
                      there was already a native woman passenger in the cab. I felt so tired after an almost
                      sleepless night that I decided to sit between the driver and this woman with the sleeping
                      Henry on my knee. It was as well I did, because I soon found myself dosing off and
                      drooping over towards the woman. Had she not been there I might easily have fallen
                      out as the battered cab had no door. However I was alert enough when daylight came
                      and changed places with the woman to our mutual relief. She was now able to converse
                      with the African driver and I was able to enjoy the scenery and the fresh air!
                      George, John and Jim were less comfortable. They sat in the lorry behind the
                      cab hemmed in by packing cases. As the lorry was an open one the sun beat down
                      unmercifully upon them until George, ever resourceful, moved a table to the front of the
                      truck. The two boys crouched under this and so got shelter from the sun but they still had
                      to endure the dust. Fanny complicated things by getting car sick and with one thing and
                      another we were all jolly glad to get to Dodoma.

                      We spent the night at the Dodoma Hotel and after hot baths, a good meal and a
                      good nights rest we cheerfully boarded a bus of the Tanganyika Bus Service next
                      morning to continue our journey to Mbeya. The rest of the journey was uneventful. We slept two nights on the road, the first at Iringa Hotel and the second at Chimala. We
                      reached Mbeya on the 27th.

                      I was rather taken aback when I first saw the little house which has been allocated
                      to us. I had become accustomed to the spacious houses we had in Morogoro and
                      Lyamungu. However though the house is tiny it is secluded and has a long garden
                      sloping down to the road in front and another long strip sloping up behind. The front
                      garden is shaded by several large cypress and eucalyptus trees but the garden behind
                      the house has no shade and consists mainly of humpy beds planted with hundreds of
                      carnations sadly in need of debudding. I believe that the previous Game Ranger’s wife
                      cultivated the carnations and, by selling them, raised money for War Funds.
                      Like our own first home, this little house is built of sun dried brick. Its original
                      owners were Germans. It is now rented to the Government by the Custodian of Enemy
                      Property, and George has his office in another ex German house.

                      This afternoon we drove to the school to arrange about enrolling John there. The
                      school is about four miles out of town. It was built by the German settlers in the late
                      1930’s and they were justifiably proud of it. It consists of a great assembly hall and
                      classrooms in one block and there are several attractive single storied dormitories. This
                      school was taken over by the Government when the Germans were interned on the
                      outbreak of war and many improvements have been made to the original buildings. The
                      school certainly looks very attractive now with its grassed playing fields and its lawns and
                      bright flower beds.

                      The Union Jack flies from a tall flagpole in front of the Hall and all traces of the
                      schools German origin have been firmly erased. We met the Headmaster, Mr
                      Wallington, and his wife and some members of the staff. The school is co-educational
                      and caters for children from the age of seven to standard six. The leaving age is elastic
                      owing to the fact that many Tanganyika children started school very late because of lack
                      of educational facilities in this country.

                      The married members of the staff have their own cottages in the grounds. The
                      Matrons have quarters attached to the dormitories for which they are responsible. I felt
                      most enthusiastic about the school until I discovered that the Headmaster is adamant
                      upon one subject. He utterly refuses to take any day pupils at the school. So now our
                      poor reserved Johnny will have to adjust himself to boarding school life.
                      We have arranged that he will start school on November 5th and I shall be very
                      busy trying to assemble his school uniform at short notice. The clothing list is sensible.
                      Boys wear khaki shirts and shorts on weekdays with knitted scarlet jerseys when the
                      weather is cold. On Sundays they wear grey flannel shorts and blazers with the silver
                      and scarlet school tie.

                      Mbeya looks dusty, brown and dry after the lush evergreen vegetation of
                      Lyamungu, but I prefer this drier climate and there are still mountains to please the eye.
                      In fact the lower slopes of Lolesa Mountain rise at the upper end of our garden.

                      Eleanor.

                      c/o Game Dept. Mbeya. 21st November 1945

                      Dearest Family.

                      We’re quite settled in now and I have got the little house fixed up to my
                      satisfaction. I have engaged a rather uncouth looking houseboy but he is strong and
                      capable and now that I am not tied down in the mornings by John’s lessons I am able to
                      go out occasionally in the mornings and take Jim and Henry to play with other children.
                      They do not show any great enthusiasm but are not shy by nature as John is.
                      I have had a good deal of heartache over putting John to boarding school. It
                      would have been different had he been used to the company of children outside his
                      own family, or if he had even known one child there. However he seems to be adjusting
                      himself to the life, though slowly. At least he looks well and tidy and I am quite sure that
                      he is well looked after.

                      I must confess that when the time came for John to go to school I simply did not
                      have the courage to take him and he went alone with George, looking so smart in his
                      new uniform – but his little face so bleak. The next day, Sunday, was visiting day but the
                      Headmaster suggested that we should give John time to settle down and not visit him
                      until Wednesday.

                      When we drove up to the school I spied John on the far side of the field walking
                      all alone. Instead of running up with glad greetings, as I had expected, he came almost
                      reluctently and had little to say. I asked him to show me his dormitory and classroom and
                      he did so politely as though I were a stranger. At last he volunteered some information.
                      “Mummy,” he said in an awed voice, Do you know on the night I came here they burnt a
                      man! They had a big fire and they burnt him.” After a blank moment the penny dropped.
                      Of course John had started school and November the fifth but it had never entered my
                      head to tell him about that infamous character, Guy Fawkes!

                      I asked John’s Matron how he had settled down. “Well”, she said thoughtfully,
                      John is very good and has not cried as many of the juniors do when they first come
                      here, but he seems to keep to himself all the time.” I went home very discouraged but
                      on the Sunday John came running up with another lad of about his own age.” This is my
                      friend Marks,” he announced proudly. I could have hugged Marks.

                      Mbeya is very different from the small settlement we knew in the early 1930’s.
                      Gone are all the colourful characters from the Lupa diggings for the alluvial claims are all
                      worked out now, gone also are our old friends the Menzies from the Pub and also most
                      of the Government Officials we used to know. Mbeya has lost its character of a frontier
                      township and has become almost suburban.

                      The social life revolves around two places, the Club and the school. The Club
                      which started out as a little two roomed building, has been expanded and the golf
                      course improved. There are also tennis courts and a good library considering the size of
                      the community. There are frequent parties and dances, though most of the club revenue
                      comes from Bar profits. The parties are relatively sober affairs compared with the parties
                      of the 1930’s.

                      The school provides entertainment of another kind. Both Mr and Mrs Wallington
                      are good amateur actors and I am told that they run an Amateur Dramatic Society. Every
                      Wednesday afternoon there is a hockey match at the school. Mbeya town versus a
                      mixed team of staff and scholars. The match attracts almost the whole European
                      population of Mbeya. Some go to play hockey, others to watch, and others to snatch
                      the opportunity to visit their children. I shall have to try to arrange a lift to school when
                      George is away on safari.

                      I have now met most of the local women and gladly renewed an old friendship
                      with Sheilagh Waring whom I knew two years ago at Morogoro. Sheilagh and I have
                      much in common, the same disregard for the trappings of civilisation, the same sense of
                      the ludicrous, and children. She has eight to our six and she has also been cut off by the
                      war from two of her children. Sheilagh looks too young and pretty to be the mother of so
                      large a family and is, in fact, several years younger than I am. her husband, Donald, is a
                      large quiet man who, as far as I can judge takes life seriously.

                      Our next door neighbours are the Bank Manager and his wife, a very pleasant
                      couple though we seldom meet. I have however had correspondence with the Bank
                      Manager. Early on Saturday afternoon their houseboy brought a note. It informed me
                      that my son was disturbing his rest by precipitating a heart attack. Was I aware that my
                      son was about 30 feet up in a tree and balanced on a twig? I ran out and,sure enough,
                      there was Jim, right at the top of the tallest eucalyptus tree. It would be the one with the
                      mound of stones at the bottom! You should have heard me fluting in my most
                      wheedling voice. “Sweets, Jimmy, come down slowly dear, I’ve some nice sweets for
                      you.”

                      I’ll bet that little story makes you smile. I remember how often you have told me
                      how, as a child, I used to make your hearts turn over because I had no fear of heights
                      and how I used to say, “But that is silly, I won’t fall.” I know now only too well, how you
                      must have felt.

                      Eleanor.

                      c/o Game Dept. Mbeya. 14th January 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      I hope that by now you have my telegram to say that Kate got home safely
                      yesterday. It was wonderful to have her back and what a beautiful child she is! Kate
                      seems to have enjoyed the train journey with Miss Craig, in spite of the tears she tells
                      me she shed when she said good-bye to you. She also seems to have felt quite at
                      home with the Hopleys at Salisbury. She flew from Salisbury in a small Dove aircraft
                      and they had a smooth passage though Kate was a little airsick.

                      I was so excited about her home coming! This house is so tiny that I had to turn
                      out the little store room to make a bedroom for her. With a fresh coat of whitewash and
                      pretty sprigged curtains and matching bedspread, borrowed from Sheilagh Waring, the
                      tiny room looks most attractive. I had also iced a cake, made ice-cream and jelly and
                      bought crackers for the table so that Kate’s home coming tea could be a proper little
                      celebration.

                      I was pleased with my preparations and then, a few hours before the plane was
                      due, my crowned front tooth dropped out, peg and all! When my houseboy wants to
                      describe something very tatty, he calls it “Second-hand Kabisa.” Kabisa meaning
                      absolutely. That is an apt description of how I looked and felt. I decided to try some
                      emergency dentistry. I think you know our nearest dentist is at Dar es Salaam five
                      hundred miles away.

                      First I carefully dried the tooth and with a match stick covered the peg and base
                      with Durofix. I then took the infants rubber bulb enema, sucked up some heat from a
                      candle flame and pumped it into the cavity before filling that with Durofix. Then hopefully
                      I stuck the tooth in its former position and held it in place for several minutes. No good. I
                      sent the houseboy to a shop for Scotine and tried the whole process again. No good
                      either.

                      When George came home for lunch I appealed to him for advice. He jokingly
                      suggested that a maize seed jammed into the space would probably work, but when
                      he saw that I really was upset he produced some chewing gum and suggested that I
                      should try that . I did and that worked long enough for my first smile anyway.
                      George and the three boys went to meet Kate but I remained at home to
                      welcome her there. I was afraid that after all this time away Kate might be reluctant to
                      rejoin the family but she threw her arms around me and said “Oh Mummy,” We both
                      shed a few tears and then we both felt fine.

                      How gay Kate is, and what an infectious laugh she has! The boys follow her
                      around in admiration. John in fact asked me, “Is Kate a Princess?” When I said
                      “Goodness no, Johnny, she’s your sister,” he explained himself by saying, “Well, she
                      has such golden hair.” Kate was less complementary. When I tucked her in bed last night
                      she said, “Mummy, I didn’t expect my little brothers to be so yellow!” All three boys
                      have been taking a course of Atebrin, an anti-malarial drug which tinges skin and eyeballs
                      yellow.

                      So now our tiny house is bursting at its seams and how good it feels to have one
                      more child under our roof. We are booked to sail for England in May and when we return
                      we will have Ann and George home too. Then I shall feel really content.

                      Eleanor.

                      c/o Game Dept. Mbeya. 2nd March 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      My life just now is uneventful but very busy. I am sewing hard and knitting fast to
                      try to get together some warm clothes for our leave in England. This is not a simple
                      matter because woollen materials are in short supply and very expensive, and now that
                      we have boarding school fees to pay for both Kate and John we have to budget very
                      carefully indeed.

                      Kate seems happy at school. She makes friends easily and seems to enjoy
                      communal life. John also seems reconciled to school now that Kate is there. He no
                      longer feels that he is the only exile in the family. He seems to rub along with the other
                      boys of his age and has a couple of close friends. Although Mbeya School is coeducational
                      the smaller boys and girls keep strictly apart. It is considered extremely
                      cissy to play with girls.

                      The local children are allowed to go home on Sundays after church and may bring
                      friends home with them for the day. Both John and Kate do this and Sunday is a very
                      busy day for me. The children come home in their Sunday best but bring play clothes to
                      change into. There is always a scramble to get them to bath and change again in time to
                      deliver them to the school by 6 o’clock.

                      When George is home we go out to the school for the morning service. This is
                      taken by the Headmaster Mr Wallington, and is very enjoyable. There is an excellent
                      school choir to lead the singing. The service is the Church of England one, but is
                      attended by children of all denominations, except the Roman Catholics. I don’t think that
                      more than half the children are British. A large proportion are Greeks, some as old as
                      sixteen, and about the same number are Afrikaners. There are Poles and non-Nazi
                      Germans, Swiss and a few American children.

                      All instruction is through the medium of English and it is amazing how soon all the
                      foreign children learn to chatter in English. George has been told that we will return to
                      Mbeya after our leave and for that I am very thankful as it means that we will still be living
                      near at hand when Jim and Henry start school. Because many of these children have to
                      travel many hundreds of miles to come to school, – Mbeya is a two day journey from the
                      railhead, – the school year is divided into two instead of the usual three terms. This
                      means that many of these children do not see their parents for months at a time. I think
                      this is a very sad state of affairs especially for the seven and eight year olds but the
                      Matrons assure me , that many children who live on isolated farms and stations are quite
                      reluctant to go home because they miss the companionship and the games and
                      entertainment that the school offers.

                      My only complaint about the life here is that I see far too little of George. He is
                      kept extremely busy on this range and is hardly at home except for a few days at the
                      months end when he has to be at his office to check up on the pay vouchers and the
                      issue of ammunition to the Scouts. George’s Range takes in the whole of the Southern
                      Province and the Southern half of the Western Province and extends to the border with
                      Northern Rhodesia and right across to Lake Tanganyika. This vast area is patrolled by
                      only 40 Game Scouts because the Department is at present badly under staffed, due
                      partly to the still acute shortage of rifles, but even more so to the extraordinary reluctance
                      which the Government shows to allocate adequate funds for the efficient running of the
                      Department.

                      The Game Scouts must see that the Game Laws are enforced, protect native
                      crops from raiding elephant, hippo and other game animals. Report disease amongst game and deal with stock raiding lions. By constantly going on safari and checking on
                      their work, George makes sure the range is run to his satisfaction. Most of the Game
                      Scouts are fine fellows but, considering they receive only meagre pay for dangerous
                      and exacting work, it is not surprising that occasionally a Scout is tempted into accepting
                      a bribe not to report a serious infringement of the Game Laws and there is, of course,
                      always the temptation to sell ivory illicitly to unscrupulous Indian and Arab traders.
                      Apart from supervising the running of the Range, George has two major jobs.
                      One is to supervise the running of the Game Free Area along the Rhodesia –
                      Tanganyika border, and the other to hunt down the man-eating lions which for years have
                      terrorised the Njombe District killing hundreds of Africans. Yes I know ‘hundreds’ sounds
                      fantastic, but this is perfectly true and one day, when the job is done and the official
                      report published I shall send it to you to prove it!

                      I hate to think of the Game Free Area and so does George. All the game from
                      buffalo to tiny duiker has been shot out in a wide belt extending nearly two hundred
                      miles along the Northern Rhodesia -Tanganyika border. There are three Europeans in
                      widely spaced camps who supervise this slaughter by African Game Guards. This
                      horrible measure is considered necessary by the Veterinary Departments of
                      Tanganyika, Rhodesia and South Africa, to prevent the cattle disease of Rinderpest
                      from spreading South.

                      When George is home however, we do relax and have fun. On the Saturday
                      before the school term started we took Kate and the boys up to the top fishing camp in
                      the Mporoto Mountains for her first attempt at trout fishing. There are three of these
                      camps built by the Mbeya Trout Association on the rivers which were first stocked with
                      the trout hatched on our farm at Mchewe. Of the three, the top camp is our favourite. The
                      scenery there is most glorious and reminds me strongly of the rivers of the Western
                      Cape which I so loved in my childhood.

                      The river, the Kawira, flows from the Rungwe Mountain through a narrow valley
                      with hills rising steeply on either side. The water runs swiftly over smooth stones and
                      sometimes only a foot or two below the level of the banks. It is sparkling and shallow,
                      but in places the water is deep and dark and the banks high. I had a busy day keeping
                      an eye on the boys, especially Jim, who twice climbed out on branches which overhung
                      deep water. “Mummy, I was only looking for trout!”

                      How those kids enjoyed the freedom of the camp after the comparative
                      restrictions of town. So did Fanny, she raced about on the hills like a mad dog chasing
                      imaginary rabbits and having the time of her life. To escape the noise and commotion
                      George had gone far upstream to fish and returned in the late afternoon with three good
                      sized trout and four smaller ones. Kate proudly showed George the two she had caught
                      with the assistance or our cook Hamisi. I fear they were caught in a rather unorthodox
                      manner but this I kept a secret from George who is a stickler for the orthodox in trout
                      fishing.

                      Eleanor.

                      Jacksdale England 24th June 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      Here we are all together at last in England. You cannot imagine how wonderful it
                      feels to have the whole Rushby family reunited. I find myself counting heads. Ann,
                      George, Kate, John, Jim, and Henry. All present and well. We had a very pleasant trip
                      on the old British India Ship Mantola. She was crowded with East Africans going home
                      for the first time since the war, many like us, eagerly looking forward to a reunion with their
                      children whom they had not seen for years. There was a great air of anticipation and
                      good humour but a little anxiety too.

                      “I do hope our children will be glad to see us,” said one, and went on to tell me
                      about a Doctor from Dar es Salaam who, after years of separation from his son had
                      recently gone to visit him at his school. The Doctor had alighted at the railway station
                      where he had arranged to meet his son. A tall youth approached him and said, very
                      politely, “Excuse me sir. Are you my Father?” Others told me of children who had
                      become so attached to their relatives in England that they gave their parents a very cool
                      reception. I began to feel apprehensive about Ann and George but fortunately had no
                      time to mope.

                      Oh, that washing and ironing for six! I shall remember for ever that steamy little
                      laundry in the heat of the Red Sea and queuing up for the ironing and the feeling of guilt
                      at the size of my bundle. We met many old friends amongst the passengers, and made
                      some new ones, so the voyage was a pleasant one, We did however have our
                      anxious moments.

                      John was the first to disappear and we had an anxious search for him. He was
                      quite surprised that we had been concerned. “I was just talking to my friend Chinky
                      Chinaman in his workshop.” Could John have called him that? Then, when I returned to
                      the cabin from dinner one night I found Henry swigging Owbridge’s Lung Tonic. He had
                      drunk half the bottle neat and the label said ‘five drops in water’. Luckily it did not harm
                      him.

                      Jim of course was forever risking his neck. George had forbidden him to climb on
                      the railings but he was forever doing things which no one had thought of forbidding him
                      to do, like hanging from the overhead pipes on the deck or standing on the sill of a
                      window and looking down at the well deck far below. An Officer found him doing this and
                      gave me the scolding.

                      Another day he climbed up on a derrick used for hoisting cargo. George,
                      oblivious to this was sitting on the hatch cover with other passengers reading a book. I
                      was in the wash house aft on the same deck when Kate rushed in and said, “Mummy
                      come and see Jim.” Before I had time to more than gape, the butcher noticed Jim and
                      rushed out knife in hand. “Get down from there”, he bellowed. Jim got, and with such
                      speed that he caught the leg or his shorts on a projecting piece of metal. The cotton
                      ripped across the seam from leg to leg and Jim stood there for a humiliating moment in a
                      sort of revealing little kilt enduring the smiles of the passengers who had looked up from
                      their books at the butcher’s shout.

                      That incident cured Jim of his urge to climb on the ship but he managed to give
                      us one more fright. He was lost off Dover. People from whom we enquired said, “Yes
                      we saw your little boy. He was by the railings watching that big aircraft carrier.” Now Jim,
                      though mischievous , is very obedient. It was not until George and I had conducted an
                      exhaustive search above and below decks that I really became anxious. Could he have
                      fallen overboard? Jim was returned to us by an unamused Officer. He had been found
                      in one of the lifeboats on the deck forbidden to children.

                      Our ship passed Dover after dark and it was an unforgettable sight. Dover Castle
                      and the cliffs were floodlit for the Victory Celebrations. One of the men passengers sat
                      down at the piano and played ‘The White Cliffs of Dover’, and people sang and a few
                      wept. The Mantola docked at Tilbury early next morning in a steady drizzle.
                      There was a dockers strike on and it took literally hours for all the luggage to be
                      put ashore. The ships stewards simply locked the public rooms and went off leaving the
                      passengers shivering on the docks. Eventually damp and bedraggled, we arrived at St
                      Pancras Station and were given a warm welcome by George’s sister Cath and her
                      husband Reg Pears, who had come all the way from Nottingham to meet us.
                      As we had to spend an hour in London before our train left for Nottingham,
                      George suggested that Cath and I should take the children somewhere for a meal. So
                      off we set in the cold drizzle, the boys and I without coats and laden with sundry
                      packages, including a hand woven native basket full of shoes. We must have looked like
                      a bunch of refugees as we stood in the hall of The Kings Cross Station Hotel because a
                      supercilious waiter in tails looked us up and down and said, “I’m afraid not Madam”, in
                      answer to my enquiry whether the hotel could provide lunch for six.
                      Anyway who cares! We had lunch instead at an ABC tea room — horrible
                      sausage and a mound or rather sloppy mashed potatoes, but very good ice-cream.
                      After the train journey in a very grimy third class coach, through an incredibly green and
                      beautiful countryside, we eventually reached Nottingham and took a bus to Jacksdale,
                      where George’s mother and sisters live in large detached houses side by side.
                      Ann and George were at the bus stop waiting for us, and thank God, submitted
                      to my kiss as though we had been parted for weeks instead of eight years. Even now
                      that we are together again my heart aches to think of all those missed years. They have
                      not changed much and I would have picked them out of a crowd, but Ann, once thin and
                      pale, is now very rosy and blooming. She still has her pretty soft plaits and her eyes are
                      still a clear calm blue. Young George is very striking looking with sparkling brown eyes, a
                      ready, slightly lopsided smile, and charming manners.

                      Mother, and George’s elder sister, Lottie Giles, welcomed us at the door with the
                      cheering news that our tea was ready. Ann showed us the way to mother’s lovely lilac
                      tiled bathroom for a wash before tea. Before I had even turned the tap, Jim had hung
                      form the glass towel rail and it lay in three pieces on the floor. There have since been
                      similar tragedies. I can see that life in civilisation is not without snags.

                      I am most grateful that Ann and George have accepted us so naturally and
                      affectionately. Ann said candidly, “Mummy, it’s a good thing that you had Aunt Cath with
                      you when you arrived because, honestly, I wouldn’t have known you.”

                      Eleanor.

                      Jacksdale England 28th August 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      I am sorry that I have not written for some time but honestly, I don’t know whether
                      I’m coming or going. Mother handed the top floor of her house to us and the
                      arrangement was that I should tidy our rooms and do our laundry and Mother would
                      prepare the meals except for breakfast. It looked easy at first. All the rooms have wall to
                      wall carpeting and there was a large vacuum cleaner in the box room. I was told a
                      window cleaner would do the windows.

                      Well the first time I used the Hoover I nearly died of fright. I pressed the switch
                      and immediately there was a roar and the bag filled with air to bursting point, or so I
                      thought. I screamed for Ann and she came at the run. I pointed to the bag and shouted
                      above the din, “What must I do? It’s going to burst!” Ann looked at me in astonishment
                      and said, “But Mummy that’s the way it works.” I couldn’t have her thinking me a
                      complete fool so I switched the current off and explained to Ann how it was that I had
                      never seen this type of equipment in action. How, in Tanganyika , I had never had a
                      house with electricity and that, anyway, electric equipment would be superfluous
                      because floors are of cement which the houseboy polishes by hand, one only has a
                      few rugs or grass mats on the floor. “But what about Granny’s house in South Africa?’”
                      she asked, so I explained about your Josephine who threatened to leave if you
                      bought a Hoover because that would mean that you did not think she kept the house
                      clean. The sad fact remains that, at fourteen, Ann knows far more about housework than I
                      do, or rather did! I’m learning fast.

                      The older children all go to school at different times in the morning. Ann leaves first
                      by bus to go to her Grammar School at Sutton-in-Ashfield. Shortly afterwards George
                      catches a bus for Nottingham where he attends the High School. So they have
                      breakfast in relays, usually scrambled egg made from a revolting dried egg mixture.
                      Then there are beds to make and washing and ironing to do, so I have little time for
                      sightseeing, though on a few afternoons George has looked after the younger children
                      and I have gone on bus tours in Derbyshire. Life is difficult here with all the restrictions on
                      foodstuffs. We all have ration books so get our fair share but meat, fats and eggs are
                      scarce and expensive. The weather is very wet. At first I used to hang out the washing
                      and then rush to bring it in when a shower came. Now I just let it hang.

                      We have left our imprint upon my Mother-in-law’s house for ever. Henry upset a
                      bottle of Milk of Magnesia in the middle of the pale fawn bedroom carpet. John, trying to
                      be helpful and doing some dusting, broke one of the delicate Dresden china candlesticks
                      which adorn our bedroom mantelpiece.Jim and Henry have wrecked the once
                      professionally landscaped garden and all the boys together bored a large hole through
                      Mother’s prized cherry tree. So now Mother has given up and gone off to Bournemouth
                      for a much needed holiday. Once a week I have the capable help of a cleaning woman,
                      called for some reason, ‘Mrs Two’, but I have now got all the cooking to do for eight. Mrs
                      Two is a godsend. She wears, of all things, a print mob cap with a hole in it. Says it
                      belonged to her Grandmother. Her price is far beyond Rubies to me, not so much
                      because she does, in a couple of hours, what it takes me all day to do, but because she
                      sells me boxes of fifty cigarettes. Some non-smoking relative, who works in Players
                      tobacco factory, passes on his ration to her. Until Mrs Two came to my rescue I had
                      been starved of cigarettes. Each time I asked for them at the shop the grocer would say,
                      “Are you registered with us?” Only very rarely would some kindly soul sell me a little
                      packet of five Woodbines.

                      England is very beautiful but the sooner we go home to Tanganyika, the better.
                      On this, George and I and the children agree.

                      Eleanor.

                      Jacksdale England 20th September 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      Our return passages have now been booked on the Winchester Castle and we
                      sail from Southampton on October the sixth. I look forward to returning to Tanganyika but
                      hope to visit England again in a few years time when our children are older and when
                      rationing is a thing of the past.

                      I have grown fond of my Sisters-in-law and admire my Mother-in-law very much.
                      She has a great sense of humour and has entertained me with stories of her very
                      eventful life, and told me lots of little stories of the children which did not figure in her
                      letters. One which amused me was about young George. During one of the air raids
                      early in the war when the sirens were screaming and bombers roaring overhead Mother
                      made the two children get into the cloak cupboard under the stairs. Young George
                      seemed quite unconcerned about the planes and the bombs but soon an anxious voice
                      asked in the dark, “Gran, what will I do if a spider falls on me?” I am afraid that Mother is
                      going to miss Ann and George very much.

                      I had a holiday last weekend when Lottie and I went up to London on a spree. It
                      was a most enjoyable weekend, though very rushed. We placed ourselves in the
                      hands of Thos. Cook and Sons and saw most of the sights of London and were run off
                      our feet in the process. As you all know London I shall not describe what I saw but just
                      to say that, best of all, I enjoyed walking along the Thames embankment in the evening
                      and the changing of the Guard at Whitehall. On Sunday morning Lottie and I went to
                      Kew Gardens and in the afternoon walked in Kensington Gardens.

                      We went to only one show, ‘The Skin of our Teeth’ starring Vivienne Leigh.
                      Neither of us enjoyed the performance at all and regretted having spent so much on
                      circle seats. The show was far too highbrow for my taste, a sort of satire on the survival
                      of the human race. Miss Leigh was unrecognisable in a blond wig and her voice strident.
                      However the night was not a dead loss as far as entertainment was concerned as we
                      were later caught up in a tragicomedy at our hotel.

                      We had booked communicating rooms at the enormous Imperial Hotel in Russell
                      Square. These rooms were comfortably furnished but very high up, and we had a rather
                      terrifying and dreary view from the windows of the enclosed courtyard far below. We
                      had some snacks and a chat in Lottie’s room and then I moved to mine and went to bed.
                      I had noted earlier that there was a special lock on the outer door of my room so that
                      when the door was closed from the inside it automatically locked itself.
                      I was just dropping off to sleep when I heard a hammering which seemed to
                      come from my wardrobe. I got up, rather fearfully, and opened the wardrobe door and
                      noted for the first time that the wardrobe was set in an opening in the wall and that the
                      back of the wardrobe also served as the back of the wardrobe in the room next door. I
                      quickly shut it again and went to confer with Lottie.

                      Suddenly a male voice was raised next door in supplication, “Mary Mother of
                      God, Help me! They’ve locked me in!” and the hammering resumed again, sometimes
                      on the door, and then again on the back of the wardrobe of the room next door. Lottie
                      had by this time joined me and together we listened to the prayers and to the
                      hammering. Then the voice began to threaten, “If you don’t let me out I’ll jump out of the
                      window.” Great consternation on our side of the wall. I went out into the passage and
                      called through the door, “You’re not locked in. Come to your door and I’ll tell you how to
                      open it.” Silence for a moment and then again the prayers followed by a threat. All the
                      other doors in the corridor remained shut.

                      Luckily just then a young man and a woman came walking down the corridor and I
                      explained the situation. The young man hurried off for the night porter who went into the
                      next door room. In a matter of minutes there was peace next door. When the night
                      porter came out into the corridor again I asked for an explanation. He said quite casually,
                      “It’s all right Madam. He’s an Irish Gentleman in Show Business. He gets like this on a
                      Saturday night when he has had a drop too much. He won’t give any more trouble
                      now.” And he didn’t. Next morning at breakfast Lottie and I tried to spot the gentleman in
                      the Show Business, but saw no one who looked like the owner of that charming Irish
                      voice.

                      George had to go to London on business last Monday and took the older
                      children with him for a few hours of sight seeing. They returned quite unimpressed.
                      Everything was too old and dirty and there were far too many people about, but they
                      had enjoyed riding on the escalators at the tube stations, and all agreed that the highlight
                      of the trip was, “Dad took us to lunch at the Chicken Inn.”

                      Now that it is almost time to leave England I am finding the housework less of a
                      drudgery, Also, as it is school holiday time, Jim and Henry are able to go on walks with
                      the older children and so use up some of their surplus energy. Cath and I took the
                      children (except young George who went rabbit shooting with his uncle Reg, and
                      Henry, who stayed at home with his dad) to the Wakes at Selston, the neighbouring
                      village. There were the roundabouts and similar contraptions but the side shows had
                      more appeal for the children. Ann and Kate found a stall where assorted prizes were
                      spread out on a sloping table. Anyone who could land a penny squarely on one of
                      these objects was given a similar one as a prize.

                      I was touched to see that both girls ignored all the targets except a box of fifty
                      cigarettes which they were determined to win for me. After numerous attempts, Kate
                      landed her penny successfully and you would have loved to have seen her radiant little
                      face.

                      Eleanor.

                      Dar es Salaam 22nd October 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      Back in Tanganyika at last, but not together. We have to stay in Dar es Salaam
                      until tomorrow when the train leaves for Dodoma. We arrived yesterday morning to find
                      all the hotels filled with people waiting to board ships for England. Fortunately some
                      friends came to the rescue and Ann, Kate and John have gone to stay with them. Jim,
                      Henry and I are sleeping in a screened corner of the lounge of the New Africa Hotel, and
                      George and young George have beds in the Palm Court of the same hotel.

                      We travelled out from England in the Winchester Castle under troopship
                      conditions. We joined her at Southampton after a rather slow train journey from
                      Nottingham. We arrived after dark and from the station we could see a large ship in the
                      docks with a floodlit red funnel. “Our ship,” yelled the children in delight, but it was not the
                      Winchester Castle but the Queen Elizabeth, newly reconditioned.

                      We had hoped to board our ship that evening but George made enquiries and
                      found that we would not be allowed on board until noon next day. Without much hope,
                      we went off to try to get accommodation for eight at a small hotel recommended by the
                      taxi driver. Luckily for us there was a very motherly woman at the reception desk. She
                      looked in amusement at the six children and said to me, “Goodness are all these yours,
                      ducks? Then she called over her shoulder, “Wilf, come and see this lady with lots of
                      children. We must try to help.” They settled the problem most satisfactorily by turning
                      two rooms into a dormitory.

                      In the morning we had time to inspect bomb damage in the dock area of
                      Southampton. Most of the rubble had been cleared away but there are still numbers of
                      damaged buildings awaiting demolition. A depressing sight. We saw the Queen Mary
                      at anchor, still in her drab war time paint, but magnificent nevertheless.
                      The Winchester Castle was crammed with passengers and many travelled in
                      acute discomfort. We were luckier than most because the two girls, the three small boys
                      and I had a stateroom to ourselves and though it was stripped of peacetime comforts,
                      we had a private bathroom and toilet. The two Georges had bunks in a huge men-only
                      dormitory somewhere in the bowls of the ship where they had to share communal troop
                      ship facilities. The food was plentiful but unexciting and one had to queue for afternoon
                      tea. During the day the decks were crowded and there was squatting room only. The
                      many children on board got bored.

                      Port Said provided a break and we were all entertained by the ‘Gully Gully’ man
                      and his conjuring tricks, and though we had no money to spend at Simon Artz, we did at
                      least have a chance to stretch our legs. Next day scores of passengers took ill with
                      sever stomach upsets, whether from food poisoning, or as was rumoured, from bad
                      water taken on at the Egyptian port, I don’t know. Only the two Georges in our family
                      were affected and their attacks were comparatively mild.

                      As we neared the Kenya port of Mombassa, the passengers for Dar es Salaam
                      were told that they would have to disembark at Mombassa and continue their journey in
                      a small coaster, the Al Said. The Winchester Castle is too big for the narrow channel
                      which leads to Dar es Salaam harbour.

                      From the wharf the Al Said looked beautiful. She was once the private yacht of
                      the Sultan of Zanzibar and has lovely lines. Our admiration lasted only until we were
                      shown our cabins. With one voice our children exclaimed, “Gosh they stink!” They did, of
                      a mixture of rancid oil and sweat and stale urine. The beds were not yet made and the
                      thin mattresses had ominous stains on them. John, ever fastidious, lifted his mattress and two enormous cockroaches scuttled for cover.

                      We had a good homely lunch served by two smiling African stewards and
                      afterwards we sat on deck and that was fine too, though behind ones enjoyment there
                      was the thought of those stuffy and dirty cabins. That first night nearly everyone,
                      including George and our older children, slept on deck. Women occupied deck chairs
                      and men and children slept on the bare decks. Horrifying though the idea was, I decided
                      that, as Jim had a bad cough, he, Henry and I would sleep in our cabin.

                      When I announced my intention of sleeping in the cabin one of the passengers
                      gave me some insecticide spray which I used lavishly, but without avail. The children
                      slept but I sat up all night with the light on, determined to keep at least their pillows clear
                      of the cockroaches which scurried about boldly regardless of the light. All the next day
                      and night we avoided the cabins. The Al Said stopped for some hours at Zanzibar to
                      offload her deck cargo of live cattle and packing cases from the hold. George and the
                      elder children went ashore for a walk but I felt too lazy and there was plenty to watch
                      from deck.

                      That night I too occupied a deck chair and slept quite comfortably, and next
                      morning we entered the palm fringed harbour of Dar es Salaam and were home.

                      Eleanor.

                      Mbeya 1st November 1946

                      Dearest Family.

                      Home at last! We are all most happily installed in a real family house about three
                      miles out of Mbeya and near the school. This house belongs to an elderly German and
                      has been taken over by the Custodian of Enemy Property and leased to the
                      Government.

                      The owner, whose name is Shenkel, was not interned but is allowed to occupy a
                      smaller house on the Estate. I found him in the garden this morning lecturing the children
                      on what they may do and may not do. I tried to make it quite clear to him that he was not
                      our landlord, though he clearly thinks otherwise. After he had gone I had to take two
                      aspirin and lie down to recover my composure! I had been warned that he has this effect
                      on people.

                      Mr Shenkel is a short and ugly man, his clothes are stained with food and he
                      wears steel rimmed glasses tied round his head with a piece of dirty elastic because
                      one earpiece is missing. He speaks with a thick German accent but his English is fluent
                      and I believe he is a cultured and clever man. But he is maddening. The children were
                      more amused than impressed by his exhortations and have happily Christened our
                      home, ‘Old Shenks’.

                      The house has very large grounds as the place is really a derelict farm. It suits us
                      down to the ground. We had no sooner unpacked than George went off on safari after
                      those maneating lions in the Njombe District. he accounted for one, and a further two
                      jointly with a Game Scout, before we left for England. But none was shot during the five
                      months we were away as George’s relief is quite inexperienced in such work. George
                      thinks that there are still about a dozen maneaters at large. His theory is that a female
                      maneater moved into the area in 1938 when maneating first started, and brought up her
                      cubs to be maneaters, and those cubs in turn did the same. The three maneating lions
                      that have been shot were all in very good condition and not old and maimed as
                      maneaters usually are.

                      George anticipates that it will be months before all these lions are accounted for
                      because they are constantly on the move and cover a very large area. The lions have to
                      be hunted on foot because they range over broken country covered by bush and fairly
                      dense thicket.

                      I did a bit of shooting myself yesterday and impressed our African servants and
                      the children and myself. What a fluke! Our houseboy came to say that there was a snake
                      in the garden, the biggest he had ever seen. He said it was too big to kill with a stick and
                      would I shoot it. I had no gun but a heavy .450 Webley revolver and I took this and
                      hurried out with the children at my heels.

                      The snake turned out to be an unusually large puff adder which had just shed its
                      skin. It looked beautiful in a repulsive way. So flanked by servants and children I took
                      aim and shot, not hitting the head as I had planned, but breaking the snake’s back with
                      the heavy bullet. The two native boys then rushed up with sticks and flattened the head.
                      “Ma you’re a crack shot,” cried the kids in delighted surprise. I hope to rest on my laurels
                      for a long, long while.

                      Although there are only a few weeks of school term left the four older children will
                      start school on Monday. Not only am I pleased with our new home here but also with
                      the staff I have engaged. Our new houseboy, Reuben, (but renamed Robin by our
                      children) is not only cheerful and willing but intelligent too, and Jumbe, the wood and
                      garden boy, is a born clown and a source of great entertainment to the children.

                      I feel sure that we are all going to be very happy here at ‘Old Shenks!.

                      Eleanor.

                      #6265
                      TracyTracy
                      Participant

                        From Tanganyika with Love

                        continued  ~ part 6

                        With thanks to Mike Rushby.

                        Mchewe 6th June 1937

                        Dearest Family,

                        Home again! We had an uneventful journey. Kate was as good as gold all the
                        way. We stopped for an hour at Bulawayo where we had to change trains but
                        everything was simplified for me by a very pleasant man whose wife shared my
                        compartment. Not only did he see me through customs but he installed us in our new
                        train and his wife turned up to see us off with magazines for me and fruit and sweets for
                        Kate. Very, very kind, don’t you think?

                        Kate and I shared the compartment with a very pretty and gentle girl called
                        Clarice Simpson. She was very worried and upset because she was going home to
                        Broken Hill in response to a telegram informing her that her young husband was
                        dangerously ill from Blackwater Fever. She was very helpful with Kate whose
                        cheerfulness helped Clarice, I think, though I, quite unintentionally was the biggest help
                        at the end of our journey. Remember the partial dentures I had had made just before
                        leaving Cape Town? I know I shall never get used to the ghastly things, I’ve had them
                        two weeks now and they still wobble. Well this day I took them out and wrapped them
                        in a handkerchief, but when we were packing up to leave the train I could find the
                        handkerchief but no teeth! We searched high and low until the train had slowed down to
                        enter Broken Hill station. Then Clarice, lying flat on the floor, spied the teeth in the dark
                        corner under the bottom bunk. With much stretching she managed to retrieve the
                        dentures covered in grime and fluff. My look of horror, when I saw them, made young
                        Clarice laugh. She was met at the station by a very grave elderly couple. I do wonder
                        how things turned out for her.

                        I stayed overnight with Kate at the Great Northern Hotel, and we set off for
                        Mbeya by plane early in the morning. One of our fellow passengers was a young
                        mother with a three week old baby. How ideas have changed since Ann was born. This
                        time we had a smooth passage and I was the only passenger to get airsick. Although
                        there were other women passengers it was a man once again, who came up and
                        offered to help. Kate went off with him amiably and he entertained her until we touched
                        down at Mbeya.

                        George was there to meet us with a wonderful surprise, a little red two seater
                        Ford car. She is a bit battered and looks a bit odd because the boot has been
                        converted into a large wooden box for carrying raw salt, but she goes like the wind.
                        Where did George raise the cash to buy a car? Whilst we were away he found a small
                        cave full of bat guano near a large cave which is worked by a man called Bob Sargent.
                        As Sargent did not want any competition he bought the contents of the cave from
                        George giving him the small car as part payment.

                        It was lovely to return to our little home and find everything fresh and tidy and the
                        garden full of colour. But it was heartbreaking to go into the bedroom and see George’s
                        precious forgotten boots still standing by his empty bed.

                        With much love,
                        Eleanor.

                        Mchewe 25th June 1937

                        Dearest Family,

                        Last Friday George took Kate and me in the little red Ford to visit Mr Sargent’s
                        camp on the Songwe River which cuts the Mbeya-Mbosi road. Mr Sargent bought
                        Hicky-Wood’s guano deposit and also our small cave and is making a good living out of
                        selling the bat guano to the coffee farmers in this province. George went to try to interest
                        him in a guano deposit near Kilwa in the Southern Province. Mr Sargent agreed to pay
                        25 pounds to cover the cost of the car trip and pegging costs. George will make the trip
                        to peg the claim and take samples for analysis. If the quality is sufficiently high, George
                        and Mr Sargent will go into partnership. George will work the claim and ship out the
                        guano from Kilwa which is on the coast of the Southern Province of Tanganyika. So now
                        we are busy building castles in the air once more.

                        On Saturday we went to Mbeya where George had to attend a meeting of the
                        Trout Association. In the afternoon he played in a cricket match so Kate and I spent the
                        whole day with the wife of the new Superintendent of Police. They have a very nice
                        new house with lawns and a sunken rose garden. Kate had a lovely romp with Kit, her
                        three year old son.

                        Mrs Wolten also has two daughters by a previous marriage. The elder girl said to
                        me, “Oh Mrs Rushby your husband is exactly like the strong silent type of man I
                        expected to see in Africa but he is the only one I have seen. I think he looks exactly like
                        those men in the ‘Barney’s Tobacco’ advertisements.”

                        I went home with a huge pile of magazines to keep me entertained whilst
                        George is away on the Kilwa trip.

                        Lots of love,
                        Eleanor.

                        Mchewe 9th July 1937

                        Dearest Family,

                        George returned on Monday from his Kilwa safari. He had an entertaining
                        tale to tell.

                        Before he approached Mr Sargent about going shares in the Kilwa guano
                        deposit he first approached a man on the Lupa who had done very well out of a small
                        gold reef. This man, however said he was not interested so you can imagine how
                        indignant George was when he started on his long trip, to find himself being trailed by
                        this very man and a co-driver in a powerful Ford V8 truck. George stopped his car and
                        had some heated things to say – awful threats I imagine as to what would happen to
                        anyone who staked his claim. Then he climbed back into our ancient little two seater and
                        went off like a bullet driving all day and most of the night. As the others took turns in
                        driving you can imagine what a feat it was for George to arrive in Kilwa ahead of them.
                        When they drove into Kilwa he met them with a bright smile and a bit of bluff –
                        quite justifiable under the circumstances I think. He said, you chaps can have a rest now,
                        you’re too late.” He then whipped off and pegged the claim. he brought some samples
                        of guano back but until it has been analysed he will not know whether the guano will be
                        an economic proposition or not. George is not very hopeful. He says there is a good
                        deal of sand mixed with the guano and that much of it was damp.

                        The trip was pretty eventful for Kianda, our houseboy. The little two seater car
                        had been used by its previous owner for carting bags of course salt from his salt pans.
                        For this purpose the dicky seat behind the cab had been removed, and a kind of box
                        built into the boot of the car. George’s camp kit and provisions were packed into this
                        open box and Kianda perched on top to keep an eye on the belongings. George
                        travelled so fast on the rough road that at some point during the night Kianda was
                        bumped off in the middle of the Game Reserve. George did not notice that he was
                        missing until the next morning. He concluded, quite rightly as it happened, that Kianda
                        would be picked up by the rival truck so he continued his journey and Kianda rejoined
                        him at Kilwa.

                        Believe it or not, the same thing happened on the way back but fortunately this
                        time George noticed his absence. He stopped the car and had just started back on his
                        tracks when Kianda came running down the road still clutching the unlighted storm lamp
                        which he was holding in his hand when he fell. The glass was not even cracked.
                        We are finding it difficult just now to buy native chickens and eggs. There has
                        been an epidemic amongst the poultry and one hesitates to eat the survivors. I have a
                        brine tub in which I preserve our surplus meat but I need the chickens for soup.
                        I hope George will be home for some months. He has arranged to take a Mr
                        Blackburn, a wealthy fruit farmer from Elgin, Cape, on a hunting safari during September
                        and October and that should bring in some much needed cash. Lillian Eustace has
                        invited Kate and me to spend the whole of October with her in Tukuyu.
                        I am so glad that you so much enjoy having Ann and George with you. We miss
                        them dreadfully. Kate is a pretty little girl and such a little madam. You should hear the
                        imperious way in which she calls the kitchenboy for her meals. “Boy Brekkis, Boy Lunch,
                        and Boy Eggy!” are her three calls for the day. She knows no Ki-Swahili.

                        Eleanor

                        Mchewe 8th October 1937

                        Dearest Family,

                        I am rapidly becoming as superstitious as our African boys. They say the wild
                        animals always know when George is away from home and come down to have their
                        revenge on me because he has killed so many.

                        I am being besieged at night by a most beastly leopard with a half grown cub. I
                        have grown used to hearing leopards grunt as they hunt in the hills at night but never
                        before have I had one roaming around literally under the windows. It has been so hot at
                        night lately that I have been sleeping with my bedroom door open onto the verandah. I
                        felt quite safe because the natives hereabouts are law-abiding and in any case I always
                        have a boy armed with a club sleeping in the kitchen just ten yards away. As an added
                        precaution I also have a loaded .45 calibre revolver on my bedside table, and Fanny
                        our bullterrier, sleeps on the mat by my bed. I am also looking after Barney, a fine
                        Airedale dog belonging to the Costers. He slept on a mat by the open bedroom door
                        near a dimly burning storm lamp.

                        As usual I went to sleep with an easy mind on Monday night, but was awakened
                        in the early hours of Tuesday by the sound of a scuffle on the front verandah. The noise
                        was followed by a scream of pain from Barney. I jumped out of bed and, grabbing the
                        lamp with my left hand and the revolver in my right, I rushed outside just in time to see
                        two animal figures roll over the edge of the verandah into the garden below. There they
                        engaged in a terrific tug of war. Fortunately I was too concerned for Barney to be
                        nervous. I quickly fired two shots from the revolver, which incidentally makes a noise like
                        a cannon, and I must have startled the leopard for both animals, still locked together,
                        disappeared over the edge of the terrace. I fired two more shots and in a few moments
                        heard the leopard making a hurried exit through the dry leaves which lie thick under the
                        wild fig tree just beyond the terrace. A few seconds later Barney appeared on the low
                        terrace wall. I called his name but he made no move to come but stood with hanging
                        head. In desperation I rushed out, felt blood on my hands when I touched him, so I
                        picked him up bodily and carried him into the house. As I regained the verandah the boy
                        appeared, club in hand, having been roused by the shots. He quickly grasped what had
                        happened when he saw my blood saturated nightie. He fetched a bowl of water and a
                        clean towel whilst I examined Barney’s wounds. These were severe, the worst being a
                        gaping wound in his throat. I washed the gashes with a strong solution of pot permang
                        and I am glad to say they are healing remarkably well though they are bound to leave
                        scars. Fanny, very prudently, had taken no part in the fighting except for frenzied barking
                        which she kept up all night. The shots had of course wakened Kate but she seemed
                        more interested than alarmed and kept saying “Fanny bark bark, Mummy bang bang.
                        Poor Barney lots of blood.”

                        In the morning we inspected the tracks in the garden. There was a shallow furrow
                        on the terrace where Barney and the leopard had dragged each other to and fro and
                        claw marks on the trunk of the wild fig tree into which the leopard climbed after I fired the
                        shots. The affair was of course a drama after the Africans’ hearts and several of our
                        shamba boys called to see me next day to make sympathetic noises and discuss the
                        affair.

                        I went to bed early that night hoping that the leopard had been scared off for
                        good but I must confess I shut all windows and doors. Alas for my hopes of a restful
                        night. I had hardly turned down the lamp when the leopard started its terrifying grunting
                        just under the bedroom windows. If only she would sniff around quietly I should not
                        mind, but the noise is ghastly, something like the first sickening notes of a braying
                        donkey, amplified here by the hills and the gorge which is only a stones throw from the
                        bedroom. Barney was too sick to bark but Fanny barked loud enough for two and the more
                        frantic she became the hungrier the leopard sounded. Kate of course woke up and this
                        time she was frightened though I assured her that the noise was just a donkey having
                        fun. Neither of us slept until dawn when the leopard returned to the hills. When we
                        examined the tracks next morning we found that the leopard had been accompanied by
                        a fair sized cub and that together they had prowled around the house, kitchen, and out
                        houses, visiting especially the places to which the dogs had been during the day.
                        As I feel I cannot bear many more of these nights, I am sending a note to the
                        District Commissioner, Mbeya by the messenger who takes this letter to the post,
                        asking him to send a game scout or an armed policeman to deal with the leopard.
                        So don’t worry, for by the time this reaches you I feel sure this particular trouble
                        will be over.

                        Eleanor.

                        Mchewe 17th October 1937

                        Dearest Family,

                        More about the leopard I fear! My messenger returned from Mbeya to say that
                        the District Officer was on safari so he had given the message to the Assistant District
                        Officer who also apparently left on safari later without bothering to reply to my note, so
                        there was nothing for me to do but to send for the village Nimrod and his muzzle loader
                        and offer him a reward if he could frighten away or kill the leopard.

                        The hunter, Laza, suggested that he should sleep at the house so I went to bed
                        early leaving Laza and his two pals to make themselves comfortable on the living room
                        floor by the fire. Laza was armed with a formidable looking muzzle loader, crammed I
                        imagine with nuts and bolts and old rusty nails. One of his pals had a spear and the other
                        a panga. This fellow was also in charge of the Petromax pressure lamp whose light was
                        hidden under a packing case. I left the campaign entirely to Laza’s direction.
                        As usual the leopard came at midnight stealing down from the direction of the
                        kitchen and announcing its presence and position with its usual ghastly grunts. Suddenly
                        pandemonium broke loose on the back verandah. I heard the roar of the muzzle loader
                        followed by a vigourous tattoo beaten on an empty paraffin tin and I rushed out hoping
                        to find the dead leopard. however nothing of the kind had happened except that the
                        noise must have scared the beast because she did not return again that night. Next
                        morning Laza solemnly informed me that, though he had shot many leopards in his day,
                        this was no ordinary leopard but a “sheitani” (devil) and that as his gun was no good
                        against witchcraft he thought he might as well retire from the hunt. Scared I bet, and I
                        don’t blame him either.

                        You can imagine my relief when a car rolled up that afternoon bringing Messers
                        Stewart and Griffiths, two farmers who live about 15 miles away, between here and
                        Mbeya. They had a note from the Assistant District Officer asking them to help me and
                        they had come to set up a trap gun in the garden. That night the leopard sniffed all
                        around the gun and I had the added strain of waiting for the bang and wondering what I
                        should do if the beast were only wounded. I conjured up horrible visions of the two little
                        totos trotting up the garden path with the early morning milk and being horribly mauled,
                        but I needn’t have worried because the leopard was far too wily to be caught that way.
                        Two more ghastly nights passed and then I had another visitor, a Dr Jackson of
                        the Tsetse Department on safari in the District. He listened sympathetically to my story
                        and left his shotgun and some SSG cartridges with me and instructed me to wait until the
                        leopard was pretty close and blow its b—– head off. It was good of him to leave his
                        gun. George always says there are three things a man should never lend, ‘His wife, his
                        gun and his dog.’ (I think in that order!)I felt quite cheered by Dr Jackson’s visit and sent
                        once again for Laza last night and arranged a real show down. In the afternoon I draped
                        heavy blankets over the living room windows to shut out the light of the pressure lamp
                        and the four of us, Laza and his two stooges and I waited up for the leopard. When we
                        guessed by her grunts that she was somewhere between the kitchen and the back door
                        we all rushed out, first the boy with the panga and the lamp, next Laza with his muzzle
                        loader, then me with the shotgun followed closely by the boy with the spear. What a
                        farce! The lamp was our undoing. We were blinded by the light and did not even
                        glimpse the leopard which made off with a derisive grunt. Laza said smugly that he knew
                        it was hopeless to try and now I feel tired and discouraged too.

                        This morning I sent a runner to Mbeya to order the hotel taxi for tomorrow and I
                        shall go to friends in Mbeya for a day or two and then on to Tukuyu where I shall stay
                        with the Eustaces until George returns from Safari.

                        Eleanor.

                        Mchewe 18th November 1937

                        My darling Ann,

                        Here we are back in our own home and how lovely it is to have Daddy back from
                        safari. Thank you very much for your letter. I hope by now you have got mine telling you
                        how very much I liked the beautiful tray cloth you made for my birthday. I bet there are
                        not many little girls of five who can embroider as well as you do, darling. The boy,
                        Matafari, washes and irons it so carefully and it looks lovely on the tea tray.

                        Daddy and I had some fun last night. I was in bed and Daddy was undressing
                        when we heard a funny scratching noise on the roof. I thought it was the leopard. Daddy
                        quickly loaded his shotgun and ran outside. He had only his shirt on and he looked so
                        funny. I grabbed the loaded revolver from the cupboard and ran after Dad in my nightie
                        but after all the rush it was only your cat, Winnie, though I don’t know how she managed
                        to make such a noise. We felt so silly, we laughed and laughed.

                        Kate talks a lot now but in such a funny way you would laugh to her her. She
                        hears the houseboys call me Memsahib so sometimes instead of calling me Mummy
                        she calls me “Oompaab”. She calls the bedroom a ‘bippon’ and her little behind she
                        calls her ‘sittendump’. She loves to watch Mandawi’s cattle go home along the path
                        behind the kitchen. Joseph your donkey, always leads the cows. He has a lazy life now.
                        I am glad you had such fun on Guy Fawkes Day. You will be sad to leave
                        Plumstead but I am sure you will like going to England on the big ship with granny Kate.
                        I expect you will start school when you get to England and I am sure you will find that
                        fun.

                        God bless my dear little girl. Lots of love from Daddy and Kate,
                        and Mummy

                        Mchewe 18th November 1937

                        Hello George Darling,

                        Thank you for your lovely drawing of Daddy shooting an elephant. Daddy says
                        that the only thing is that you have drawn him a bit too handsome.

                        I went onto the verandah a few minutes ago to pick a banana for Kate from the
                        bunch hanging there and a big hornet flew out and stung my elbow! There are lots of
                        them around now and those stinging flies too. Kate wears thick corduroy dungarees so
                        that she will not get her fat little legs bitten. She is two years old now and is a real little
                        pickle. She loves running out in the rain so I have ordered a pair of red Wellingtons and a
                        tiny umbrella from a Nairobi shop for her Christmas present.

                        Fanny’s puppies have their eyes open now and have very sharp little teeth.
                        They love to nip each other. We are keeping the fiercest little one whom we call Paddy
                        but are giving the others to friends. The coffee bushes are full of lovely white flowers
                        and the bees and ants are very busy stealing their honey.

                        Yesterday a troop of baboons came down the hill and Dad shot a big one to
                        scare the others off. They are a nuisance because they steal the maize and potatoes
                        from the native shambas and then there is not enough food for the totos.
                        Dad and I are very proud of you for not making a fuss when you went to the
                        dentist to have that tooth out.

                        Bye bye, my fine little son.
                        Three bags full of love from Kate, Dad and Mummy.

                        Mchewe 12th February, 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        here is some news that will please you. George has been offered and has
                        accepted a job as Forester at Mbulu in the Northern Province of Tanganyika. George
                        would have preferred a job as Game Ranger, but though the Game Warden, Philip
                        Teare, is most anxious to have him in the Game Department, there is no vacancy at
                        present. Anyway if one crops up later, George can always transfer from one
                        Government Department to another. Poor George, he hates the idea of taking a job. He
                        says that hitherto he has always been his own master and he detests the thought of
                        being pushed around by anyone.

                        Now however he has no choice. Our capitol is almost exhausted and the coffee
                        market shows no signs of improving. With three children and another on the way, he
                        feels he simply must have a fixed income. I shall be sad to leave this little farm. I love
                        our little home and we have been so very happy here, but my heart rejoices at the
                        thought of overseas leave every thirty months. Now we shall be able to fetch Ann and
                        George from England and in three years time we will all be together in Tanganyika once
                        more.

                        There is no sale for farms so we will just shut the house and keep on a very small
                        labour force just to keep the farm from going derelict. We are eating our hens but will
                        take our two dogs, Fanny and Paddy with us.

                        One thing I shall be glad to leave is that leopard. She still comes grunting around
                        at night but not as badly as she did before. I do not mind at all when George is here but
                        until George was accepted for this forestry job I was afraid he might go back to the
                        Diggings and I should once more be left alone to be cursed by the leopard’s attentions.
                        Knowing how much I dreaded this George was most anxious to shoot the leopard and
                        for weeks he kept his shotgun and a powerful torch handy at night.

                        One night last week we woke to hear it grunting near the kitchen. We got up very
                        quietly and whilst George loaded the shotgun with SSG, I took the torch and got the
                        heavy revolver from the cupboard. We crept out onto the dark verandah where George
                        whispered to me to not switch on the torch until he had located the leopard. It was pitch
                        black outside so all he could do was listen intently. And then of course I spoilt all his
                        plans. I trod on the dog’s tin bowl and made a terrific clatter! George ordered me to
                        switch on the light but it was too late and the leopard vanished into the long grass of the
                        Kalonga, grunting derisively, or so it sounded.

                        She never comes into the clearing now but grunts from the hillside just above it.

                        Eleanor.

                        Mbulu 18th March, 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Journeys end at last. here we are at Mbulu, installed in our new quarters which are
                        as different as they possibly could be from our own cosy little home at Mchewe. We
                        live now, my dears, in one wing of a sort of ‘Beau Geste’ fort but I’ll tell you more about
                        it in my next letter. We only arrived yesterday and have not had time to look around.
                        This letter will tell you just about our trip from Mbeya.

                        We left the farm in our little red Ford two seater with all our portable goods and
                        chattels plus two native servants and the two dogs. Before driving off, George took one
                        look at the flattened springs and declared that he would be surprised if we reached
                        Mbeya without a breakdown and that we would never make Mbulu with the car so
                        overloaded.

                        However luck was with us. We reached Mbeya without mishap and at one of the
                        local garages saw a sturdy used Ford V8 boxbody car for sale. The garage agreed to
                        take our small car as part payment and George drew on our little remaining capitol for the
                        rest. We spent that night in the house of the Forest Officer and next morning set out in
                        comfort for the Northern Province of Tanganyika.

                        I had done the journey from Dodoma to Mbeya seven years before so was
                        familiar with the scenery but the road was much improved and the old pole bridges had
                        been replaced by modern steel ones. Kate was as good as gold all the way. We
                        avoided hotels and camped by the road and she found this great fun.
                        The road beyond Dodoma was new to me and very interesting country, flat and
                        dry and dusty, as little rain falls there. The trees are mostly thorn trees but here and there
                        one sees a giant baobab, weird trees with fantastically thick trunks and fat squat branches
                        with meagre foliage. The inhabitants of this area I found interesting though. They are
                        called Wagogo and are a primitive people who ape the Masai in dress and customs
                        though they are much inferior to the Masai in physique. They are also great herders of
                        cattle which, rather surprisingly, appear to thrive in that dry area.

                        The scenery alters greatly as one nears Babati, which one approaches by a high
                        escarpment from which one has a wonderful view of the Rift Valley. Babati township
                        appears to be just a small group of Indian shops and shabby native houses, but I
                        believe there are some good farms in the area. Though the little township is squalid,
                        there is a beautiful lake and grand mountains to please the eye. We stopped only long
                        enough to fill up with petrol and buy some foodstuffs. Beyond Babati there is a tsetse
                        fly belt and George warned our two native servants to see that no tsetse flies settled on
                        the dogs.

                        We stopped for the night in a little rest house on the road about 80 miles from
                        Arusha where we were to spend a few days with the Forest Officer before going on to
                        Mbulu. I enjoyed this section of the road very much because it runs across wide plains
                        which are bounded on the West by the blue mountains of the Rift Valley wall. Here for
                        the first time I saw the Masai on their home ground guarding their vast herds of cattle. I
                        also saw their strange primitive hovels called Manyattas, with their thorn walled cattle
                        bomas and lots of plains game – giraffe, wildebeest, ostriches and antelope. Kate was
                        wildly excited and entranced with the game especially the giraffe which stood gazing
                        curiously and unafraid of us, often within a few yards of the road.

                        Finally we came across the greatest thrill of all, my first view of Mt Meru the extinct
                        volcano about 16,000 feet high which towers over Arusha township. The approach to
                        Arusha is through flourishing coffee plantations very different alas from our farm at Mchewe. George says that at Arusha coffee growing is still a paying proposition
                        because here the yield of berry per acre is much higher than in the Southern highlands
                        and here in the North the farmers have not such heavy transport costs as the railway runs
                        from Arusha to the port at Tanga.

                        We stayed overnight at a rather second rate hotel but the food was good and we
                        had hot baths and a good nights rest. Next day Tom Lewis the Forest Officer, fetched
                        us and we spent a few days camping in a tent in the Lewis’ garden having meals at their
                        home. Both Tom and Lillian Lewis were most friendly. Tom lewis explained to George
                        what his work in the Mbulu District was to be, and they took us camping in a Forest
                        Reserve where Lillian and her small son David and Kate and I had a lovely lazy time
                        amidst beautiful surroundings. Before we left for Mbulu, Lillian took me shopping to buy
                        material for curtains for our new home. She described the Forest House at Mbulu to me
                        and it sounded delightful but alas, when we reached Mbulu we discovered that the
                        Assistant District Officer had moved into the Forest House and we were directed to the
                        Fort or Boma. The night before we left Arusha for Mbulu it rained very heavily and the
                        road was very treacherous and slippery due to the surface being of ‘black cotton’ soil
                        which has the appearance and consistency of chocolate blancmange, after rain. To get to
                        Mbulu we had to drive back in the direction of Dodoma for some 70 miles and then turn
                        to the right and drive across plains to the Great Rift Valley Wall. The views from this
                        escarpment road which climbs this wall are magnificent. At one point one looks down
                        upon Lake Manyara with its brilliant white beaches of soda.

                        The drive was a most trying one for George. We had no chains for the wheels
                        and several times we stuck in the mud and our two houseboys had to put grass and
                        branches under the wheels to stop them from spinning. Quite early on in the afternoon
                        George gave up all hope of reaching Mbulu that day and planned to spend the night in
                        a little bush rest camp at Karatu. However at one point it looked as though we would not
                        even reach this resthouse for late afternoon found us properly bogged down in a mess
                        of mud at the bottom of a long and very steep hill. In spite of frantic efforts on the part of
                        George and the two boys, all now very wet and muddy, the heavy car remained stuck.
                        Suddenly five Masai men appeared through the bushes beside the road. They
                        were all tall and angular and rather terrifying looking to me. Each wore only a blanket
                        knotted over one shoulder and all were armed with spears. They lined up by the side of
                        the road and just looked – not hostile but simply aloof and supercilious. George greeted
                        them and said in Ki-Swahili, “Help to push and I will reward you.” But they said nothing,
                        just drawing back imperceptibly to register disgust at the mere idea of manual labour.
                        Their expressions said quite clearly “A Masai is a warrior and does not soil his hands.”
                        George then did something which startled them I think, as much as me. He
                        plucked their spears from their hands one by one and flung them into the back of the
                        boxbody. “Now push!” he said, “And when we are safely out of the mud you shall have
                        your spears back.” To my utter astonishment the Masai seemed to applaud George’s
                        action. I think they admire courage in a man more than anything else. They pushed with a
                        will and soon we were roaring up the long steep slope. “I can’t stop here” quoth George
                        as up and up we went. The Masai were in mad pursuit with their blankets streaming
                        behind. They took a very steep path which was a shortcut to the top. They are certainly
                        amazing athletes and reached the top at the same time as the car. Their route of course
                        was shorter but much more steep, yet they came up without any sign of fatigue to claim
                        their spears and the money which George handed out with a friendly grin. The Masai
                        took the whole episode in good heart and we parted on the most friendly terms.

                        After a rather chilly night in the three walled shack, we started on the last lap of our
                        journey yesterday morning in bright weather and made the trip to Mbulu without incident.

                        Eleanor.

                        Mbulu 24th March, 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Mbulu is an attractive station but living in this rather romantic looking fort has many
                        disadvantages. Our quarters make up one side of the fort which is built up around a
                        hollow square. The buildings are single storied but very tall in the German manner and
                        there is a tower on one corner from which the Union Jack flies. The tower room is our
                        sitting room, and one has very fine views from the windows of the rolling country side.
                        However to reach this room one has to climb a steep flight of cement steps from the
                        court yard. Another disadvantage of this tower room is that there is a swarm of bees in
                        the roof and the stray ones drift down through holes in the ceiling and buzz angrily
                        against the window panes or fly around in a most menacing manner.

                        Ours are the only private quarters in the Fort. Two other sides of the Fort are
                        used as offices, storerooms and court room and the fourth side is simply a thick wall with
                        battlements and loopholes and a huge iron shod double door of enormous thickness
                        which is always barred at sunset when the flag is hauled down. Two Police Askari always
                        remain in the Fort on guard at night. The effect from outside the whitewashed fort is very
                        romantic but inside it is hardly homely and how I miss my garden at Mchewe and the
                        grass and trees.

                        We have no privacy downstairs because our windows overlook the bare
                        courtyard which is filled with Africans patiently waiting to be admitted to the courtroom as
                        witnesses or spectators. The outside windows which overlook the valley are heavily
                        barred. I can only think that the Germans who built this fort must have been very scared
                        of the local natives.

                        Our rooms are hardly cosy and are furnished with typical heavy German pieces.
                        We have a vast bleak bedroom, a dining room and an enormous gloomy kitchen in
                        which meals for the German garrison were cooked. At night this kitchen is alive with
                        gigantic rats but fortunately they do not seem to care for the other rooms. To crown
                        everything owls hoot and screech at night on the roof.

                        On our first day here I wandered outside the fort walls with Kate and came upon a
                        neatly fenced plot enclosing the graves of about fifteen South African soldiers killed by
                        the Germans in the 1914-18 war. I understand that at least one of theses soldiers died in
                        the courtyard here. The story goes, that during the period in the Great War when this fort
                        was occupied by a troop of South African Horse, a German named Siedtendorf
                        appeared at the great barred door at night and asked to speak to the officer in command
                        of the Troop. The officer complied with this request and the small shutter in the door was
                        opened so that he could speak with the German. The German, however, had not come
                        to speak. When he saw the exposed face of the officer, he fired, killing him, and
                        escaped into the dark night. I had this tale on good authority but cannot vouch for it. I do
                        know though, that there are two bullet holes in the door beside the shutter. An unhappy
                        story to think about when George is away, as he is now, and the moonlight throws queer
                        shadows in the court yard and the owls hoot.

                        However though I find our quarters depressing, I like Mbulu itself very much. It is
                        rolling country, treeless except for the plantations of the Forestry Dept. The land is very
                        fertile in the watered valleys but the grass on hills and plains is cropped to the roots by
                        the far too numerous cattle and goats. There are very few Europeans on the station, only
                        Mr Duncan, the District Officer, whose wife and children recently left for England, the
                        Assistant District Officer and his wife, a bachelor Veterinary Officer, a Road Foreman and
                        ourselves, and down in the village a German with an American wife and an elderly
                        Irishman whom I have not met. The Government officials have a communal vegetable
                        garden in the valley below the fort which keeps us well supplied with green stuff. 

                        Most afternoons George, Kate and I go for walks after tea. On Fridays there is a
                        little ceremony here outside the fort. In the late afternoon a little procession of small
                        native schoolboys, headed by a drum and penny whistle band come marching up the
                        road to a tune which sounds like ‘Two lovely black eyes”. They form up below our tower
                        and as the flag is lowered for the day they play ‘God save the King’, and then march off
                        again. It is quite a cheerful little ceremony.

                        The local Africans are a skinny lot and, I should say, a poor tribe. They protect
                        themselves against the cold by wrapping themselves in cotton blankets or a strip of
                        unbleached sheeting. This they drape over their heads, almost covering their faces and
                        the rest is wrapped closely round their bodies in the manner of a shroud. A most
                        depressing fashion. They live in very primitive comfortless houses. They simply make a
                        hollow in the hillside and build a front wall of wattle and daub. Into this rude shelter at night
                        go cattle and goats, men, women, and children.

                        Mbulu village has the usual mud brick and wattle dukas and wattle and daub
                        houses. The chief trader is a Goan who keeps a surprisingly good variety of tinned
                        foodstuffs and also sells hardware and soft goods.

                        The Europeans here have been friendly but as you will have noted there are
                        only two other women on station and no children at all to be companions for Kate.

                        Eleanor.

                        Mbulu 20th June 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Here we are on Safari with George at Babati where we are occupying a rest
                        house on the slopes of Ufiome Mountain. The slopes are a Forest Reserve and
                        George is supervising the clearing of firebreaks in preparation for the dry weather. He
                        goes off after a very early breakfast and returns home in the late afternoon so Kate and I
                        have long lazy days.

                        Babati is a pleasant spot and the resthouse is quite comfortable. It is about a mile
                        from the village which is just the usual collection of small mud brick and corrugated iron
                        Indian Dukas. There are a few settlers in the area growing coffee, or going in for mixed
                        farming but I don’t think they are doing very well. The farm adjoining the rest house is
                        owned by Lord Lovelace but is run by a manager.

                        George says he gets enough exercise clambering about all day on the mountain,
                        so Kate and I do our walking in the mornings when George is busy, and we all relax in
                        the evenings when George returns from his field work. Kate’s favourite walk is to the big
                        block of mtama (sorghum) shambas lower down the hill. There are huge swarms of tiny
                        grain eating birds around waiting the chance to plunder the mtama, so the crops are
                        watched from sunrise to sunset.

                        Crude observation platforms have been erected for this purpose in the centre of
                        each field and the women and the young boys of the family concerned, take it in turn to
                        occupy the platform and scare the birds. Each watcher has a sling and uses clods of
                        earth for ammunition. The clod is placed in the centre of the sling which is then whirled
                        around at arms length. Suddenly one end of the sling is released and the clod of earth
                        flies out and shatters against the mtama stalks. The sling makes a loud whip like crack and
                        the noise is quite startling and very effective in keeping the birds at a safe distance.

                        Eleanor.

                        Karatu 3rd July 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Still on safari you see! We left Babati ten days ago and passed through Mbulu
                        on our way to this spot. We slept out of doors one night beside Lake Tiawa about eight
                        miles from Mbulu. It was a peaceful spot and we enjoyed watching the reflection of the
                        sunset on the lake and the waterhens and duck and pelicans settling down for the night.
                        However it turned piercingly cold after sunset so we had an early supper and then all
                        three of us lay down to sleep in the back of the boxbody (station wagon). It was a tight
                        fit and a real case of ‘When Dad turns, we all turn.’

                        Here at Karatu we are living in a grass hut with only three walls. It is rather sweet
                        and looks like the setting for a Nativity Play. Kate and I share the only camp bed and
                        George and the dogs sleep on the floor. The air here is very fresh and exhilarating and
                        we all feel very fit. George is occupied all day supervising the cutting of firebreaks
                        around existing plantations and the forest reserve of indigenous trees. Our camp is on
                        the hillside and below us lie the fertile wheat lands of European farmers.

                        They are mostly Afrikaners, the descendants of the Boer families who were
                        invited by the Germans to settle here after the Boer War. Most of them are pro-British
                        now and a few have called in here to chat to George about big game hunting. George
                        gets on extremely well with them and recently attended a wedding where he had a
                        lively time dancing at the reception. He likes the older people best as most are great
                        individualists. One fine old man, surnamed von Rooyen, visited our camp. He is a Boer
                        of the General Smuts type with spare figure and bearded face. George tells me he is a
                        real patriarch with an enormous family – mainly sons. This old farmer fought against the
                        British throughout the Boer War under General Smuts and again against the British in the
                        German East Africa campaign when he was a scout and right hand man to Von Lettow. It
                        is said that Von Lettow was able to stay in the field until the end of the Great War
                        because he listened to the advise given to him by von Rooyen. However his dislike for
                        the British does not extend to George as they have a mutual interest in big game
                        hunting.

                        Kate loves being on safari. She is now so accustomed to having me as her nurse
                        and constant companion that I do not know how she will react to paid help. I shall have to
                        get someone to look after her during my confinement in the little German Red Cross
                        hospital at Oldeani.

                        George has obtained permission from the District Commissioner, for Kate and
                        me to occupy the Government Rest House at Oldeani from the end of July until the end
                        of August when my baby is due. He will have to carry on with his field work but will join
                        us at weekends whenever possible.

                        Eleanor.

                        Karatu 12th July 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Not long now before we leave this camp. We have greatly enjoyed our stay
                        here in spite of the very chilly earl mornings and the nights when we sit around in heavy
                        overcoats until our early bed time.

                        Last Sunday I persuaded George to take Kate and me to the famous Ngoro-
                        Ngoro Crater. He was not very keen to do so because the road is very bumpy for
                        anyone in my interesting condition but I feel so fit that I was most anxious to take this
                        opportunity of seeing the enormous crater. We may never be in this vicinity again and in
                        any case safari will not be so simple with a small baby.

                        What a wonderful trip it was! The road winds up a steep escarpment from which
                        one gets a glorious birds eye view of the plains of the Great Rift Valley far, far below.
                        The crater is immense. There is a road which skirts the rim in places and one has quite
                        startling views of the floor of the crater about two thousand feet below.

                        A camp for tourists has just been built in a clearing in the virgin forest. It is most
                        picturesque as the camp buildings are very neatly constructed log cabins with very high
                        pitched thatched roofs. We spent about an hour sitting on the grass near the edge of the
                        crater enjoying the sunshine and the sharp air and really awe inspiring view. Far below us
                        in the middle of the crater was a small lake and we could see large herds of game
                        animals grazing there but they were too far away to be impressive, even seen through
                        George’s field glasses. Most appeared to be wildebeest and zebra but I also picked
                        out buffalo. Much more exciting was my first close view of a wild elephant. George
                        pointed him out to me as we approached the rest camp on the inward journey. He
                        stood quietly under a tree near the road and did not seem to be disturbed by the car
                        though he rolled a wary eye in our direction. On our return journey we saw him again at
                        almost uncomfortably close quarters. We rounded a sharp corner and there stood the
                        elephant, facing us and slap in the middle of the road. He was busily engaged giving
                        himself a dust bath but spared time to give us an irritable look. Fortunately we were on a
                        slight slope so George quickly switched off the engine and backed the car quietly round
                        the corner. He got out of the car and loaded his rifle, just in case! But after he had finished
                        his toilet the elephant moved off the road and we took our chance and passed without
                        incident.

                        One notices the steepness of the Ngoro-Ngoro road more on the downward
                        journey than on the way up. The road is cut into the side of the mountain so that one has
                        a steep slope on one hand and a sheer drop on the other. George told me that a lorry
                        coming down the mountain was once charged from behind by a rhino. On feeling and
                        hearing the bash from behind the panic stricken driver drove off down the mountain as
                        fast as he dared and never paused until he reached level ground at the bottom of the
                        mountain. There was no sign of the rhino so the driver got out to examine his lorry and
                        found the rhino horn embedded in the wooden tail end of the lorry. The horn had been
                        wrenched right off!

                        Happily no excitement of that kind happened to us. I have yet to see a rhino.

                        Eleanor.

                        Oldeani. 19th July 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Greetings from a lady in waiting! Kate and I have settled down comfortably in the
                        new, solidly built Government Rest House which comprises one large living room and
                        one large office with a connecting door. Outside there is a kitchen and a boys quarter.
                        There are no resident Government officials here at Oldeani so the office is in use only
                        when the District Officer from Mbulu makes his monthly visit. However a large Union
                        Jack flies from a flagpole in the front of the building as a gentle reminder to the entirely
                        German population of Oldeani that Tanganyika is now under British rule.

                        There is quite a large community of German settlers here, most of whom are
                        engaged in coffee farming. George has visited several of the farms in connection with his
                        forestry work and says the coffee plantations look very promising indeed. There are also
                        a few German traders in the village and there is a large boarding school for German
                        children and also a very pleasant little hospital where I have arranged to have the baby.
                        Right next door to the Rest House is a General Dealers Store run by a couple named
                        Schnabbe. The shop is stocked with drapery, hardware, china and foodstuffs all
                        imported from Germany and of very good quality. The Schnabbes also sell local farm
                        produce, beautiful fresh vegetables, eggs and pure rich milk and farm butter. Our meat
                        comes from a German butchery and it is a great treat to get clean, well cut meat. The
                        sausages also are marvellous and in great variety.

                        The butcher is an entertaining character. When he called round looking for custom I
                        expected him to break out in a yodel any minute, as it was obvious from a glance that
                        the Alps are his natural background. From under a green Tyrollean hat with feather,
                        blooms a round beefy face with sparkling small eyes and such widely spaced teeth that
                        one inevitably thinks of a garden rake. Enormous beefy thighs bulge from greasy
                        lederhosen which are supported by the traditional embroidered braces. So far the
                        butcher is the only cheery German, male or female, whom I have seen, and I have met
                        most of the locals at the Schnabbe’s shop. Most of the men seem to have cultivated
                        the grim Hitler look. They are all fanatical Nazis and one is usually greeted by a raised
                        hand and Heil Hitler! All very theatrical. I always feel like crying in ringing tones ‘God
                        Save the King’ or even ‘St George for England’. However the men are all very correct
                        and courteous and the women friendly. The women all admire Kate and cry, “Ag, das
                        kleine Englander.” She really is a picture with her rosy cheeks and huge grey eyes and
                        golden curls. Kate is having a wonderful time playing with Manfried, the Scnabbe’s small
                        son. Neither understands a word said by the other but that doesn’t seem to worry them.

                        Before he left on safari, George took me to hospital for an examination by the
                        nurse, Sister Marianne. She has not been long in the country and knows very little
                        English but is determined to learn and carried on an animated, if rather quaint,
                        conversation with frequent references to a pocket dictionary. She says I am not to worry
                        because there is not doctor here. She is a very experienced midwife and anyway in an
                        emergency could call on the old retired Veterinary Surgeon for assistance.
                        I asked sister Marianne whether she knew of any German woman or girl who
                        would look after Kate whilst I am in hospital and today a very top drawer German,
                        bearing a strong likeness to ‘Little Willie’, called and offered the services of his niece who
                        is here on a visit from Germany. I was rather taken aback and said, “Oh no Baron, your
                        niece would not be the type I had in mind. I’m afraid I cannot pay much for a companion.”
                        However the Baron was not to be discouraged. He told me that his niece is seventeen
                        but looks twenty, that she is well educated and will make a cheerful companion. Her
                        father wishes her to learn to speak English fluently and that is why the Baron wished her
                        to come to me as a house daughter. As to pay, a couple of pounds a month for pocket
                        money and her keep was all he had in mind. So with some misgivings I agreed to take
                        the niece on as a companion as from 1st August.

                        Eleanor.

                        Oldeani. 10th August 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Never a dull moment since my young companion arrived. She is a striking looking
                        girl with a tall boyish figure and very short and very fine dark hair which she wears
                        severely slicked back. She wears tweeds, no make up but has shiny rosy cheeks and
                        perfect teeth – she also,inevitably, has a man friend and I have an uncomfortable
                        suspicion that it is because of him that she was planted upon me. Upon second
                        thoughts though, maybe it was because of her excessive vitality, or even because of
                        her healthy appetite! The Baroness, I hear is in poor health and I can imagine that such
                        abundant health and spirit must have been quite overpowering. The name is Ingeborg,
                        but she is called Mouche, which I believe means Mouse. Someone in her family must
                        have a sense of humour.

                        Her English only needed practice and she now chatters fluently so that I know her
                        background and views on life. Mouche’s father is a personal friend of Goering. He was
                        once a big noise in the German Airforce but is now connected with the car industry and
                        travels frequently and intensively in Europe and America on business. Mouche showed
                        me some snap shots of her family and I must say they look prosperous and charming.
                        Mouche tells me that her father wants her to learn to speak English fluently so that
                        she can get a job with some British diplomat in Cairo. I had immediate thought that I
                        might be nursing a future Mata Hari in my bosom, but this was immediately extinguished
                        when Mouche remarked that her father would like her to marry an Englishman. However
                        it seems that the mere idea revolts her. “Englishmen are degenerates who swill whisky
                        all day.” I pointed out that she had met George, who was a true blue Englishman, but
                        was nevertheless a fine physical specimen and certainly didn’t drink all day. Mouche
                        replied that George is not an Englishman but a hunter, as though that set him apart.
                        Mouche is an ardent Hitler fan and an enthusiastic member of the Hitler Youth
                        Movement. The house resounds with Hitler youth songs and when she is not singing,
                        her gramophone is playing very stirring marching songs. I cannot understand a word,
                        which is perhaps as well. Every day she does the most strenuous exercises watched
                        with envy by me as my proportions are now those of a circus Big Top. Mouche eats a
                        fantastic amount of meat and I feel it is a blessing that she is much admired by our
                        Tyrollean butcher who now delivers our meat in person and adds as a token of his
                        admiration some extra sausages for Mouche.

                        I must confess I find her stimulating company as George is on safari most of the
                        time and my evenings otherwise would be lonely. I am a little worried though about
                        leaving Kate here with Mouche when I go to hospital. The dogs and Kate have not taken
                        to her. I am trying to prepare Kate for the separation but she says, “She’s not my
                        mummy. You are my dear mummy, and I want you, I want you.” George has got
                        permission from the Provincial Forestry Officer to spend the last week of August here at
                        the Rest House with me and I only hope that the baby will be born during that time.
                        Kate adores her dad and will be perfectly happy to remain here with him.

                        One final paragraph about Mouche. I thought all German girls were domesticated
                        but not Mouche. I have Kesho-Kutwa here with me as cook and I have engaged a local
                        boy to do the laundry. I however expected Mouche would take over making the
                        puddings and pastry but she informed me that she can only bake a chocolate cake and
                        absolutely nothing else. She said brightly however that she would do the mending. As
                        there is none for her to do, she has rescued a large worn handkerchief of George’s and
                        sits with her feet up listening to stirring gramophone records whilst she mends the
                        handkerchief with exquisite darning.

                        Eleanor.

                        Oldeani. 20th August 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        Just after I had posted my last letter I received what George calls a demi official
                        letter from the District Officer informing me that I would have to move out of the Rest
                        House for a few days as the Governor and his hangers on would be visiting Oldeani
                        and would require the Rest House. Fortunately George happened to be here for a few
                        hours and he arranged for Kate and Mouche and me to spend a few days at the
                        German School as borders. So here I am at the school having a pleasant and restful
                        time and much entertained by all the goings on.

                        The school buildings were built with funds from Germany and the school is run on
                        the lines of a contemporary German school. I think the school gets a grant from the
                        Tanganyika Government towards running expenses, but I am not sure. The school hall is
                        dominated by a more than life sized oil painting of Adolf Hitler which, at present, is
                        flanked on one side by the German Flag and on the other by the Union Jack. I cannot
                        help feeling that the latter was put up today for the Governor’s visit today.
                        The teachers are very amiable. We all meet at mealtimes, and though few of the
                        teachers speak English, the ones who do are anxious to chatter. The headmaster is a
                        scholarly man but obviously anti-British. He says he cannot understand why so many
                        South Africans are loyal to Britain – or rather to England. “They conquered your country
                        didn’t they?” I said that that had never occurred to me and that anyway I was mainly of
                        Scots descent and that loyalty to the crown was natural to me. “But the English
                        conquered the Scots and yet you are loyal to England. That I cannot understand.” “Well I
                        love England,” said I firmly, ”and so do all British South Africans.” Since then we have
                        stuck to English literature. Shakespeare, Lord Byron and Galsworthy seem to be the
                        favourites and all, thank goodness, make safe topics for conversation.
                        Mouche is in her element but Kate and I do not enjoy the food which is typically
                        German and consists largely of masses of fat pork and sauerkraut and unfamiliar soups. I
                        feel sure that the soup at lunch today had blobs of lemon curd in it! I also find most
                        disconcerting the way that everyone looks at me and says, “Bon appetite”, with much
                        smiling and nodding so I have to fight down my nausea and make a show of enjoying
                        the meals.

                        The teacher whose room adjoins mine is a pleasant woman and I take my
                        afternoon tea with her. She, like all the teachers, has a large framed photo of Hitler on her
                        wall flanked by bracket vases of fresh flowers. One simply can’t get away from the man!
                        Even in the dormitories each child has a picture of Hitler above the bed. Hitler accepting
                        flowers from a small girl, or patting a small boy on the head. Even the children use the
                        greeting ‘Heil Hitler’. These German children seem unnaturally prim when compared with
                        my cheerful ex-pupils in South Africa but some of them are certainly very lovely to look
                        at.

                        Tomorrow Mouche, Kate and I return to our quarters in the Rest House and in a
                        few days George will join us for a week.

                        Eleanor.

                        Oldeani Hospital. 9th September 1938

                        Dearest Family,

                        You will all be delighted to hear that we have a second son, whom we have
                        named John. He is a darling, so quaint and good. He looks just like a little old man with a
                        high bald forehead fringed around the edges with a light brown fluff. George and I call
                        him Johnny Jo because he has a tiny round mouth and a rather big nose and reminds us
                        of A.A.Milne’s ‘Jonathan Jo has a mouth like an O’ , but Kate calls him, ‘My brother John’.
                        George was not here when he was born on September 5th, just two minutes
                        before midnight. He left on safari on the morning of the 4th and, of course, that very night
                        the labour pains started. Fortunately Kate was in bed asleep so Mouche walked with
                        me up the hill to the hospital where I was cheerfully received by Sister Marianne who
                        had everything ready for the confinement. I was lucky to have such an experienced
                        midwife because this was a breech birth and sister had to manage single handed. As
                        there was no doctor present I was not allowed even a sniff of anaesthetic. Sister slaved
                        away by the light of a pressure lamp endeavouring to turn the baby having first shoved
                        an inverted baby bath under my hips to raise them.

                        What a performance! Sister Marianne was very much afraid that she might not be
                        able to save the baby and great was our relief when at last she managed to haul him out
                        by the feet. One slap and the baby began to cry without any further attention so Sister
                        wrapped him up in a blanket and took Johnny to her room for the night. I got very little
                        sleep but was so thankful to have the ordeal over that I did not mind even though I
                        heard a hyaena cackling and calling under my window in a most evil way.
                        When Sister brought Johnny to me in the early morning I stared in astonishment.
                        Instead of dressing him in one of his soft Viyella nighties, she had dressed him in a short
                        sleeved vest of knitted cotton with a cotton cloth swayed around his waist sarong
                        fashion. When I protested, “But Sister why is the baby not dressed in his own clothes?”
                        She answered firmly, “I find it is not allowed. A baby’s clotheses must be boiled and I
                        cannot boil clotheses of wool therefore your baby must wear the clotheses of the Red
                        Cross.”

                        It was the same with the bedding. Poor Johnny lies all day in a deep wicker
                        basket with a detachable calico lining. There is no pillow under his head but a vast kind of
                        calico covered pillow is his only covering. There is nothing at all cosy and soft round my
                        poor baby. I said crossly to the Sister, “As every thing must be so sterile, I wonder you
                        don’t boil me too.” This she ignored.

                        When my message reached George he dashed back to visit us. Sister took him
                        first to see the baby and George was astonished to see the baby basket covered by a
                        sheet. “She has the poor little kid covered up like a bloody parrot,” he told me. So I
                        asked him to go at once to buy a square of mosquito netting to replace the sheet.
                        Kate is quite a problem. She behaves like an Angel when she is here in my
                        room but is rebellious when Sister shoos her out. She says she “Hates the Nanny”
                        which is what she calls Mouche. Unfortunately it seems that she woke before midnight
                        on the night Johnny Jo was born to find me gone and Mouche in my bed. According to
                        Mouche, Kate wept all night and certainly when she visited me in the early morning
                        Kate’s face was puffy with crying and she clung to me crying “Oh my dear mummy, why
                        did you go away?” over and over again. Sister Marianne was touched and suggested
                        that Mouche and Kate should come to the hospital as boarders as I am the only patient
                        at present and there is plenty of room. Luckily Kate does not seem at all jealous of the
                        baby and it is a great relief to have here here under my eye.

                        Eleanor.

                        #6263
                        TracyTracy
                        Participant

                          From Tanganyika with Love

                          continued  ~ part 4

                          With thanks to Mike Rushby.

                          Mchewe Estate. 31st January 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Life is very quiet just now. Our neighbours have left and I miss them all especially
                          Joni who was always a great bearer of news. We also grew fond of his Swedish
                          brother-in-law Max, whose loud ‘Hodi’ always brought a glad ‘Karibu’ from us. His wife,
                          Marion, I saw less often. She is not strong and seldom went visiting but has always
                          been friendly and kind and ready to share her books with me.

                          Ann’s birthday is looming ahead and I am getting dreadfully anxious that her
                          parcels do not arrive in time. I am delighted that you were able to get a good head for
                          her doll, dad, but horrified to hear that it was so expensive. You would love your
                          ‘Charming Ann’. She is a most responsible little soul and seems to have outgrown her
                          mischievous ways. A pity in a way, I don’t want her to grow too serious. You should see
                          how thoroughly Ann baths and towels herself. She is anxious to do Georgie and Kate
                          as well.

                          I did not mean to teach Ann to write until after her fifth birthday but she has taught
                          herself by copying the large print in newspaper headlines. She would draw a letter and
                          ask me the name and now I find that at four Ann knows the whole alphabet. The front
                          cement steps is her favourite writing spot. She uses bits of white clay we use here for
                          whitewashing.

                          Coffee prices are still very low and a lot of planters here and at Mbosi are in a
                          mess as they can no longer raise mortgages on their farms or get advances from the
                          Bank against their crops. We hear many are leaving their farms to try their luck on the
                          Diggings.

                          George is getting fed up too. The snails are back on the shamba and doing
                          frightful damage. Talk of the plagues of Egypt! Once more they are being collected in
                          piles and bashed into pulp. The stench on the shamba is frightful! The greybeards in the
                          village tell George that the local Chief has put a curse on the farm because he is angry
                          that the Government granted George a small extension to the farm two years ago! As
                          the Chief was consulted at the time and was agreeable this talk of a curse is nonsense
                          but goes to show how the uneducated African put all disasters down to witchcraft.

                          With much love,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe Estate. 9th February 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Ann’s birthday yesterday was not quite the gay occasion we had hoped. The
                          seventh was mail day so we sent a runner for the mail, hoping against hope that your
                          parcel containing the dolls head had arrived. The runner left for Mbeya at dawn but, as it
                          was a very wet day, he did not return with the mail bag until after dark by which time Ann
                          was fast asleep. My heart sank when I saw the parcel which contained the dolls new
                          head. It was squashed quite flat. I shed a few tears over that shattered head, broken
                          quite beyond repair, and George felt as bad about it as I did. The other parcel arrived in
                          good shape and Ann loves her little sewing set, especially the thimble, and the nursery
                          rhymes are a great success.

                          Ann woke early yesterday and began to open her parcels. She said “But
                          Mummy, didn’t Barbara’s new head come?” So I had to show her the fragments.
                          Instead of shedding the flood of tears I expected, Ann just lifted the glass eyes in her
                          hand and said in a tight little voice “Oh poor Barbara.” George saved the situation. as
                          usual, by saying in a normal voice,”Come on Ann, get up and lets play your new
                          records.” So we had music and sweets before breakfast. Later I removed Barbara’s
                          faded old blond wig and gummed on the glossy new brown one and Ann seems quite
                          satisfied.

                          Last night, after the children were tucked up in bed, we discussed our financial
                          situation. The coffee trees that have survived the plagues of borer beetle, mealie bugs
                          and snails look strong and fine, but George says it will be years before we make a living
                          out of the farm. He says he will simply have to make some money and he is leaving for
                          the Lupa on Saturday to have a look around on the Diggings. If he does decide to peg
                          a claim and work it he will put up a wattle and daub hut and the children and I will join him
                          there. But until such time as he strikes gold I shall have to remain here on the farm and
                          ‘Keep the Home Fires Burning’.

                          Now don’t go and waste pity on me. Women all over the country are having to
                          stay at home whilst their husbands search for a livelihood. I am better off than most
                          because I have a comfortable little home and loyal servants and we still have enough
                          capitol to keep the wolf from the door. Anyway this is the rainy season and hardly the
                          best time to drag three small children around the sodden countryside on prospecting
                          safaris.

                          So I’ll stay here at home and hold thumbs that George makes a lucky strike.

                          Heaps of love to all,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe Estate. 27th February 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Well, George has gone but here we are quite safe and cosy. Kate is asleep and
                          Ann and Georgie are sprawled on the couch taking it in turns to enumerate the things
                          God has made. Every now and again Ann bothers me with an awkward question. “Did
                          God make spiders? Well what for? Did he make weeds? Isn’t He silly, mummy? She is
                          becoming a very practical person. She sews surprisingly well for a four year old and has
                          twice made cakes in the past week, very sweet and liberally coloured with cochineal and
                          much appreciated by Georgie.

                          I have been without George for a fortnight and have adapted myself to my new
                          life. The children are great company during the day and I have arranged my evenings so
                          that they do not seem long. I am determined that when George comes home he will find
                          a transformed wife. I read an article entitled ‘Are you the girl he married?’ in a magazine
                          last week and took a good look in the mirror and decided that I certainly was not! Hair dry,
                          skin dry, and I fear, a faint shadow on the upper lip. So now I have blown the whole of
                          your Christmas Money Order on an order to a chemist in Dar es Salaam for hair tonic,
                          face cream and hair remover and am anxiously awaiting the parcel.

                          In the meantime, after tucking the children into bed at night, I skip on the verandah
                          and do the series of exercises recommended in the magazine article. After this exertion I
                          have a leisurely bath followed by a light supper and then read or write letters to pass
                          the time until Kate’s ten o’clock feed. I have arranged for Janey to sleep in the house.
                          She comes in at 9.30 pm and makes up her bed on the living room floor by the fire.

                          The days are by no means uneventful. The day before yesterday the biggest
                          troop of monkeys I have ever seen came fooling around in the trees and on the grass
                          only a few yards from the house. These monkeys were the common grey monkeys
                          with black faces. They came in all sizes and were most entertaining to watch. Ann and
                          Georgie had a great time copying their antics and pulling faces at the monkeys through
                          the bedroom windows which I hastily closed.

                          Thomas, our headman, came running up and told me that this troop of monkeys
                          had just raided his maize shamba and asked me to shoot some of them. I would not of
                          course do this. I still cannot bear to kill any animal, but I fired a couple of shots in the air
                          and the monkeys just melted away. It was fantastic, one moment they were there and
                          the next they were not. Ann and Georgie thought I had been very unkind to frighten the
                          poor monkeys but honestly, when I saw what they had done to my flower garden, I
                          almost wished I had hardened my heart and shot one or two.

                          The children are all well but Ann gave me a nasty fright last week. I left Ann and
                          Georgie at breakfast whilst I fed Fanny, our bull terrier on the back verandah. Suddenly I
                          heard a crash and rushed inside to find Ann’s chair lying on its back and Ann beside it on
                          the floor perfectly still and with a paper white face. I shouted for Janey to bring water and
                          laid Ann flat on the couch and bathed her head and hands. Soon she sat up with a wan
                          smile and said “I nearly knocked my head off that time, didn’t I.” She must have been
                          standing on the chair and leaning against the back. Our brick floors are so terribly hard that
                          she might have been seriously hurt.

                          However she was none the worse for the fall, but Heavens, what an anxiety kids
                          are.

                          Lots of love,
                          Eleanor

                          Mchewe Estate. 12th March 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          It was marvellous of you to send another money order to replace the one I spent
                          on cosmetics. With this one I intend to order boots for both children as a protection from
                          snake bite, though from my experience this past week the threat seems to be to the
                          head rather than the feet. I was sitting on the couch giving Kate her morning milk from a
                          cup when a long thin snake fell through the reed ceiling and landed with a thud just behind
                          the couch. I shouted “Nyoka, Nyoka!” (Snake,Snake!) and the houseboy rushed in with
                          a stick and killed the snake. I then held the cup to Kate’s mouth again but I suppose in
                          my agitation I tipped it too much because the baby choked badly. She gasped for
                          breath. I quickly gave her a sharp smack on the back and a stream of milk gushed
                          through her mouth and nostrils and over me. Janey took Kate from me and carried her
                          out into the fresh air on the verandah and as I anxiously followed her through the door,
                          another long snake fell from the top of the wall just missing me by an inch or so. Luckily
                          the houseboy still had the stick handy and dispatched this snake also.

                          The snakes were a pair of ‘boomslangs’, not nice at all, and all day long I have
                          had shamba boys coming along to touch hands and say “Poli Memsahib” – “Sorry
                          madam”, meaning of course ‘Sorry you had a fright.’

                          Apart from that one hectic morning this has been a quiet week. Before George
                          left for the Lupa he paid off most of the farm hands as we can now only afford a few
                          labourers for the essential work such as keeping the weeds down in the coffee shamba.
                          There is now no one to keep the grass on the farm roads cut so we cannot use the pram
                          when we go on our afternoon walks. Instead Janey carries Kate in a sling on her back.
                          Janey is a very clean slim woman, and her clothes are always spotless, so Kate keeps
                          cool and comfortable. Ann and Georgie always wear thick overalls on our walks as a
                          protection against thorns and possible snakes. We usually make our way to the
                          Mchewe River where Ann and Georgie paddle in the clear cold water and collect shiny
                          stones.

                          The cosmetics parcel duly arrived by post from Dar es Salaam so now I fill the
                          evenings between supper and bed time attending to my face! The much advertised
                          cream is pink and thick and feels revolting. I smooth it on before bedtime and keep it on
                          all night. Just imagine if George could see me! The advertisements promise me a skin
                          like a rose in six weeks. What a surprise there is in store for George!

                          You will have been wondering what has happened to George. Well on the Lupa
                          he heard rumours of a new gold strike somewhere in the Sumbawanga District. A couple
                          of hundred miles from here I think, though I am not sure where it is and have no one to
                          ask. You look it up on the map and tell me. John Molteno is also interested in this and
                          anxious to have it confirmed so he and George have come to an agreement. John
                          Molteno provided the porters for the journey together with prospecting tools and
                          supplies but as he cannot leave his claims, or his gold buying business, George is to go
                          on foot to the area of the rumoured gold strike and, if the strike looks promising will peg
                          claims in both their names.

                          The rainy season is now at its height and the whole countryside is under water. All
                          roads leading to the area are closed to traffic and, as there are few Europeans who
                          would attempt the journey on foot, George proposes to get a head start on them by
                          making this uncomfortable safari. I have just had my first letter from George since he left
                          on this prospecting trip. It took ages to reach me because it was sent by runner to
                          Abercorn in Northern Rhodesia, then on by lorry to Mpika where it was put on a plane
                          for Mbeya. George writes the most charming letters which console me a little upon our
                          all too frequent separations.

                          His letter was cheerful and optimistic, though reading between the lines I should
                          say he had a grim time. He has reached Sumbawanga after ‘a hell of a trip’, to find that
                          the rumoured strike was at Mpanda and he had a few more days of foot safari ahead.
                          He had found the trip from the Lupa even wetter than he had expected. The party had
                          three days of wading through swamps sometimes waist deep in water. Of his sixteen
                          porters, four deserted an the second day out and five others have had malaria and so
                          been unable to carry their loads. He himself is ‘thin but very fit’, and he sounds full of
                          beans and writes gaily of the marvellous holiday we will have if he has any decent luck! I
                          simply must get that mink and diamonds complexion.

                          The frustrating thing is that I cannot write back as I have no idea where George is
                          now.

                          With heaps of love,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe Estate. 24th March 1936

                          Dearest Family,
                          How kind you are. Another parcel from home. Although we are very short
                          of labourers I sent a special runner to fetch it as Ann simply couldn’t bear the suspense
                          of waiting to see Brenda, “My new little girl with plaits.” Thank goodness Brenda is
                          unbreakable. I could not have born another tragedy. She really is an exquisite little doll
                          and has hardly been out of Ann’s arms since arrival. She showed Brenda proudly to all
                          the staff. The kitchen boy’s face was a study. His eyes fairly came out on sticks when he
                          saw the dolls eyes not only opening and shutting, but moving from side to side in that
                          incredibly lifelike way. Georgie loves his little model cars which he carries around all day
                          and puts under his pillow at night.

                          As for me, I am enchanted by my very smart new frock. Janey was so lavish with
                          her compliments when I tried the frock on, that in a burst of generosity I gave her that
                          rather tartish satin and lace trousseau nighty, and she was positively enthralled. She
                          wore it that very night when she appeared as usual to doss down by the fire.
                          By the way it was Janey’s turn to have a fright this week. She was in the
                          bathroom washing the children’s clothes in an outsize hand basin when it happened. As
                          she took Georgie’s overalls from the laundry basket a large centipede ran up her bare
                          arm. Luckily she managed to knock the centipede off into the hot water in the hand basin.
                          It was a brute, about six inches long of viciousness with a nasty sting. The locals say that
                          the bite is much worse than a scorpions so Janey had a lucky escape.

                          Kate cut her first two teeth yesterday and will, I hope, sleep better now. I don’t
                          feel that pink skin food is getting a fair trial with all those broken nights. There is certainly
                          no sign yet of ‘The skin he loves to touch”. Kate, I may say, is rosy and blooming. She
                          can pull herself upright providing she has something solid to hold on to. She is so plump
                          I have horrible visions of future bow legs so I push her down, but she always bobs up
                          again.

                          Both Ann and Georgie are mad on books. Their favourites are ‘Barbar and
                          Celeste” and, of all things, ‘Struvel Peter’ . They listen with absolute relish to the sad tale
                          of Harriet who played with matches.

                          I have kept a laugh for the end. I am hoping that it will not be long before George
                          comes home and thought it was time to take the next step towards glamour, so last
                          Wednesday after lunch I settled the children on their beds and prepared to remove the ,
                          to me, obvious down on my upper lip. (George always loyally says that he can’t see
                          any.) Well I got out the tube of stuff and carefully followed the directions. I smoothed a
                          coating on my upper lip. All this was watched with great interest by the children, including
                          the baby, who stood up in her cot for a better view. Having no watch, I had propped
                          the bedroom door open so that I could time the operation by the cuckoo clock in the
                          living room. All the children’s surprised comments fell on deaf ears. I would neither talk
                          nor smile for fear of cracking the hair remover which had set hard. The set time was up
                          and I was just about to rinse the remover off when Kate slipped, knocking her head on
                          the corner of the cot. I rushed to the rescue and precious seconds ticked off whilst I
                          pacified her.

                          So, my dears, when I rinsed my lip, not only the plaster and the hair came away
                          but the skin as well and now I really did have a Ronald Coleman moustache – a crimson
                          one. I bathed it, I creamed it, powdered it but all to no avail. Within half an hour my lip
                          had swollen until I looked like one of those Duckbilled West African women. Ann’s
                          comments, “Oh Mummy, you do look funny. Georgie, doesn’t Mummy look funny?”
                          didn’t help to soothe me and the last straw was that just then there was the sound of a car drawing up outside – the first car I had heard for months. Anyway, thank heaven, it
                          was not George, but the representative of a firm which sells agricultural machinery and
                          farm implements, looking for orders. He had come from Dar es Salaam and had not
                          heard that all the planters from this district had left their farms. Hospitality demanded that I
                          should appear and offer tea. I did not mind this man because he was a complete
                          stranger and fat, middle aged and comfortable. So I gave him tea, though I didn’t
                          attempt to drink any myself, and told him the whole sad tale.

                          Fortunately much of the swelling had gone next day and only a brown dryness
                          remained. I find myself actually hoping that George is delayed a bit longer. Of one thing
                          I am sure. If ever I grow a moustache again, it stays!

                          Heaps of love from a sadder but wiser,
                          Eleanor

                          Mchewe Estate. 3rd April 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Sound the trumpets, beat the drums. George is home again. The safari, I am sad
                          to say, was a complete washout in more ways than one. Anyway it was lovely to be
                          together again and we don’t yet talk about the future. The home coming was not at all as
                          I had planned it. I expected George to return in our old A.C. car which gives ample
                          warning of its arrival. I had meant to wear my new frock and make myself as glamourous
                          as possible, with our beautiful babe on one arm and our other jewels by my side.
                          This however is what actually happened. Last Saturday morning at about 2 am , I
                          thought I heard someone whispering my name. I sat up in bed, still half asleep, and
                          there was George at the window. He was thin and unshaven and the tiredest looking
                          man I have ever seen. The car had bogged down twenty miles back along the old Lupa
                          Track, but as George had had no food at all that day, he decided to walk home in the
                          bright moonlight.

                          This is where I should have served up a tasty hot meal but alas, there was only
                          the heal of a loaf and no milk because, before going to bed I had given the remaining
                          milk to the dog. However George seemed too hungry to care what he ate. He made a
                          meal off a tin of bully, a box of crustless cheese and the bread washed down with cup
                          after cup of black tea. Though George was tired we talked for hours and it was dawn
                          before we settled down to sleep.

                          During those hours of talk George described his nightmarish journey. He started
                          up the flooded Rukwa Valley and there were days of wading through swamp and mud
                          and several swollen rivers to cross. George is a strong swimmer and the porters who
                          were recruited in that area, could also swim. There remained the problem of the stores
                          and of Kianda the houseboy who cannot swim. For these they made rough pole rafts
                          which they pulled across the rivers with ropes. Kianda told me later that he hopes never
                          to make such a journey again. He swears that the raft was submerged most of the time
                          and that he was dragged through the rivers underwater! You should see the state of
                          George’s clothes which were packed in a supposedly water tight uniform trunk. The
                          whole lot are mud stained and mouldy.

                          To make matters more trying for George he was obliged to live mostly on
                          porters rations, rice and groundnut oil which he detests. As all the district roads were
                          closed the little Indian Sores in the remote villages he passed had been unable to
                          replenish their stocks of European groceries. George would have been thinner had it not
                          been for two Roman Catholic missions enroute where he had good meals and dry
                          nights. The Fathers are always wonderfully hospitable to wayfarers irrespective of
                          whether or not they are Roman Catholics. George of course is not a Catholic. One finds
                          the Roman Catholic missions right out in the ‘Blue’ and often on spots unhealthy to
                          Europeans. Most of the Fathers are German or Dutch but they all speak a little English
                          and in any case one can always fall back on Ki-Swahili.

                          George reached his destination all right but it soon became apparent that reports
                          of the richness of the strike had been greatly exaggerated. George had decided that
                          prospects were brighter on the Lupa than on the new strike so he returned to the Lupa
                          by the way he had come and, having returned the borrowed equipment decided to
                          make his way home by the shortest route, the old and now rarely used road which
                          passes by the bottom of our farm.

                          The old A.C. had been left for safe keeping at the Roman Catholic Galala
                          Mission 40 miles away, on George’s outward journey, and in this old car George, and
                          the houseboy Kianda , started for home. The road was indescribably awful. There were long stretches that were simply one big puddle, in others all the soil had been washed
                          away leaving the road like a rocky river bed. There were also patches where the tall
                          grass had sprung up head high in the middle of the road,
                          The going was slow because often the car bogged down because George had
                          no wheel chains and he and Kianda had the wearisome business of digging her out. It
                          was just growing dark when the old A.C. settled down determinedly in the mud for the
                          last time. They could not budge her and they were still twenty miles from home. George
                          decided to walk home in the moonlight to fetch help leaving Kianda in charge of the car
                          and its contents and with George’s shot gun to use if necessary in self defence. Kianda
                          was reluctant to stay but also not prepared to go for help whilst George remained with
                          the car as lions are plentiful in that area. So George set out unarmed in the moonlight.
                          Once he stopped to avoid a pride of lion coming down the road but he circled safely
                          around them and came home without any further alarms.

                          Kianda said he had a dreadful night in the car, “With lions roaming around the car
                          like cattle.” Anyway the lions did not take any notice of the car or of Kianda, and the next
                          day George walked back with all our farm boys and dug and pushed the car out of the
                          mud. He brought car and Kianda back without further trouble but the labourers on their
                          way home were treed by the lions.

                          The wet season is definitely the time to stay home.

                          Lots and lots of love,
                          Eleanor

                          Mchewe Estate. 30th April 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Young George’s third birthday passed off very well yesterday. It started early in
                          the morning when he brought his pillow slip of presents to our bed. Kate was already
                          there and Ann soon joined us. Young George liked all the presents you sent, especially
                          the trumpet. It has hardly left his lips since and he is getting quite smart about the finger
                          action.

                          We had quite a party. Ann and I decorated the table with Christmas tree tinsel
                          and hung a bunch of balloons above it. Ann also decorated young George’s chair with
                          roses and phlox from the garden. I had made and iced a fruit cake but Ann begged to
                          make a plain pink cake. She made it entirely by herself though I stood by to see that
                          she measured the ingredients correctly. When the cake was baked I mixed some soft
                          icing in a jug and she poured it carefully over the cake smoothing the gaps with her
                          fingers!

                          During the party we had the gramophone playing and we pulled crackers and
                          wore paper hats and altogether had a good time. I forgot for a while that George is
                          leaving again for the Lupa tomorrow for an indefinite time. He was marvellous at making
                          young George’s party a gay one. You will have noticed the change from Georgie to
                          young George. Our son declares that he now wants to be called George, “Like Dad”.
                          He an Ann are a devoted couple and I am glad that there is only a fourteen
                          months difference in their ages. They play together extremely well and are very
                          independent which is just as well for little Kate now demands a lot of my attention. My
                          garden is a real cottage garden and looks very gay and colourful. There are hollyhocks
                          and Snapdragons, marigolds and phlox and of course the roses and carnations which, as
                          you know, are my favourites. The coffee shamba does not look so good because the
                          small labour force, which is all we can afford, cannot cope with all the weeds. You have
                          no idea how things grow during the wet season in the tropics.

                          Nothing alarming ever seems to happen when George is home, so I’m afraid this
                          letter is rather dull. I wanted you to know though, that largely due to all your gifts of toys
                          and sweets, Georgie’s 3rd birthday party went with a bang.

                          Your very affectionate,
                          Eleanor

                          Mchewe Estate. 17th September 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          I am sorry to hear that Mummy worries about me so much. “Poor Eleanor”,
                          indeed! I have a quite exceptional husband, three lovely children, a dear little home and
                          we are all well.It is true that I am in rather a rut but what else can we do? George comes
                          home whenever he can and what excitement there is when he does come. He cannot
                          give me any warning because he has to take advantage of chance lifts from the Diggings
                          to Mbeya, but now that he is prospecting nearer home he usually comes walking over
                          the hills. About 50 miles of rough going. Really and truly I am all right. Although our diet is
                          monotonous we have plenty to eat. Eggs and milk are cheap and fruit plentiful and I
                          have a good cook so can devote all my time to the children. I think it is because they are
                          my constant companions that Ann and Georgie are so grown up for their years.
                          I have no ayah at present because Janey has been suffering form rheumatism
                          and has gone home for one of her periodic rests. I manage very well without her except
                          in the matter of the afternoon walks. The outward journey is all right. George had all the
                          grass cut on his last visit so I am able to push the pram whilst Ann, George and Fanny
                          the dog run ahead. It is the uphill return trip that is so trying. Our walk back is always the
                          same, down the hill to the river where the children love to play and then along the car
                          road to the vegetable garden. I never did venture further since the day I saw a leopard
                          jump on a calf. I did not tell you at the time as I thought you might worry. The cattle were
                          grazing on a small knoll just off our land but near enough for me to have a clear view.
                          Suddenly the cattle scattered in all directions and we heard the shouts of the herd boys
                          and saw – or rather had the fleeting impression- of a large animal jumping on a calf. I
                          heard the herd boy shout “Chui, Chui!” (leopard) and believe me, we turned in our
                          tracks and made for home. To hasten things I picked up two sticks and told the children
                          that they were horses and they should ride them home which they did with
                          commendable speed.

                          Ann no longer rides Joseph. He became increasingly bad tempered and a
                          nuisance besides. He took to rolling all over my flower beds though I had never seen
                          him roll anywhere else. Then one day he kicked Ann in the chest, not very hard but
                          enough to send her flying. Now George has given him to the native who sells milk to us
                          and he seems quite happy grazing with the cattle.

                          With love to you all,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe Estate. 2nd October 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Since I last wrote George has been home and we had a lovely time as usual.
                          Whilst he was here the District Commissioner and his wife called. Mr Pollock told
                          George that there is to be a big bush clearing scheme in some part of the Mbeya
                          District to drive out Tsetse Fly. The game in the area will have to be exterminated and
                          there will probably be a job for George shooting out the buffalo. The pay would be
                          good but George says it is a beastly job. Although he is a professional hunter, he hates
                          slaughter.

                          Mrs P’s real reason for visiting the farm was to invite me to stay at her home in
                          Mbeya whilst she and her husband are away in Tukuyu. Her English nanny and her small
                          daughter will remain in Mbeya and she thought it might be a pleasant change for us and
                          a rest for me as of course Nanny will do the housekeeping. I accepted the invitation and I
                          think I will go on from there to Tukuyu and visit my friend Lillian Eustace for a fortnight.
                          She has given us an open invitation to visit her at any time.

                          I had a letter from Dr Eckhardt last week, telling me that at a meeting of all the
                          German Settlers from Mbeya, Tukuyu and Mbosi it had been decided to raise funds to
                          build a school at Mbeya. They want the British Settlers to co-operate in this and would
                          be glad of a subscription from us. I replied to say that I was unable to afford a
                          subscription at present but would probably be applying for a teaching job.
                          The Eckhardts are the leaders of the German community here and are ardent
                          Nazis. For this reason they are unpopular with the British community but he is the only
                          doctor here and I must say they have been very decent to us. Both of them admire
                          George. George has still not had any luck on the Lupa and until he makes a really
                          promising strike it is unlikely that the children and I will join him. There is no fresh milk there
                          and vegetables and fruit are imported from Mbeya and Iringa and are very expensive.
                          George says “You wouldn’t be happy on the diggings anyway with a lot of whores and
                          their bastards!”

                          Time ticks away very pleasantly here. Young George and Kate are blooming
                          and I keep well. Only Ann does not look well. She is growing too fast and is listless and
                          pale. If I do go to Mbeya next week I shall take her to the doctor to be overhauled.
                          We do not go for our afternoon walks now that George has returned to the Lupa.
                          That leopard has been around again and has killed Tubbage that cowardly Alsatian. We
                          gave him to the village headman some months ago. There is no danger to us from the
                          leopard but I am terrified it might get Fanny, who is an excellent little watchdog and
                          dearly loved by all of us. Yesterday I sent a note to the Boma asking for a trap gun and
                          today the farm boys are building a trap with logs.

                          I had a mishap this morning in the garden. I blundered into a nest of hornets and
                          got two stings in the left arm above the elbow. Very painful at the time and the place is
                          still red and swollen.

                          Much love to you all,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe Estate. 10th October 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          Well here we are at Mbeya, comfortably installed in the District Commissioner’s
                          house. It is one of two oldest houses in Mbeya and is a charming gabled place with tiled
                          roof. The garden is perfectly beautiful. I am enjoying the change very much. Nanny
                          Baxter is very entertaining. She has a vast fund of highly entertaining tales of the goings
                          on amongst the British Aristocracy, gleaned it seems over the nursery teacup in many a
                          Stately Home. Ann and Georgie are enjoying the company of other children.
                          People are very kind about inviting us out to tea and I gladly accept these
                          invitations but I have turned down invitations to dinner and one to a dance at the hotel. It
                          is no fun to go out at night without George. There are several grass widows at the pub
                          whose husbands are at the diggings. They have no inhibitions about parties.
                          I did have one night and day here with George, he got the chance of a lift and
                          knowing that we were staying here he thought the chance too good to miss. He was
                          also anxious to hear the Doctor’s verdict on Ann. I took Ann to hospital on my second
                          day here. Dr Eckhardt said there was nothing specifically wrong but that Ann is a highly
                          sensitive type with whom the tropics does not agree. He advised that Ann should
                          spend a year in a more temperate climate and that the sooner she goes the better. I felt
                          very discouraged to hear this and was most relieved when George turned up
                          unexpectedly that evening. He phoo-hood Dr Eckhardt’s recommendation and next
                          morning called in Dr Aitkin, the Government Doctor from Chunya and who happened to
                          be in Mbeya.

                          Unfortunately Dr Aitkin not only confirmed Dr Eckhardt’s opinion but said that he
                          thought Ann should stay out of the tropics until she had passed adolescence. I just don’t
                          know what to do about Ann. She is a darling child, very sensitive and gentle and a
                          lovely companion to me. Also she and young George are inseparable and I just cannot
                          picture one without the other. I know that you would be glad to have Ann but how could
                          we bear to part with her?

                          Your worried but affectionate,
                          Eleanor.

                          Tukuyu. 23rd October 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          As you see we have moved to Tukuyu and we are having a lovely time with
                          Lillian Eustace. She gave us such a warm welcome and has put herself out to give us
                          every comfort. She is a most capable housekeeper and I find her such a comfortable
                          companion because we have the same outlook in life. Both of us are strictly one man
                          women and that is rare here. She has a two year old son, Billy, who is enchanted with
                          our rolly polly Kate and there are other children on the station with whom Ann and
                          Georgie can play. Lillian engaged a temporary ayah for me so I am having a good rest.
                          All the children look well and Ann in particular seems to have benefited by the
                          change to a cooler climate. She has a good colour and looks so well that people all
                          exclaim when I tell them, that two doctors have advised us to send Ann out of the
                          country. Perhaps after all, this holiday in Tukuyu will set her up.

                          We had a trying journey from Mbeya to Tukuyu in the Post Lorry. The three
                          children and I were squeezed together on the front seat between the African driver on
                          one side and a vast German on the other. Both men smoked incessantly – the driver
                          cigarettes, and the German cheroots. The cab was clouded with a blue haze. Not only
                          that! I suddenly felt a smarting sensation on my right thigh. The driver’s cigarette had
                          burnt a hole right through that new checked linen frock you sent me last month.
                          I had Kate on my lap all the way but Ann and Georgie had to stand against the
                          windscreen all the way. The fat German offered to take Ann on his lap but she gave him
                          a very cold “No thank you.” Nor did I blame her. I would have greatly enjoyed the drive
                          under less crowded conditions. The scenery is gorgeous. One drives through very high
                          country crossing lovely clear streams and at one point through rain forest. As it was I
                          counted the miles and how thankful I was to see the end of the journey.
                          In the days when Tanganyika belonged to the Germans, Tukuyu was the
                          administrative centre for the whole of the Southern Highlands Province. The old German
                          Fort is still in use as Government offices and there are many fine trees which were
                          planted by the Germans. There is a large prosperous native population in this area.
                          They go in chiefly for coffee and for bananas which form the basis of their diet.
                          There are five British married couples here and Lillian and I go out to tea most
                          mornings. In the afternoon there is tennis or golf. The gardens here are beautiful because
                          there is rain or at least drizzle all the year round. There are even hedge roses bordering
                          some of the district roads. When one walks across the emerald green golf course or
                          through the Boma gardens, it is hard to realise that this gentle place is Tropical Africa.
                          ‘Such a green and pleasant land’, but I think I prefer our corner of Tanganyika.

                          Much love,
                          Eleanor.

                          Mchewe. 12th November 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          We had a lovely holiday but it is so nice to be home again, especially as Laza,
                          the local Nimrod, shot that leopard whilst we were away (with his muzzleloader gun). He
                          was justly proud of himself, and I gave him a tip so that he could buy some native beer
                          for a celebration. I have never seen one of theses parties but can hear the drums and
                          sounds of merrymaking, especially on moonlight nights.

                          Our house looks so fresh and uncluttered. Whilst I was away, the boys
                          whitewashed the house and my houseboy had washed all the curtains, bedspreads,
                          and loose covers and watered the garden. If only George were here it would be
                          heaven.

                          Ann looked so bonny at Tukuyu that I took her to the Government Doctor there
                          hoping that he would find her perfectly healthy, but alas he endorsed the finding of the
                          other two doctors so, when an opportunity offers, I think I shall have to send Ann down
                          to you for a long holiday from the Tropics. Mother-in-law has offered to fetch her next
                          year but England seems so far away. With you she will at least be on the same
                          continent.

                          I left the children for the first time ever, except for my stay in hospital when Kate
                          was born, to go on an outing to Lake Masoko in the Tukuyu district, with four friends.
                          Masoko is a beautiful, almost circular crater lake and very very deep. A detachment of
                          the King’s African Rifles are stationed there and occupy the old German barracks
                          overlooking the lake.

                          We drove to Masoko by car and spent the afternoon there as guests of two
                          British Army Officers. We had a good tea and the others went bathing in the lake but i
                          could not as I did not have a costume. The Lake was as beautiful as I had been lead to
                          imagine and our hosts were pleasant but I began to grow anxious as the afternoon
                          advanced and my friends showed no signs of leaving. I was in agonies when they
                          accepted an invitation to stay for a sundowner. We had this in the old German beer
                          garden overlooking the Lake. It was beautiful but what did I care. I had promised the
                          children that I would be home to give them their supper and put them to bed. When I
                          did at length return to Lillian’s house I found the situation as I had expected. Ann, with her
                          imagination had come to the conclusion that I never would return. She had sobbed
                          herself into a state of exhaustion. Kate was screaming in sympathy and George 2 was
                          very truculent. He wouldn’t even speak to me. Poor Lillian had had a trying time.
                          We did not return to Mbeya by the Mail Lorry. Bill and Lillian drove us across to
                          Mbeya in their new Ford V8 car. The children chattered happily in the back of the car
                          eating chocolate and bananas all the way. I might have known what would happen! Ann
                          was dreadfully and messily car sick.

                          I engaged the Mbeya Hotel taxi to drive us out to the farm the same afternoon
                          and I expect it will be a long time before we leave the farm again.

                          Lots and lots of love to all,
                          Eleanor.

                          Chunya 27th November 1936

                          Dearest Family,

                          You will be surprised to hear that we are all together now on the Lupa goldfields.
                          I have still not recovered from my own astonishment at being here. Until last Saturday
                          night I never dreamed of this move. At about ten o’clock I was crouched in the inglenook
                          blowing on the embers to make a fire so that I could heat some milk for Kate who is
                          cutting teeth and was very restless. Suddenly I heard a car outside. I knew it must be
                          George and rushed outside storm lamp in hand. Sure enough, there was George
                          standing by a strange car, and beaming all over his face. “Something for you my love,”
                          he said placing a little bundle in my hand. It was a knotted handkerchief and inside was a
                          fine gold nugget.

                          George had that fire going in no time, Kate was given the milk and half an aspirin
                          and settles down to sleep, whilst George and I sat around for an hour chatting over our
                          tea. He told me that he had borrowed the car from John Molteno and had come to fetch
                          me and the children to join him on the diggings for a while. It seems that John, who has a
                          camp at Itewe, a couple of miles outside the township of Chunya, the new
                          Administrative Centre of the diggings, was off to the Cape to visit his family for a few
                          months. John had asked George to run his claims in his absence and had given us the
                          loan of his camp and his car.

                          George had found the nugget on his own claim but he is not too elated because
                          he says that one good month on the diggings is often followed by several months of
                          dead loss. However, I feel hopeful, we have had such a run of bad luck that surely it is
                          time for the tide to change. George spent Sunday going over the farm with Thomas, the
                          headman, and giving him instructions about future work whilst I packed clothes and
                          kitchen equipment. I have brought our ex-kitchenboy Kesho Kutwa with me as cook and
                          also Janey, who heard that we were off to the Lupa and came to offer her services once
                          more as ayah. Janey’s ex-husband Abel is now cook to one of the more successful
                          diggers and I think she is hoping to team up with him again.

                          The trip over the Mbeya-Chunya pass was new to me and I enjoyed it very
                          much indeed. The road winds over the mountains along a very high escarpment and
                          one looks down on the vast Usangu flats stretching far away to the horizon. At the
                          highest point the road rises to about 7000 feet, and this was too much for Ann who was
                          leaning against the back of my seat. She was very thoroughly sick, all over my hair.
                          This camp of John Molteno’s is very comfortable. It consists of two wattle and
                          daub buildings built end to end in a clearing in the miombo bush. The main building
                          consists of a large living room, a store and an office, and the other of one large bedroom
                          and a small one separated by an area for bathing. Both buildings are thatched. There are
                          no doors, and there are no windows, but these are not necessary because one wall of
                          each building is built up only a couple of feet leaving a six foot space for light and air. As
                          this is the dry season the weather is pleasant. The air is fresh and dry but not nearly so
                          hot as I expected.

                          Water is a problem and must be carried long distances in kerosene tins.
                          vegetables and fresh butter are brought in a van from Iringa and Mbeya Districts about
                          once a fortnight. I have not yet visited Chunya but I believe it is as good a shopping
                          centre as Mbeya so we will be able to buy all the non perishable food stuffs we need.
                          What I do miss is the fresh milk. The children are accustomed to drinking at least a pint of
                          milk each per day but they do not care for the tinned variety.

                          Ann and young George love being here. The camp is surrounded by old
                          prospecting trenches and they spend hours each day searching for gold in the heaps of gravel. Sometimes they find quartz pitted with little spots of glitter and they bring them
                          to me in great excitement. Alas it is only Mica. We have two neighbours. The one is a
                          bearded Frenchman and the other an Australian. I have not yet met any women.
                          George looks very sunburnt and extremely fit and the children also look well.
                          George and I have decided that we will keep Ann with us until my Mother-in-law comes
                          out next year. George says that in spite of what the doctors have said, he thinks that the
                          shock to Ann of being separated from her family will do her more harm than good. She
                          and young George are inseparable and George thinks it would be best if both
                          George and Ann return to England with my Mother-in-law for a couple of years. I try not
                          to think at all about the breaking up of the family.

                          Much love to all,
                          Eleanor.

                           

                          #6262
                          TracyTracy
                          Participant

                            From Tanganyika with Love

                            continued  ~ part 3

                            With thanks to Mike Rushby.

                            Mchewe Estate. 22nd March 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            I am feeling much better now that I am five months pregnant and have quite got
                            my appetite back. Once again I go out with “the Mchewe Hunt” which is what George
                            calls the procession made up of the donkey boy and donkey with Ann confidently riding
                            astride, me beside the donkey with Georgie behind riding the stick which he much
                            prefers to the donkey. The Alsatian pup, whom Ann for some unknown reason named
                            ‘Tubbage’, and the two cats bring up the rear though sometimes Tubbage rushes
                            ahead and nearly knocks me off my feet. He is not the loveable pet that Kelly was.
                            It is just as well that I have recovered my health because my mother-in-law has
                            decided to fly out from England to look after Ann and George when I am in hospital. I am
                            very grateful for there is no one lse to whom I can turn. Kath Hickson-Wood is seldom on
                            their farm because Hicky is working a guano claim and is making quite a good thing out of
                            selling bat guano to the coffee farmers at Mbosi. They camp out at the claim, a series of
                            caves in the hills across the valley and visit the farm only occasionally. Anne Molteno is
                            off to Cape Town to have her baby at her mothers home and there are no women in
                            Mbeya I know well. The few women are Government Officials wives and they come
                            and go. I make so few trips to the little town that there is no chance to get on really
                            friendly terms with them.

                            Janey, the ayah, is turning into a treasure. She washes and irons well and keeps
                            the children’s clothes cupboard beautifully neat. Ann and George however are still
                            reluctant to go for walks with her. They find her dull because, like all African ayahs, she
                            has no imagination and cannot play with them. She should however be able to help with
                            the baby. Ann is very excited about the new baby. She so loves all little things.
                            Yesterday she went into ecstasies over ten newly hatched chicks.

                            She wants a little sister and perhaps it would be a good thing. Georgie is so very
                            active and full of mischief that I feel another wild little boy might be more than I can
                            manage. Although Ann is older, it is Georgie who always thinks up the mischief. They
                            have just been having a fight. Georgie with the cooks umbrella versus Ann with her frilly
                            pink sunshade with the inevitable result that the sunshade now has four broken ribs.
                            Any way I never feel lonely now during the long hours George is busy on the
                            shamba. The children keep me on my toes and I have plenty of sewing to do for the
                            baby. George is very good about amusing the children before their bedtime and on
                            Sundays. In the afternoons when it is not wet I take Ann and Georgie for a walk down
                            the hill. George meets us at the bottom and helps me on the homeward journey. He
                            grabs one child in each hand by the slack of their dungarees and they do a sort of giant
                            stride up the hill, half walking half riding.

                            Very much love,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 14th June 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            A great flap here. We had a letter yesterday to say that mother-in-law will be
                            arriving in four days time! George is very amused at my frantic efforts at spring cleaning
                            but he has told me before that she is very house proud so I feel I must make the best
                            of what we have.

                            George is very busy building a store for the coffee which will soon be ripening.
                            This time he is doing the bricklaying himself. It is quite a big building on the far end of the
                            farm and close to the river. He is also making trays of chicken wire nailed to wooden
                            frames with cheap calico stretched over the wire.

                            Mother will have to sleep in the verandah room which leads off the bedroom
                            which we share with the children. George will have to sleep in the outside spare room as
                            there is no door between the bedroom and the verandah room. I am sewing frantically
                            to make rose coloured curtains and bedspread out of material mother-in-law sent for
                            Christmas and will have to make a curtain for the doorway. The kitchen badly needs
                            whitewashing but George says he cannot spare the labour so I hope mother won’t look.
                            To complicate matters, George has been invited to lunch with the Governor on the day
                            of Mother’s arrival. After lunch they are to visit the newly stocked trout streams in the
                            Mporotos. I hope he gets back to Mbeya in good time to meet mother’s plane.
                            Ann has been off colour for a week. She looks very pale and her pretty fair hair,
                            normally so shiny, is dull and lifeless. It is such a pity that mother should see her like this
                            because first impressions do count so much and I am looking to the children to attract
                            attention from me. I am the size of a circus tent and hardly a dream daughter-in-law.
                            Georgie, thank goodness, is blooming but he has suddenly developed a disgusting
                            habit of spitting on the floor in the manner of the natives. I feel he might say “Gran, look
                            how far I can spit and give an enthusiastic demonstration.

                            Just hold thumbs that all goes well.

                            your loving but anxious,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 28th June 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            Mother-in-law duly arrived in the District Commissioner’s car. George did not dare
                            to use the A.C. as she is being very temperamental just now. They also brought the
                            mail bag which contained a parcel of lovely baby clothes from you. Thank you very
                            much. Mother-in-law is very put out because the large parcel she posted by surface
                            mail has not yet arrived.

                            Mother arrived looking very smart in an ankle length afternoon frock of golden
                            brown crepe and smart hat, and wearing some very good rings. She is a very
                            handsome woman with the very fair complexion that goes with red hair. The hair, once
                            Titan, must now be grey but it has been very successfully tinted and set. I of course,
                            was shapeless in a cotton maternity frock and no credit to you. However, so far, motherin-
                            law has been uncritical and friendly and charmed with the children who have taken to
                            her. Mother does not think that the children resemble me in any way. Ann resembles her
                            family the Purdys and Georgie is a Morley, her mother’s family. She says they had the
                            same dark eyes and rather full mouths. I say feebly, “But Georgie has my colouring”, but
                            mother won’t hear of it. So now you know! Ann is a Purdy and Georgie a Morley.
                            Perhaps number three will be a Leslie.

                            What a scramble I had getting ready for mother. Her little room really looks pretty
                            and fresh, but the locally woven grass mats arrived only minutes before mother did. I
                            also frantically overhauled our clothes and it a good thing that I did so because mother
                            has been going through all the cupboards looking for mending. Mother is kept so busy
                            in her own home that I think she finds time hangs on her hands here. She is very good at
                            entertaining the children and has even tried her hand at picking coffee a couple of times.
                            Mother cannot get used to the native boy servants but likes Janey, so Janey keeps her
                            room in order. Mother prefers to wash and iron her own clothes.

                            I almost lost our cook through mother’s surplus energy! Abel our previous cook
                            took a new wife last month and, as the new wife, and Janey the old, were daggers
                            drawn, Abel moved off to a job on the Lupa leaving Janey and her daughter here.
                            The new cook is capable, but he is a fearsome looking individual called Alfani. He has a
                            thick fuzz of hair which he wears long, sometimes hidden by a dingy turban, and he
                            wears big brass earrings. I think he must be part Somali because he has a hawk nose
                            and a real Brigand look. His kitchen is never really clean but he is an excellent cook and
                            as cooks are hard to come by here I just keep away from the kitchen. Not so mother!
                            A few days after her arrival she suggested kindly that I should lie down after lunch
                            so I rested with the children whilst mother, unknown to me, went out to the kitchen and
                            not only scrubbed the table and shelves but took the old iron stove to pieces and
                            cleaned that. Unfortunately in her zeal she poked a hole through the stove pipe.
                            Had I known of these activities I would have foreseen the cook’s reaction when
                            he returned that evening to cook the supper. he was furious and wished to leave on the
                            spot and demanded his wages forthwith. The old Memsahib had insulted him by
                            scrubbing his already spotless kitchen and had broken his stove and made it impossible
                            for him to cook. This tirade was accompanied by such waving of hands and rolling of
                            eyes that I longed to sack him on the spot. However I dared not as I might not get
                            another cook for weeks. So I smoothed him down and he patched up the stove pipe
                            with a bit of tin and some wire and produced a good meal. I am wondering what
                            transformations will be worked when I am in hospital.

                            Our food is really good but mother just pecks at it. No wonder really, because
                            she has had some shocks. One day she found the kitchen boy diligently scrubbing the box lavatory seat with a scrubbing brush which he dipped into one of my best large
                            saucepans! No one can foresee what these boys will do. In these remote areas house
                            servants are usually recruited from the ranks of the very primitive farm labourers, who first
                            come to the farm as naked savages, and their notions of hygiene simply don’t exist.
                            One day I said to mother in George’s presence “When we were newly married,
                            mother, George used to brag about your cooking and say that you would run a home
                            like this yourself with perhaps one ‘toto’. Mother replied tartly, “That was very bad of
                            George and not true. If my husband had brought me out here I would not have stayed a
                            month. I think you manage very well.” Which reply made me warm to mother a lot.
                            To complicate things we have a new pup, a little white bull terrier bitch whom
                            George has named Fanny. She is tiny and not yet house trained but seems a plucky
                            and attractive little animal though there is no denying that she does look like a piglet.

                            Very much love to all,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 3rd August 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            Here I am in hospital, comfortably in bed with our new daughter in her basket
                            beside me. She is a lovely little thing, very plump and cuddly and pink and white and
                            her head is covered with tiny curls the colour of Golden Syrup. We meant to call her
                            Margery Kate, after our Marj and my mother-in-law whose name is Catherine.
                            I am enjoying the rest, knowing that George and mother will be coping
                            successfully on the farm. My room is full of flowers, particularly with the roses and
                            carnations which grow so well here. Kate was not due until August 5th but the doctor
                            wanted me to come in good time in view of my tiresome early pregnancy.

                            For weeks beforehand George had tinkered with the A.C. and we started for
                            Mbeya gaily enough on the twenty ninth, however, after going like a dream for a couple
                            of miles, she simply collapsed from exhaustion at the foot of a hill and all the efforts of
                            the farm boys who had been sent ahead for such an emergency failed to start her. So
                            George sent back to the farm for the machila and I sat in the shade of a tree, wondering
                            what would happen if I had the baby there and then, whilst George went on tinkering
                            with the car. Suddenly she sprang into life and we roared up that hill and all the way into
                            Mbeya. The doctor welcomed us pleasantly and we had tea with his family before I
                            settled into my room. Later he examined me and said that it was unlikely that the baby
                            would be born for several days. The new and efficient German nurse said, “Thank
                            goodness for that.” There was a man in hospital dying from a stomach cancer and she
                            had not had a decent nights sleep for three nights.

                            Kate however had other plans. I woke in the early morning with labour pains but
                            anxious not to disturb the nurse, I lay and read or tried to read a book, hoping that I
                            would not have to call the nurse until daybreak. However at four a.m., I went out into the
                            wind which was howling along the open verandah and knocked on the nurse’s door. She
                            got up and very crossly informed me that I was imagining things and should get back to
                            bed at once. She said “It cannot be so. The Doctor has said it.” I said “Of course it is,”
                            and then and there the water broke and clinched my argument. She then went into a flat
                            spin. “But the bed is not ready and my instruments are not ready,” and she flew around
                            to rectify this and also sent an African orderly to call the doctor. I paced the floor saying
                            warningly “Hurry up with that bed. I am going to have the baby now!” She shrieked
                            “Take off your dressing gown.” But I was passed caring. I flung myself on the bed and
                            there was Kate. The nurse had done all that was necessary by the time the doctor
                            arrived.

                            A funny thing was, that whilst Kate was being born on the bed, a black cat had
                            kittens under it! The doctor was furious with the nurse but the poor thing must have crept
                            in out of the cold wind when I went to call the nurse. A happy omen I feel for the baby’s
                            future. George had no anxiety this time. He stayed at the hospital with me until ten
                            o’clock when he went down to the hotel to sleep and he received the news in a note
                            from me with his early morning tea. He went to the farm next morning but will return on
                            the sixth to fetch me home.

                            I do feel so happy. A very special husband and three lovely children. What
                            more could anyone possibly want.

                            Lots and lots of love,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 20th August 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            Well here we are back at home and all is very well. The new baby is very placid
                            and so pretty. Mother is delighted with her and Ann loved her at sight but Georgie is not
                            so sure. At first he said, “Your baby is no good. Chuck her in the kalonga.” The kalonga
                            being the ravine beside the house , where, I regret to say, much of the kitchen refuse is
                            dumped. he is very jealous when I carry Kate around or feed her but is ready to admire
                            her when she is lying alone in her basket.

                            George walked all the way from the farm to fetch us home. He hired a car and
                            native driver from the hotel, but drove us home himself going with such care over ruts
                            and bumps. We had a great welcome from mother who had had the whole house
                            spring cleaned. However George loyally says it looks just as nice when I am in charge.
                            Mother obviously, had had more than enough of the back of beyond and
                            decided to stay on only one week after my return home. She had gone into the kitchen
                            one day just in time to see the houseboy scooping the custard he had spilt on the table
                            back into the jug with the side of his hand. No doubt it would have been served up
                            without a word. On another occasion she had walked in on the cook’s daily ablutions. He
                            was standing in a small bowl of water in the centre of the kitchen, absolutely naked,
                            enjoying a slipper bath. She left last Wednesday and gave us a big laugh before she
                            left. She never got over her horror of eating food prepared by our cook and used to
                            push it around her plate. Well, when the time came for mother to leave for the plane, she
                            put on the very smart frock in which she had arrived, and then came into the sitting room
                            exclaiming in dismay “Just look what has happened, I must have lost a stone!’ We
                            looked, and sure enough, the dress which had been ankle deep before, now touched
                            the floor. “Good show mother.” said George unfeelingly. “You ought to be jolly grateful,
                            you needed to lose weight and it would have cost you the earth at a beauty parlour to
                            get that sylph-like figure.”

                            When mother left she took, in a perforated matchbox, one of the frilly mantis that
                            live on our roses. She means to keep it in a goldfish bowl in her dining room at home.
                            Georgie and Ann filled another matchbox with dead flies for food for the mantis on the
                            journey.

                            Now that mother has left, Georgie and Ann attach themselves to me and firmly
                            refuse to have anything to do with the ayah,Janey. She in any case now wishes to have
                            a rest. Mother tipped her well and gave her several cotton frocks so I suspect she wants
                            to go back to her hometown in Northern Rhodesia to show off a bit.
                            Georgie has just sidled up with a very roguish look. He asked “You like your
                            baby?” I said “Yes indeed I do.” He said “I’ll prick your baby with a velly big thorn.”

                            Who would be a mother!
                            Eleanor

                            Mchewe Estate. 20th September 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            I have been rather in the wars with toothache and as there is still no dentist at
                            Mbeya to do the fillings, I had to have four molars extracted at the hospital. George
                            says it is fascinating to watch me at mealtimes these days because there is such a gleam
                            of satisfaction in my eye when I do manage to get two teeth to meet on a mouthful.
                            About those scissors Marj sent Ann. It was not such a good idea. First she cut off tufts of
                            George’s hair so that he now looks like a bad case of ringworm and then she cut a scalp
                            lock, a whole fist full of her own shining hair, which George so loves. George scolded
                            Ann and she burst into floods of tears. Such a thing as a scolding from her darling daddy
                            had never happened before. George immediately made a long drooping moustache
                            out of the shorn lock and soon had her smiling again. George is always very gentle with
                            Ann. One has to be , because she is frightfully sensitive to criticism.

                            I am kept pretty busy these days, Janey has left and my houseboy has been ill
                            with pneumonia. I now have to wash all the children’s things and my own, (the cook does
                            George’s clothes) and look after the three children. Believe me, I can hardly keep awake
                            for Kate’s ten o’clock feed.

                            I do hope I shall get some new servants next month because I also got George
                            to give notice to the cook. I intercepted him last week as he was storming down the hill
                            with my large kitchen knife in his hand. “Where are you going with my knife?” I asked.
                            “I’m going to kill a man!” said Alfani, rolling his eyes and looking extremely ferocious. “He
                            has taken my wife.” “Not with my knife”, said I reaching for it. So off Alfani went, bent on
                            vengeance and I returned the knife to the kitchen. Dinner was served and I made no
                            enquiries but I feel that I need someone more restful in the kitchen than our brigand
                            Alfani.

                            George has been working on the car and has now fitted yet another radiator. This
                            is a lorry one and much too tall to be covered by the A.C.’s elegant bonnet which is
                            secured by an old strap. The poor old A.C. now looks like an ancient shoe with a turned
                            up toe. It only needs me in it with the children to make a fine illustration to the old rhyme!
                            Ann and Georgie are going through a climbing phase. They practically live in
                            trees. I rushed out this morning to investigate loud screams and found Georgie hanging
                            from a fork in a tree by one ankle, whilst Ann stood below on tiptoe with hands stretched
                            upwards to support his head.

                            Do I sound as though I have straws in my hair? I have.
                            Lots of love,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 11th October 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            Thank goodness! I have a new ayah name Mary. I had heard that there was a
                            good ayah out of work at Tukuyu 60 miles away so sent a messenger to fetch her. She
                            arrived after dark wearing a bright dress and a cheerful smile and looked very suitable by
                            the light of a storm lamp. I was horrified next morning to see her in daylight. She was
                            dressed all in black and had a rather sinister look. She reminds me rather of your old maid
                            Candace who overheard me laughing a few days before Ann was born and croaked
                            “Yes , Miss Eleanor, today you laugh but next week you might be dead.” Remember
                            how livid you were, dad?

                            I think Mary has the same grim philosophy. Ann took one look at her and said,
                            “What a horrible old lady, mummy.” Georgie just said “Go away”, both in English and Ki-
                            Swahili. Anyway Mary’s references are good so I shall keep her on to help with Kate
                            who is thriving and bonny and placid.

                            Thank you for the offer of toys for Christmas but, if you don’t mind, I’d rather have
                            some clothing for the children. Ann is quite contented with her dolls Barbara and Yvonne.
                            Barbara’s once beautiful face is now pieced together like a jigsaw puzzle having come
                            into contact with Georgie’s ever busy hammer. However Ann says she will love her for
                            ever and she doesn’t want another doll. Yvonne’s hay day is over too. She
                            disappeared for weeks and we think Fanny, the pup, was the culprit. Ann discovered
                            Yvonne one morning in some long wet weeds. Poor Yvonne is now a ghost of her
                            former self. All the sophisticated make up was washed off her papier-mâché face and
                            her hair is decidedly bedraggled, but Ann was radiant as she tucked her back into bed
                            and Yvonne is as precious to Ann as she ever was.

                            Georgie simply does not care for toys. His paint box, hammer and the trenching
                            hoe George gave him for his second birthday are all he wants or needs. Both children
                            love books but I sometimes wonder whether they stimulate Ann’s imagination too much.
                            The characters all become friends of hers and she makes up stories about them to tell
                            Georgie. She adores that illustrated children’s Bible Mummy sent her but you would be
                            astonished at the yarns she spins about “me and my friend Jesus.” She also will call
                            Moses “Old Noses”, and looking at a picture of Jacob’s dream, with the shining angels
                            on the ladder between heaven and earth, she said “Georgie, if you see an angel, don’t
                            touch it, it’s hot.”

                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 17th October 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            I take back the disparaging things I said about my new Ayah, because she has
                            proved her worth in an unexpected way. On Wednesday morning I settled Kate in he
                            cot after her ten o’clock feed and sat sewing at the dining room table with Ann and
                            Georgie opposite me, both absorbed in painting pictures in identical seed catalogues.
                            Suddenly there was a terrific bang on the back door, followed by an even heavier blow.
                            The door was just behind me and I got up and opened it. There, almost filling the door
                            frame, stood a huge native with staring eyes and his teeth showing in a mad grimace. In
                            his hand he held a rolled umbrella by the ferrule, the shaft I noticed was unusually long
                            and thick and the handle was a big round knob.

                            I was terrified as you can imagine, especially as, through the gap under the
                            native’s raised arm, I could see the new cook and the kitchen boy running away down to
                            the shamba! I hastily tried to shut and lock the door but the man just brushed me aside.
                            For a moment he stood over me with the umbrella raised as though to strike. Rather
                            fortunately, I now think, I was too petrified to say a word. The children never moved but
                            Tubbage, the Alsatian, got up and jumped out of the window!

                            Then the native turned away and still with the same fixed stare and grimace,
                            began to attack the furniture with his umbrella. Tables and chairs were overturned and
                            books and ornaments scattered on the floor. When the madman had his back turned and
                            was busily bashing the couch, I slipped round the dining room table, took Ann and
                            Georgie by the hand and fled through the front door to the garage where I hid the
                            children in the car. All this took several minutes because naturally the children were
                            terrified. I was worried to death about the baby left alone in the bedroom and as soon
                            as I had Ann and Georgie settled I ran back to the house.

                            I reached the now open front door just as Kianda the houseboy opened the back
                            door of the lounge. He had been away at the river washing clothes but, on hearing of the
                            madman from the kitchen boy he had armed himself with a stout stick and very pluckily,
                            because he is not a robust boy, had returned to the house to eject the intruder. He
                            rushed to attack immediately and I heard a terrific exchange of blows behind me as I
                            opened our bedroom door. You can imagine what my feelings were when I was
                            confronted by an empty cot! Just then there was an uproar inside as all the farm
                            labourers armed with hoes and pangas and sticks, streamed into the living room from the
                            shamba whence they had been summoned by the cook. In no time at all the huge
                            native was hustled out of the house, flung down the front steps, and securely tied up
                            with strips of cloth.

                            In the lull that followed I heard a frightened voice calling from the bathroom.
                            ”Memsahib is that you? The child is here with me.” I hastily opened the bathroom door
                            to find Mary couched in a corner by the bath, shielding Kate with her body. Mary had
                            seen the big native enter the house and her first thought had been for her charge. I
                            thanked her and promised her a reward for her loyalty, and quickly returned to the garage
                            to reassure Ann and Georgie. I met George who looked white and exhausted as well
                            he might having run up hill all the way from the coffee store. The kitchen boy had led him
                            to expect the worst and he was most relieved to find us all unhurt if a bit shaken.
                            We returned to the house by the back way whilst George went to the front and
                            ordered our labourers to take their prisoner and lock him up in the store. George then
                            discussed the whole affair with his Headman and all the labourers after which he reported
                            to me. “The boys say that the bastard is an ex-Askari from Nyasaland. He is not mad as
                            you thought but he smokes bhang and has these attacks. I suppose I should take him to
                            Mbeya and have him up in court. But if I do that you’ll have to give evidence and that will be a nuisance as the car won’t go and there is also the baby to consider.”

                            Eventually we decided to leave the man to sleep off the effects of the Bhang
                            until evening when he would be tried before an impromptu court consisting of George,
                            the local Jumbe(Headman) and village Elders, and our own farm boys and any other
                            interested spectators. It was not long before I knew the verdict because I heard the
                            sound of lashes. I was not sorry at all because I felt the man deserved his punishment
                            and so did all the Africans. They love children and despise anyone who harms or
                            frightens them. With great enthusiasm they frog-marched him off our land, and I sincerely
                            hope that that is the last we see or him. Ann and Georgie don’t seem to brood over this
                            affair at all. The man was naughty and he was spanked, a quite reasonable state of
                            affairs. This morning they hid away in the small thatched chicken house. This is a little brick
                            building about four feet square which Ann covets as a dolls house. They came back
                            covered in stick fleas which I had to remove with paraffin. My hens are laying well but
                            they all have the ‘gapes’! I wouldn’t run a chicken farm for anything, hens are such fussy,
                            squawking things.

                            Now don’t go worrying about my experience with the native. Such things
                            happen only once in a lifetime. We are all very well and happy, and life, apart from the
                            children’s pranks is very tranquil.

                            Lots and lots of love,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 25th October 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            The hot winds have dried up the shamba alarmingly and we hope every day for
                            rain. The prices for coffee, on the London market, continue to be low and the local
                            planters are very depressed. Coffee grows well enough here but we are over 400
                            miles from the railway and transport to the railhead by lorry is very expensive. Then, as
                            there is no East African Marketing Board, the coffee must be shipped to England for
                            sale. Unless the coffee fetches at least 90 pounds a ton it simply doesn’t pay to grow it.
                            When we started planting in 1931 coffee was fetching as much as 115 pounds a ton but
                            prices this year were between 45 and 55 pounds. We have practically exhausted our
                            capitol and so have all our neighbours. The Hickson -Woods have been keeping their
                            pot boiling by selling bat guano to the coffee farmers at Mbosi but now everyone is
                            broke and there is not a market for fertilisers. They are offering their farm for sale at a very
                            low price.

                            Major Jones has got a job working on the district roads and Max Coster talks of
                            returning to his work as a geologist. George says he will have to go gold digging on the
                            Lupa unless there is a big improvement in the market. Luckily we can live quite cheaply
                            here. We have a good vegetable garden, milk is cheap and we have plenty of fruit.
                            There are mulberries, pawpaws, grenadillas, peaches, and wine berries. The wine
                            berries are very pretty but insipid though Ann and Georgie love them. Each morning,
                            before breakfast, the old garden boy brings berries for Ann and Georgie. With a thorn
                            the old man pins a large leaf from a wild fig tree into a cone which he fills with scarlet wine
                            berries. There is always a cone for each child and they wait eagerly outside for the daily
                            ceremony of presentation.

                            The rats are being a nuisance again. Both our cats, Skinny Winnie and Blackboy
                            disappeared a few weeks ago. We think they made a meal for a leopard. I wrote last
                            week to our grocer at Mbalizi asking him whether he could let us have a couple of kittens
                            as I have often seen cats in his store. The messenger returned with a nailed down box.
                            The kitchen boy was called to prize up the lid and the children stood by in eager
                            anticipation. Out jumped two snarling and spitting creatures. One rushed into the kalonga
                            and the other into the house and before they were captured they had drawn blood from
                            several boys. I told the boys to replace the cats in the box as I intended to return them
                            forthwith. They had the colouring, stripes and dispositions of wild cats and I certainly
                            didn’t want them as pets, but before the boys could replace the lid the cats escaped
                            once more into the undergrowth in the kalonga. George fetched his shotgun and said he
                            would shoot the cats on sight or they would kill our chickens. This was more easily said
                            than done because the cats could not be found. However during the night the cats
                            climbed up into the loft af the house and we could hear them moving around on the reed
                            ceiling.

                            I said to George,”Oh leave the poor things. At least they might frighten the rats
                            away.” That afternoon as we were having tea a thin stream of liquid filtered through the
                            ceiling on George’s head. Oh dear!!! That of course was the end. Some raw meat was
                            put on the lawn for bait and yesterday George shot both cats.

                            I regret to end with the sad story of Mary, heroine in my last letter and outcast in
                            this. She came to work quite drunk two days running and I simply had to get rid of her. I
                            have heard since from Kath Wood that Mary lost her last job at Tukuyu for the same
                            reason. She was ayah to twin girls and one day set their pram on fire.

                            So once again my hands are more than full with three lively children. I did say
                            didn’t I, when Ann was born that I wanted six children?

                            Very much love from us all, Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 8th November 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            To set your minds at rest I must tell you that the native who so frightened me and
                            the children is now in jail for attacking a Greek at Mbalizi. I hear he is to be sent back to
                            Rhodesia when he has finished his sentence.

                            Yesterday we had one of our rare trips to Mbeya. George managed to get a couple of
                            second hand tyres for the old car and had again got her to work so we are celebrating our
                            wedding anniversary by going on an outing. I wore the green and fawn striped silk dress
                            mother bought me and the hat and shoes you sent for my birthday and felt like a million
                            dollars, for a change. The children all wore new clothes too and I felt very proud of them.
                            Ann is still very fair and with her refined little features and straight silky hair she
                            looks like Alice in Wonderland. Georgie is dark and sturdy and looks best in khaki shirt
                            and shorts and sun helmet. Kate is a pink and gold baby and looks good enough to eat.
                            We went straight to the hotel at Mbeya and had the usual warm welcome from
                            Ken and Aunty May Menzies. Aunty May wears her hair cut short like a mans and
                            usually wears shirt and tie and riding breeches and boots. She always looks ready to go
                            on safari at a moments notice as indeed she is. She is often called out to a case of illness
                            at some remote spot.

                            There were lots of people at the hotel from farms in the district and from the
                            diggings. I met women I had not seen for four years. One, a Mrs Masters from Tukuyu,
                            said in the lounge, “My God! Last time I saw you , you were just a girl and here you are
                            now with two children.” To which I replied with pride, “There is another one in a pram on
                            the verandah if you care to look!” Great hilarity in the lounge. The people from the
                            diggings seem to have plenty of money to throw around. There was a big party on the
                            go in the bar.

                            One of our shamba boys died last Friday and all his fellow workers and our
                            house boys had the day off to attend the funeral. From what I can gather the local
                            funerals are quite cheery affairs. The corpse is dressed in his best clothes and laid
                            outside his hut and all who are interested may view the body and pay their respects.
                            The heir then calls upon anyone who had a grudge against the dead man to say his say
                            and thereafter hold his tongue forever. Then all the friends pay tribute to the dead man
                            after which he is buried to the accompaniment of what sounds from a distance, very
                            cheerful keening.

                            Most of our workmen are pagans though there is a Lutheran Mission nearby and
                            a big Roman Catholic Mission in the area too. My present cook, however, claims to be
                            a Christian. He certainly went to a mission school and can read and write and also sing
                            hymns in Ki-Swahili. When I first engaged him I used to find a large open Bible
                            prominently displayed on the kitchen table. The cook is middle aged and arrived here
                            with a sensible matronly wife. To my surprise one day he brought along a young girl,
                            very plump and giggly and announced proudly that she was his new wife, I said,”But I
                            thought you were a Christian Jeremiah? Christians don’t have two wives.” To which he
                            replied, “Oh Memsahib, God won’t mind. He knows an African needs two wives – one
                            to go with him when he goes away to work and one to stay behind at home to cultivate
                            the shamba.

                            Needles to say, it is the old wife who has gone to till the family plot.

                            With love to all,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 21st November 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            The drought has broken with a bang. We had a heavy storm in the hills behind
                            the house. Hail fell thick and fast. So nice for all the tiny new berries on the coffee! The
                            kids loved the excitement and three times Ann and Georgie ran out for a shower under
                            the eaves and had to be changed. After the third time I was fed up and made them both
                            lie on their beds whilst George and I had lunch in peace. I told Ann to keep the
                            casement shut as otherwise the rain would drive in on her bed. Half way through lunch I
                            heard delighted squeals from Georgie and went into the bedroom to investigate. Ann
                            was standing on the outer sill in the rain but had shut the window as ordered. “Well
                            Mummy , you didn’t say I mustn’t stand on the window sill, and I did shut the window.”
                            George is working so hard on the farm. I have a horrible feeling however that it is
                            what the Africans call ‘Kazi buri’ (waste of effort) as there seems no chance of the price of
                            coffee improving as long as this world depression continues. The worry is that our capitol
                            is nearly exhausted. Food is becoming difficult now that our neighbours have left. I used
                            to buy delicious butter from Kath Hickson-Wood and an African butcher used to kill a
                            beast once a week. Now that we are his only European customers he very rarely kills
                            anything larger than a goat, and though we do eat goat, believe me it is not from choice.
                            We have of course got plenty to eat, but our diet is very monotonous. I was
                            delighted when George shot a large bushbuck last week. What we could not use I cut
                            into strips and the salted strips are now hanging in the open garage to dry.

                            With love to all,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 6th December 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            We have had a lot of rain and the countryside is lovely and green. Last week
                            George went to Mbeya taking Ann with him. This was a big adventure for Ann because
                            never before had she been anywhere without me. She was in a most blissful state as
                            she drove off in the old car clutching a little basket containing sandwiches and half a bottle
                            of milk. She looked so pretty in a new blue frock and with her tiny plaits tied with
                            matching blue ribbons. When Ann is animated she looks charming because her normally
                            pale cheeks become rosy and she shows her pretty dimples.

                            As I am still without an ayah I rather looked forward to a quiet morning with only
                            Georgie and Margery Kate to care for, but Georgie found it dull without Ann and wanted
                            to be entertained and even the normally placid baby was peevish. Then in mid morning
                            the rain came down in torrents, the result of a cloudburst in the hills directly behind our
                            house. The ravine next to our house was a terrifying sight. It appeared to be a great
                            muddy, roaring waterfall reaching from the very top of the hill to a point about 30 yards
                            behind our house and then the stream rushed on down the gorge in an angry brown
                            flood. The roar of the water was so great that we had to yell at one another to be heard.
                            By lunch time the rain had stopped and I anxiously awaited the return of Ann and
                            George. They returned on foot, drenched and hungry at about 2.30pm . George had
                            had to abandon the car on the main road as the Mchewe River had overflowed and
                            turned the road into a muddy lake. The lower part of the shamba had also been flooded
                            and the water receded leaving branches and driftwood amongst the coffee. This was my
                            first experience of a real tropical storm. I am afraid that after the battering the coffee has
                            had there is little hope of a decent crop next year.

                            Anyway Christmas is coming so we don’t dwell on these mishaps. The children
                            have already chosen their tree from amongst the young cypresses in the vegetable
                            garden. We all send our love and hope that you too will have a Happy Christmas.

                            Eleanor

                            Mchewe Estate. 22nd December 1935

                            Dearest Family,

                            I’ve been in the wars with my staff. The cook has been away ill for ten days but is
                            back today though shaky and full of self pity. The houseboy, who really has been a brick
                            during the cooks absence has now taken to his bed and I feel like taking to Mine! The
                            children however have the Christmas spirit and are making weird and wonderful paper
                            decorations. George’s contribution was to have the house whitewashed throughout and
                            it looks beautifully fresh.

                            My best bit of news is that my old ayah Janey has been to see me and would
                            like to start working here again on Jan 1st. We are all very well. We meant to give
                            ourselves an outing to Mbeya as a Christmas treat but here there is an outbreak of
                            enteric fever there so will now not go. We have had two visitors from the Diggings this
                            week. The children see so few strangers that they were fascinated and hung around
                            staring. Ann sat down on the arm of the couch beside one and studied his profile.
                            Suddenly she announced in her clear voice, “Mummy do you know, this man has got
                            wax in his ears!” Very awkward pause in the conversation. By the way when I was
                            cleaning out little Kate’s ears with a swab of cotton wool a few days ago, Ann asked
                            “Mummy, do bees have wax in their ears? Well, where do you get beeswax from
                            then?”

                            I meant to keep your Christmas parcel unopened until Christmas Eve but could
                            not resist peeping today. What lovely things! Ann so loves pretties and will be
                            delighted with her frocks. My dress is just right and I love Georgie’s manly little flannel
                            shorts and blue shirt. We have bought them each a watering can. I suppose I shall
                            regret this later. One of your most welcome gifts is the album of nursery rhyme records. I
                            am so fed up with those that we have. Both children love singing. I put a record on the
                            gramophone geared to slow and off they go . Georgie sings more slowly than Ann but
                            much more tunefully. Ann sings in a flat monotone but Georgie with great expression.
                            You ought to hear him render ‘Sing a song of sixpence’. He cannot pronounce an R or
                            an S. Mother has sent a large home made Christmas pudding and a fine Christmas
                            cake and George will shoot some partridges for Christmas dinner.
                            Think of us as I shall certainly think of you.

                            Your very loving,
                            Eleanor.

                            Mchewe Estate. 2nd January 1936

                            Dearest Family,

                            Christmas was fun! The tree looked very gay with its load of tinsel, candles and
                            red crackers and the coloured balloons you sent. All the children got plenty of toys
                            thanks to Grandparents and Aunts. George made Ann a large doll’s bed and I made
                            some elegant bedding, Barbara, the big doll is now permanently bed ridden. Her poor
                            shattered head has come all unstuck and though I have pieced it together again it is a sad
                            sight. If you have not yet chosen a present for her birthday next month would you
                            please get a new head from the Handy House. I enclose measurements. Ann does so
                            love the doll. She always calls her, “My little girl”, and she keeps the doll’s bed beside
                            her own and never fails to kiss her goodnight.

                            We had no guests for Christmas this year but we were quite festive. Ann
                            decorated the dinner table with small pink roses and forget-me-knots and tinsel and the
                            crackers from the tree. It was a wet day but we played the new records and both
                            George and I worked hard to make it a really happy day for the children. The children
                            were hugely delighted when George made himself a revolting set of false teeth out of
                            plasticine and a moustache and beard of paper straw from a chocolate box. “Oh Daddy
                            you look exactly like Father Christmas!” cried an enthralled Ann. Before bedtime we lit
                            all the candles on the tree and sang ‘Away in a Manger’, and then we opened the box of
                            starlights you sent and Ann and Georgie had their first experience of fireworks.
                            After the children went to bed things deteriorated. First George went for his bath
                            and found and killed a large black snake in the bathroom. It must have been in the
                            bathroom when I bathed the children earlier in the evening. Then I developed bad
                            toothache which kept me awake all night and was agonising next day. Unfortunately the
                            bridge between the farm and Mbeya had been washed away and the water was too
                            deep for the car to ford until the 30th when at last I was able to take my poor swollen
                            face to Mbeya. There is now a young German woman dentist working at the hospital.
                            She pulled out the offending molar which had a large abscess attached to it.
                            Whilst the dentist attended to me, Ann and Georgie played happily with the
                            doctor’s children. I wish they could play more often with other children. Dr Eckhardt was
                            very pleased with Margery Kate who at seven months weighs 17 lbs and has lovely
                            rosy cheeks. He admired Ann and told her that she looked just like a German girl. “No I
                            don’t”, cried Ann indignantly, “I’m English!”

                            We were caught in a rain storm going home and as the old car still has no
                            windscreen or side curtains we all got soaked except for the baby who was snugly
                            wrapped in my raincoat. The kids thought it great fun. Ann is growing up fast now. She
                            likes to ‘help mummy’. She is a perfectionist at four years old which is rather trying. She
                            gets so discouraged when things do not turn out as well as she means them to. Sewing
                            is constantly being unpicked and paintings torn up. She is a very sensitive child.
                            Georgie is quite different. He is a man of action, but not silent. He talks incessantly
                            but lisps and stumbles over some words. At one time Ann and Georgie often
                            conversed in Ki-Swahili but they now scorn to do so. If either forgets and uses a Swahili
                            word, the other points a scornful finger and shouts “You black toto”.

                            With love to all,
                            Eleanor.

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