IN EGYPT.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXVII, Issue 2, 1 May 1915, Page 6

IN EGYPT.

AN AUCKLAND BOY’S LETTER. Trooper" Jack Penn, a son of Mr A. V. Penn, of H M. Customs, Auckland, is one of seven cousins (four Malones, two Liardets, • and himself, all grandsons’ of the. lafe Mr Thomas Penn, formerly of Stratford), who have 1 joined the (New Zealand Expeditionary 'Force. The young Aucklander, who is soldiering in the Dardanelles just .-•'now, writes from Egypt to a friend in the north. The Observer publishes bis dheery letter, and in doing so, re- ' marks that it is, unlike most letters, frank and truthful. "He does not exaggerate the .importance of the little skirmish on tiie Suez Canal, a little affair I that has given the daily papers more “copy” than the terrible fight at Neuvfii Chapelle. Thus Jack: —“Cairo, Egyjit, March 12, 1915;—I ■ Scones, you ol(I sinner, why did you not answer my letter? Surely the censor 16ft something to read in it? It was not all State secrets. Anyway, how are you? Keeping in the best’ of health, I hope* ahd not worried with /■insects like 1 am. Whoever it was Uthat said that New Zealand was 1 “God’s Own Country” spoke a true word. I’m not surprised at ' Moses | aiid the Israelites wanting to leave . Egypt, and yon can take it form me it -was not Pharaoh that made them trek, ft was mosquitoes, ants, scorpions, beetles and other alligators. (Excuse the scrawl, but I’m .writing with the pad at an obtuse angle an { my knees.) Why, last night I went ! for a hot bath. Nothing miry in that, you’ll say, but wait a; minute! I, of course, naturally f‘ thought I’d have it on my own. Hut' not so. Ants and beetles flocked in-1 to the water—mistook it for the Jor-j 1 dan evidently—and now I’m abso-' j oally-lutely dead against mixed bathing. Ugh! It thakes me shudder to think of it. “I only returned to Cairo last week, after being down the Suez Canal for a month at Kit hi. five miles from Suez. The first night there was | rather exciting, my red corpuscles •were chasing each other like fury at 'first,; We were all awakened by the sound of firing about two in the riforning—'a most inconvenient hour , for an attack, for me anyway, as I ( object most strenuously to having my < slumbers disturbed. Did we rush for . r t J

our rifles and ammunition and give battle to the'Turks r* A’o, we discussed which was the safest side of the haystack to sleep on, but as no bullets whizzed our way, we sat up and watched the display of fireworks-, and the Turks gut it hot from the warship, 1 can tell you. There would lie a -spluttering rifiejire from them, and then bang! and the warship threw a bouquet. The Turks evidently thought it wasn’t fair, u and made tracks for homo. “That was about all the active service we saw. Most of the lighting occurred higher up the canal at loussoun, near Ismailia. 1 used to ride into Suez and Port Tetyhk occasionally, but there is not much of interest there. Cairo 1 have explored thoroughly, climbed the Cheops Pyramid twice, paid the Sphinx a visit, also the buried temple and tombs, also consider myself able to write a book on mosques, give lectures on Biblical scenes and places, tell lies about the victorious battles on the canal, etc. I have dug up skeletons at Mataria, eaten spaghette at Greek restaurants, drunk beer and talked politics with the highest in the land at Heliopolis House Hotel, have sat .in the coronation chair of the 'Sultan Hassien (on whom be pea'co) at the mosque of that name. / In fact, I’Ve done Cairo 1 , arid want a change.”

Jack is probably getting Ids change.