TEL-EL-KEBIR CAMP.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXX, Issue 62, 17 June 1916, Page 7

TEL-EL-KEBIR CAMP.

(By I). I’. Dixon.) .lust a tew lines to your valuable [>iij)cr from a Taranaki wanderer now in the N.Z. and Australian training camp at lel-el-lvobir. Egypt. Ims is the big Base Camp, wnere all me Colonial troops . receive tneir iinal training before they join their nous, and at times there are anything up to (j(j (jOU men here, as there are '1 oininies and Indian troops here as well. It is an ideal place for training, there being miles of desert of hard sand and shingle, the only drawback being the Hies and the heat, which yesterday registered 100 in the shade of a mat Inn. The old historical battlefield of lel-ol-Kobir is quite close, and also Die cemetery, where the fallen heroes were buried. It is a very pretty spot, and there are. many beautiful tombstones erected in memory of the men and placed there by their regiments in England, namely, the Hoy a I Marines, Scottish Borderers, Highland Tight Infantry, and several more whom 1 cannot remember, including sonic Irish regiments, also Welsh, flic unit 1 am with is tiie New Zealand Mounted Rifles Reserve Regiment, under the command of Major Samuels, ami they are “some” regiment ! can tell yon. Lieutenant W. R. Foley, a Stratford officer, is chief instructor to the regiment. but I hear he returns to his regiment (the 2nd O.H’s.) when they move forward from their camp, 2o miles from here. W’c will he sorry to lose him. as he is a line officer, and it is a pleasure to work under him. This regiment is composed of nearly all Kkh Reinforcemtnts. There are more forms of amusement here than one would expect—picture show, circus, music hall, and there have boon some very lino concerts. There is splendid talent amongst the troops, and a man would not see hotter boxing tournaments in any stadium than there is here, as the best boxers of the Southern Seas are present.

The drink question is also well managed by the introduction of the wet canteen. Every unit lias its wet canteen for the safe of drink except whiskey and brandy, which is not sold in Egypt. The system works splendidly. F have been here four Weeks, and have not seen a drunken man, and I think now that a wet canteen should be ,n every camp in New Zealand, open lor certain hours, as is done here. Ihe food is good and sufficient. Argentine meat (beef), cheese, jam. dried fruit, and vegetables and bread, which is baked by the 4th and oth Australian bakeries, which turn out 20.000 loaves per day each, enough for 80,000 men. It’s a treat to see the bread they turn out.

The railway line to Port Said and Suez, to Cairo and Alexandria, runs through the camp, and 7 per cent, of leave is granted to men on Saturday and Sunday to visit Cairo or other places. We always get our share of gift stuff sent from New Zealand, and also tobaccos' from the. Overseas’ Tobacco Club, and cigarettes. Duly yesterday a lot of MWdy Liverpool's Fund. South Canterbury—-sox, lollies, jam, milk, handkerchiefs, 1 .; and soap, with a cheerful little note in each, arrived. Water is our greatest trouble, as it has to be pumped a long way and all filtered and chemically treated before we get itj , We do not get much to waste; butt every’ man gets a good wash or shower bath every day. '* All water taps arc guarded by armed sen-

tries day and night, and any man uho gets caught wasting water gets a bad ume mi round. Ram we no not get. i,nt a frequent visitor is a rharnseen or Sami storm, wii.-.!i lasts sometimes throe days, cau d by a wind from the south-west, oil the great Sahora desert. It is slightly hot, ami the sand fills everything. It driits over the rails and stops railway traffic. After the last one, we had seven feet of sand drifted over the rails in one place. Everything goes down before the storm.

Just now everything looks well in the fertile belt, of which we arc ,iust on the edge. All the wheat, barley, and rice is being harvested, and the cotton is just about nine inches high, the young dates are just formed. The native farmer (fallaheen, as they call nirni is a very energetic chap, and farms his little plot all tiie way, although some of his methods are very much out of date. He rides a little donkey about as big as a “skim dick” yearling calf, and as a rule his son and heir is on behind, while his wives bring up the rear on foot, and the rest of the family strung out behind. The women do most of the work. The man does all his ploughing with a water buffalo cow and a wooden plough, the latter made out of the branch of a tree ; it is a very crude affair. He threshes his grain with a stick (the branch of a palm leaf), or at least his wives do, and lie cuts Ids straw up into chaff or tihn (tihhin), it is called), and sells it to the Military for horse feed. They do not give anything away for nothing. 1 hey want payment for everything, and three times its value at that. They are terrors to steal from the soldiers—kits go every night—hut they will not steal from anyone they have eaten with or broken bread with, though that docs not happen very often, as they are ton dirty. . This is written in a tent on the floor, while I am lying on a blanket, my head in a mosquito netting hag. which is black with (lies on the outside.