PORTMANTEAU P007 19361129

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                                       Sesheke,                                              N.R.
                              29th November, 1936.
Darling Everybody,

Here we are again,
Happy as can be,
All good friends and
Jolly good Companee.

Yes, we're very well indeed this week, and it's been raining solidly all day and all the seeds are ready to be taken out of thcbir cots and put into proper, grown-up Beds now.    And we're SO happy and having SUCH fun, and me 'usbind is Such a darling one, and the wonderful Son is going to be SO wonderful that I can't help feeling well.

Is this a wide enough margin for you, Daddy? The first two I know were very bad, but I hope all the ones since have been wide enough. I know how trying it is having to take letters out each time to read them, and I hope it is all right writing on the back of this paper, because it is so thick that my ordinary length of letter wouldn't fit into the envelope on one side only!

Tragedy Number One this week.  One of the baby owls has DIED. I fed them yesterday morning; as usual on live grasshoppers, and there was one extra huge grasshopper almost a locust in fact, - who was making himself extremely objectionable by jumping out of the cage everytime I opened the door. So I picked him up in a fury and my hand, and tendered him to the Owl, who plucked him in half and swallowed him whole, if you see what I mean.    Well, he had to gulp rather hard, and shut his eyes and pushed with his neck, like Sham does when he has raw meat, and eventually the thing went down.    He sat there quite still for a little while, and shut his eyes and hunched his feathers, and I thought he was just nice and well-fed, so I picked them both out and placed them on a shelf while I cleaned the cage, and then put them both back again and stroked their noses till they stopped clicking their false teeth at me and went to sleep.

And at teatime my Husband came and woke me up after my siesta with the Tragic news that the Owl Was Dead. There he lay, stretched out on his side, with his little claws quite limp and his little eyes quite shut and his little heart quite still.  And the grasshopper had Killed him. Sob, sob, sob.

Then an exciting thing happened, because we suddenly saw a small owl just like ours flying about the trees in the garden, so we thought we'd let the other little lonely one go and see what happened. He could fly a little, so it would be quite safe and the kindest thing to do, so we took him out and placed him neatly on the lowest bough of the big fig tree, and the other one came and fle into one of the branches above him and called to him, and he went "Squeak squeak" back.

At last he summoned up all his courage and took a great big Jump and flapped violently with his wings, which took him on to the ground about half way between that tree and the next, to which his brother - we suppose it must have been his brother - had already flown. So we picked him up and put him on that tree, and presently his brother lured him on to the next, all the time getting him further away from the house.

Eventually it got a bit dark, and we had to go off for our walk, so we left them still hooting and squeaking at each other, Brother saying "Come on, you little slow-coach" and poor little fellow saying "I can't, I'm too small."  When we came back from our walk they'd got to the second to last tree before the huge blank space of the aerodrome, so we left them there and I don't know how they got themselves across the aerodrome, unless they just stayed in the tree till he could fly properly.  But we haven't seen them since.

Tuesday, 1st. December, 1936.

Do you know what I am wearing to-day? My thick navy blue shetland jumper that I bought in St. Andrews last year, and my thick warm blue skirt, and Wooly etceteras! It rained solidly all yesterday, and it has been grey and cold and windy and lovely all to-day, and it's such a marvellous change to have to sleep under a rug in the afternoon instead of looking for the coolest room in the place and still being hot.

We have been very social this week.  On Thurs evening we walked down to Miss Breach's garden, and she gave us some parsley and some cuttings of passion fruit and some roses, and then we went back with her to her little house and had sundowners with her and Mr. Read (the cattle one I think I told you about, who is always at daggers drawn with the Government). She's such a funny little person, Miss Breach - a mixture of Dear Aunt Agnes and Little Miss Exley, with her bright orange hair and huge round blue eyes and face like parchment.    She is sixty, South African, and has ten sisters and two brothers!! Sorry, slight exaggeration on my part! I meant 12 brothersandsisters).

Then on Friday we had Miss Lanz up to tea as usual, and on Saturday we had the Monteverdis the people at the Mission who look like a pubkeeper. We had sardine sandwiches for tea, and chocolate biscuits, and it was rather fun entertaining in my own house for the first time, and doing the "'ow many lumps, Sam? Two?" stunt.  We talked in English, but I think they would prefer to talk French as they had a little difficulty in understanding sometimes.  

They came in their car, a Ford V8 vannette) bumping over the grass and sandy tracks and ant-hills. It can't have been very pleasant. They had been out on tour for a fortnight or so, in their car, and had gone along the "road" they have been making to a place about thirty miles away to do something or other - I didn't quite gather what. The "road" is a wide patch of sandy ground from which the trees and bush have been removed, but I shouldn't think any car could get through the deep,  slidy sand that there is on the part nearest Sesheke that I've seen.    

They hadn't seen any game at all, which was very dull of them, and hadn't even heard a hyena!

And THEN, on Sunday, came mail again, and the lovely wire from Pax and Weston saying how thrilled you are over Robin - or Judy! We haven't got your letters yet saying what you suggest, but now that you have presumably written them we tell you what we thought of calling it.

Robin, as that includes Dad; and Uncle Robbie who married us and who is G's godfather; G, as it is one of his names; G's grandfather; and no doubt a whole horde of other people, and also it's the name we both like best, and we think Robin Clay sounds rather nice, and there are no other Robin Clays are there?

Baden as his second name as it gives a touch of my ex-name which we thought might be nice.

That's all for the boy.

Judy, because we both like it, and it's nice and short. Do any of you object very strongly? Because if so I'm afraid you'll just have to Lump it.

Minella, because we found it in a book, and G wanted to call her Ella after his favourite grandmother, and I can't bear Ella, but we both think Minella is awfully sweet, do you? Anyway, she won't be called it, but I couldn't bear her to go through life as Ella.

St. Clair, because of it being my sort of family name and I would like my daughter to carry it on, even though I hate having the name myself!

And that's all for her. it's really too many, but we both wanted those two last names, but she couldn't be called either of them, and we both love Judy. Do you think those are all right?

Now to answer your letters.

MUM. POOR you, having all that work on your hands, and I feel sure you are doing much too much. I am so glad Rusty is such a darling. it's just as well we didn t get to know him too well or we wouldn't hare been able to part with him! How pathetic, poor Army getting lost like that, and we can sympathise with you over it having lost our Wol. Yes, Heather told us all about the exciting scandal of Mr. Brooke-Knight running over a man and Killing him and never stopping, In fact we got so thrilled about it that I went so far as to write a Poem on the subject. Did Heather show it to you? I am so proud of it!

DAD.    How simply thrilling and lovely the House sounds, but I can quite understand you're not wanting to leave Pax, although it must be Frightfully tempting, with all the refrigerators and radios and fires and things, and of course glass drawers for socks and things are just heaven, aren't they. And all the crockery and things provided too - it sounds just too good to be true.    But I can't imagine Rusty scrabbling on the sofas, and all the lovely curios and things we have at Pax being transferred into those surroundings - it wouldn't be HOME.    Couldn't you have it as a sort of Retreat, to go to when there are too many people at Pax and you want to have a rest? Or wouldn't you be allowed to have it as a second house?  It's terribly kind of the King to offer it to you, isn't it.

G is writing to you this week to thank you for your very sweet letters to him, and to assure you that I haven't ruined his life for him - yet! He doesn't get much time for writing letters, as there is rather a lot of business connected with Taking Over a station, and anyway, that's what his wife is for, for writing his private letters for him.

Mummy. Thank you so much for Fixing Harrods for me, and for doing the fool-glasses etc. I am glad you saw the same man as I did - the one with one arm, as it does make a difference if they know already what you are talking about, doesn't it: I like his taking such a fatherly interest in my welfare! Young Granny really is marvellous, isn't she. I was so glad she came to the wedding as I'd heard such a lot about her and I thought she was a perfect dear, and so bright and gay.  Poor Ralph walking into the Kingsley Hotel looking like a Workman, and I don't blame him for leaving it and going somewhere else; we laughed like anything over that, and Uncle Ernest cutting him dead on the platform;   We DO hope you manage to get the lovely bluebell wood at Abbot's Wood, as it would make such a difference.

How terribly sweet of you to send us Xmas presents, and I know we will love them when they come. We are thinking of having all the Locals up for a great Binge on Xmas night, which ought to be rather fun, with Crackers and Champagne and Christmas Pudding.

I forgot to tell you about our Armistice Day. Me 'usbind went to the Office, and at about ten o'clock a messenger came down to the house with the box of poppies - mouldy little ones with no stalks - and I bought two and stuck them in my buttonhole and went on with my typing.  I looked up and saw the time wasabout 1/4 to 11, so I thought, "well I'll just stand up for two minutes at eleven", and when I looked at the clock again it said 23 minutes past eleven! So I thought nobody would mind if I didn't stand up, as I wasn't feeling too well that day and two minutes is such a long time.

Then there was your lovely typewritten letter, which didn't seem half so much You as your written ones, but I know it is much easier to type than write, isn't it, and much less tiring.    Weren't those pictures of Dad doing his exercises comic! Thank you so much for sending them to us, they were awfully good and SO like him, which newspaper photos usually aren't.    Oh, how funny, you going to a lecture on Gas Attacks, and I do hope you didn't go and try the gas as it would be so bad for your eyes I'm sure. They are still "scaring" about gas at home, are they - thank goodness we are well out of the way of that here.

I think that's all there is in the letters to answer. Now I'll tell you another excitement we had the other day. When G and I went for our evening constitutional down to the river we passed a bunch of excited-looking natives whith shovels and some dogs, who were jumping about and barking the dogs were - and they started digging in a big hole near the path.  So on our way back from the river we went and asked what they'd got there, thinking it might be another pangolin or something, and they said "inama" which is just any kind of game, and used some word that G didn't know. So we thought it might be a small buck that had dived down a hole to escape the dogs, and we went on home, and passed two of our boys running out to see what all the fun was about, and they told us they had heard it was a porcupine "chinungi".

Then later they brought it up to the house, dead, and so we put it in a shed to wait till the morning to take a film of it.  It Was rather high in the morning, but I took a film from about 25 feet so it was all right! It was very dead.  It was quite a big fellow, and seemed awfully heavy, and two boys had to carry it, and it hung right down in the middle. It had got such funny feet, and a little tail hanging out at the back covered with smaller, sharper quills. We asked the boys what they were going to do with it, and they said "Eat it!" So we said they liked having thorns for lunch, did they? Which amused them highly.  So that was the end of him, and they didn't dig out any more from the hole.

There has just been a slight interruption to this letter, as we have been rather busy getting an Owl out of the chimney!  Phibbs had told us that there was a nest of some sort in the sitting-room chimney, and when we tried to light a fire in there last night (for warmth, which we needed!) the smoke just poured out into the room. So this morning I told them to "wamya" it (i.e. make it good) so Musonda pushed a stick up from below, and Chishimba and Shimeo climbed up on to the roof and stuck a stick down from above, and they finally located an Owl.    So they got him up to the top, and tied a string on to his leg while he was still hampered by the smallness of the chimney from struggling, and then, when I was ready with the camera down below, they pulled the string and out flew Owl.  Shimeo the Timid leapt a mile and with a scream of terror leapt round to the other side of the chimney pot and cowered down behind it! I do wish I could reproduce noises on the camera, because the boys' remarks, and their giggles as they were poking about there were, too funny for words. They just love anything out of the ordinary or exciting or new, and Chishimba goes "blurbblurbblurb" in his funny deep voice, which I think is impossible to hear, and Shimeo squeaks and giggles and shrieks if anything happens.

So the Owl flew up out of the chimney, and then found he couldn't go very far and started sliding down the roof, with Chishimba holding the end of the rope so that he couldn't escape altogether.    He got down on the the path quite near me, and tried to fly once or twice, and I took a good film of him close to, and then we put him in the meat safe to wait for G. Then G came down for tea - morning tea, I mean - we looked him up in our Priest's book, and found he was An African Barn Owl, the most frequently seen owl in Africa.

The book says that they are almost the most useful and beneficial birds to man in Africa, because of the enormous number of mice they kill - each bird eats two mice a night for twelve years, so if you can work that out it makes quite a pretty little sum and shows how valuable Owls are. It's a very interesting book - four fat volumes - and it is such fun looking up all the things we meet and finding out all about them.

He was rather sleepy, as it was in the day, so he didn't try and peck us or anything, though he did struggle quite a lot. He lay on his side in the meat safe quite calmly till we'd seen what he was, and was quite calm lying in our hands when we examined him for colouring, and was so gorgeously soft, with a lovely soft deep ruff of white feathers all round his face, with his black, pooly eyes in 

the middle. It seems a shame that he's got to make a new nest now, somewhere else, as we of course let him go at once. We are wondering if he is the parent of our two Baby Owls, as we aren't sure what kind they were as they were only young and hadn't got their grown-up clothes on yet.

Well, that's all for this week, and I haven't any more time now. I'm afraid this letter isn't frightfully exciting, but it brings you our love, and says how TERRIBLY happy we are.

                          Your two (and a half!)

                                    Us.