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an excellent clerk, but an utterly hopeless N.C.O. & I really cannot see him as a full Corporal in charge. And Casmi goes readily on doing [ ?] under instructions, & he may be quite good by Feb. But I still think it is ridiculous to base such senior ranks after such short service. The member of my Corp giving me the most trouble at the moment is my little dog Peter. It has always been a self willed, obstinate little sod, but he is getting worse. He would not come in the other night, nor stop barking, & eventually, at midnight, I had to put on gum boots over pajamas, & sludge out through the mud & spend 1/2 hour getting him. It was then that he received the first real beating he has had as yet. He was most surprised & pained. On Saturday, while watching a [ ?] football match, he was losing his temper a bit with Dan, Ben's Boxer dog about twice his size. I picked up Peter & put him on my knee. I let him go after about 10 minutes & he immediately attacked Dan with the most
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fury - & so I did the same to Peter. And again today, he attacked a small white dog, in a really bad tempered way. He seems to be becoming a fighting dog, which is the last thing I want. So I fixed him up, took cross strap off my Sam Browne & laced into him with that. He screamed & howled & gave me most pathetic looks - but he has been very humble & affectionate for the remainder of today. Also he is getting frightfully randy - he does not jump up on dogs thank goodness, - but on the slightest pretext, his thingmugbob sticks out. I think Chamatzski feeds him too much meat & so he is now going on ration of bread & rice & gravy & stock & porridge. I have just been sent a new officer to take the place of Moseavitz. He is 25, comes from Poland, has been in Palestine 5 years, was in a Bank in Jerusalem, - & his name is Dekman. He seems a pretty timid, unenthusiastic [pretty dopy son ?] of individual. I do not think he will be much use. God knows how they select these people as officers. He came out of the same officer's course as Ben's brother, who as I think I told you, is a pc class chap, & they turned him out as a private soldier. It really
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is a bloody shame. Tuesday Dec 16th And I had an A.G. today, dated Nov 1st, which is 6 1/2 weeks to get here. It is too silly - & they call it the All Air Routes. You said how ready & willing you were to come out here, to me, providing the journey would not do Maxie any harm. You are magnificent, my darling - & wonderful - to be willing to go to any reasonable limits to come & join me wherever I am. Even if my application to come home is unsuccessful, & you are not able to join me, I shall always remember that you wanted to & tried to. But I am not considering that seriously yet, by one means or another we [will underlined] beat the forces which keep us apart. I have had one interruption after another tonight. I have written the few lines above between 8-30 & 11-30. Goodnight sweetest Barbara. XXX H. Thursday Dec 18th I went into Tel Aviv yesterday afternoon in order to buy Christmas presents for the Hopkins, then I go to stay with them. I had not the faintest intentions of staying there for more than an hour or so _ & then I saw a poster showing that Bette Davis in "The Letter" was on; & I remembered you saying what a wonderful film you had thought it to be. & so I did not hesitate. Ben had come in too, as it was his wife's birthday, & so the three of us went together. I thought it was 1st class & Bette Davis' performance was tremendous. She was on the screen practically every moment of the time, & I simply cannot imagine anyone else being one quarter as good. I wonder what Gladys Cooper thought of it? I had some quite good news today - a letter from Col Leicester to say that he was passing on my
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recommendation that Ben-Ariz be appointed 2nd l/cl in the Corp & that he expected it to be approved. My last letter on the subject was very strong & to the point, & I should have felt not a little annoyed if he or they had refused. This means, of course, that Solaman will go to another Corp & will, as a Captain I hope, because he has done very well. I gave him a good write up; & that Headley will go too, as they cannot very well have a Jewish L l/c & a British subaltern. I shall not miss them so very much, as I have very little in common with either of them - except being British. I suppose I shall miss them in that way. But Ben is the only one upon whom I look as a friend, & it will be a bit easier having him as a Captain. And I do not think that the Corp will suffer so very much - Ben will do Salaman's job as well, if not better; & Headley is hopeless as a platoon commander - far worse than I was as a ]Terratoreal ?]. The man loss will be that I shall no longer have at least one really good platoon commander, when Ben goes up to 2 1/c. In any case it will require some more reorganisation, which I will make things a bit more interesting for a time. And so that will now be four [ ?] in one year. I'm making up for my faithfulness to you in other directions, though, that is a pretty silly remark really, because I should loath [ ?] to the unfaithful to you, my darling. I heard the other day that the wretched Belreus has been been put on the unemployed list, or in other words, sacked from the Army. It was ridiculous even to have taken him on.
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It is lovely to think about our house after the war, isn't it, darling one. You talked in your last letter about that walled garden house in Burley in Wharfedale that really was a perfect house, providing it was not too noisy from the street. A lovely bedroom for us, & the same kind of room downstairs - Adam, were they? (You may not see what I put first - you would laugh too much) And that sweet little room - & that awful panelled dining room, could have put to some use - & the kitchen & pantries etc were so good. And easy for buses to Leeds & Bradford. I wonder will it be empty after the war - what about asking Gordon to have a look - they would love to have us so handy - & maybe buy. My old pal, Geoff, could be just down the road too. I'll feel inclined to give up golf, though, except for an odd game from time to time. I want to spend all of every weekend with you, & even if you came with me to go for a walk, it was so much time. I would much prefer to go the walk with you, the weekends are so short anyway. If I go away for 3 hours, we then begin it so late or else cut a great slice out of the middle. No, I want to be with you all the time - & I want you to want me to be too. Or else I will play golf . I must [ ? ? ?] I haven't done for weeks. Love to Maxie & all my dearest love to you XXX H.
