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(With an envelope.)

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Transcript

Trinity College | Cambridge
6 April 1932

My dear Gerald,

When I saw your envelope with its foreign stamps and Spanish names I thought you might have got a job in Argentina; but I see it is Spain and not a job. However I hope you have been getting useful experience. Perhaps I should have been wise to pay Spain a visit this spring, which I have often vaguely thought of doing; but I had such luck with my weather abroad last Easter that I felt sure I could not repeat it. Having been very busy I have put off answering your letter till I daresay you have already started for home; so it will be safest to send it through Rupert. I was glad to have the report of your paper, read before the Geological Society {1}. The vocabulary, like the English array at Bannockburn, was “gay yet fearful to behold.”

Your affectionate godfather
A. E. Housman.

[Direction on envelope:] G. C. A. Jackson Esq. | c/ Rupert Jackson Esq. M.D. | 97 Clifton Avenue | West Hartlepool [Redirected to:] Vista Alegre 9 | Minas de Rio Tinto | Huelva Spain [Redirected again to:] Dept of Geology | Royal School of Mines | S. Kensington | London S.W.7

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The envelope, which bears a 1d. stamp and a 1½d. stamp, was postmarked at Cambridge at 3 p.m. on 6 April, at West Hartlepool, Co. Durham, at 11.30 a.m. on 7 April, and at Minas de Riotinto, Huelva, on 13 April. On the back is written, in an unidentified hand, ‘Hope you are well | RU’ (i.e. Rupert).

{1} Probably ‘The geology of the N’Changa district of Northern Rhodesia’, published in the Journal of the Geological Society of London, lxxxviii (1932), 443–515.

(With an envelope.)

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Transcript

Trinity College | Cambridge
4 Aug. 1928

My dear Gerald,

I got your letter of March 17 all right, and I have left it a long while without an answer; but I hope that your new rifle has protected you from lions and buffaloes hitherto. I am glad to hear you have become a Fellow of the Geological Society. Nicholas, who is going to be our new Senior Bursar, says he has kept a table for you in the laboratory. The Ellis you speak of was one of our Chaplains in the College chapel, and I knew him fairly well.

I spent a fortnight in June at St Germain near Paris, a place with a splendid view and a forest close at hand, and I also motored about. I escaped the rain that they had in England, but it was not as warm as June should be. July has been fine and hot, and next week I am off to spend a month in Worcestershire, Gloucestershire and Hampshire. My godfather, in whom I hope you take a proper interest, is 89 and quite in good health, but losing his memory; so be prepared for my mental decay in 20 years’ time.

I hope both you and Oscar are well.

Your affectionate godfather
A. E. Housman.

[Direction on envelope:] Gerald Jackson Esq. | R.C.B.C. Ltd. | K’Changa†, via N’Dola | N. Rhodesia

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The envelope, which bears a 1½d. stamp, was postmarked at Cambridge at 9.30 p.m. on 4 August and at Ndola, N.W. Rhodesia, on 1 September.