Item 4 - Letter from A. E. Housman to G. C. A. Jackson

(With an envelope.)

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Transcript

Trinity College | Cambridge
14 Feb. 1928

My dear Gerald,

I got your Christmas letter in surroundings very unlike your own. This has been the severest and most violent winter since 1894–5, what with frost and snow in December and gales and floods ever since. Once also we had a silver thaw, with roads and streets a sheet of ice, on which no one could keep his feet, and cars spun round and round. However, I noticed no buffalos hiding behind anthills, so we have something to be thankful for.

I heard from your mother about the same time, and she seemed to think that the condition of your Company’s affairs might lead to your having only two years instead of three; but I do not gather that from your own letter, and it would be a pity.

I suppose you will have met Oscar by now. When he was here in the summer I thought him very much changed since the war, but no doubt you would recognise him.

I am probably fixed here till June, when I expect to take a short holiday in France.

Your affectionate godfather
A. E. Housman.

[Direction on envelope:] Gerald Jackson Esq. | R.C.B.C. Ltd. | NChanga, Via N’Dola | N. Rhodesia | Africa

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The envelope, which bears a 1½d. stamp, half torn away, was postmarked at Cambridge at 3.15 p.m. on 14 February and at Ndola, N.W. Rhodesia, on 10 March.