Your mother of course needed a rest away from London after the influenza got done with her; and I discovered that I had gone stale.  So she and I and the golf clubs came here yesterday—­as near to the sunlit land of Uncle Sam as you can well get on this island.  We look across the ocean—­at least out into it—­in your direction, but I must confess that Labrador is not in sight.  The place is all right, the hotel uncommonly good, but it’s Greenlandish in its temperature—­a very cold wind blowing.  The golf clubs lean up against the wall and curse the weather.  But we are away from the hordes of people and will have a little quiet here.  It’s as quiet as any far-off place by the sea, and it’s clean.  London is the dirtiest town in the world.

By the way that picture of Chud came (by Col.  Honey) along with Alice Page’s adorable little photograph.  As for the wee chick, I see how you are already beginning to get a lot of fun with her.  And you’ll have more and more as she gets bigger.  Give her my love and see what she’ll say.  You won’t get so lonesome, dear Kitty, with little Alice; and I can’t keep from thinking as well as hoping that the war will not go on as long as it sometimes seems that it must.  The utter collapse of Russia has given Germany a vast victory on that side and it may turn out that this will make an earlier peace possible than would otherwise have come.  And the Germans may be—­in fact, must be, very short of some of the essentials of war in their metals or in cotton.  They are in a worse internal plight than has been made known, I am sure.  I can’t keep from hoping that peace may come this year.  Of course, my guess may be wrong; but everything I hear points in the direction of my timid prediction.

     Bless you and little Alice,

     Affectionately,

     W.H.P.

Page’s oldest son was building a house and laying out a garden at Pinehurst, North Carolina, a fact which explains the horticultural and gastronomical suggestions contained in the following letter: 

     To Ralph W. Page

     Tregenna Castle Hotel,
     St. Ives, Cornwall, England,
     March 4, 1918.

DEAR RALPH: 

     Asparagus
     Celery
     Tomatoes
     Butter Beans
     Peas
     Sweet Corn
     Sweet Potatoes
     Squash—­the sort you cook in the rind
     Cantaloupe
     Peanuts
     Egg Plant
     Figs
     Peaches
     Pecans
     Scuppernongs
     Peanut-bacon, in glass jars
     Razor-back hams, divinely cured
     Raspberries
     Strawberries
     etc. etc. etc. etc.

     You see, having starved here for five years, my mind, as soon as it
     gets free, runs on these things and my mouth waters.  All the
     foregoing things that grow can be put up in pretty glass jars, too.