and the winter gales are starting off, and it can blow very badly in this part of the sea. November is about the worst month of the lot, but I hope that with any luck I may be elsewhere by then.

My clothing is getting in an awful state, I have hardly a garment that has not a hole in it somewhere or other, evrybody is in very much the same way as it a rather doubtful matter as to whether parcels turn up from home; Malta is our only hope, but they have such rotten cloth for coats etc. You are always thirsting for information as to what I am doing, but I am sorry to say that I can not give you any more than I do without giving things away that I have no right to. We are not doing anything at all exciting at present, but what we are doing is all in the scheme which naturally I can tell you nothing about. It may interest you to know that I have been made a Chevallier of the order of St: Maurice and St: Lazurus, by the king of Italy, in recognition of my services in the Adriatic, while in my last boat. It is nothing to make a song about but I am simply telling in the hope that it may serve as a sop for the information that you are crying for. When we pack up out here I shall be very pleased to let you know a certain amount of what we have been doing.

I am afraid that I can think of nothing more of interest to tell you, as there is nothing, outside service affairs going on.

Best love to you yours ever,

BC Archives, MS-0089 Box 1 File 4 / GLASSFORD, Deborah Florence (Leighton). Vancouver / Correspondence inward, 1916.