Levack Mine Sudbury Ont September 12 1929

My dear Ben,

Just about a couple of hours ago, I sent off the telegram to you. I guess you shall have received it long before this letter.

No, my dear pal, I am all right except for the fact that I have here a nasty cold and my tummy seems a bit out of order. But my friend the doctor here gave me some pills and medicine for both ailments and now I feel as though the recovery is in sight!

The exhibition was the goods! I knew that it was the greatest yearly exhibition is the world, but the realization sure cleaned up the expectation. What a lot to see! Cars, aeroplanes, agricultural halls, art galleries - all the industries were well represented. We watched the three mile race and the excitement of Ross's victory over Pritchard was too much for the crowd! Also listened to some nice music. And didn't we have fun with all the competitions, or, rather, games of skill and chance! And Irene was most lucky. She got two large boxes of chocolate and some smaller ones of caramel. I was singularly unlucky. But I enjoyed myself just as much!

Dear Bennie, I do hope you are not jealous because I was happy with someone else! You know perfectly well that of all my men friends you stand supreme. there are no other fellows that I can love as much as I love you. But with girls it is on a different plane altogether. If you would fall in love and be happy I would be ever so happy for you, although is you got another boy-friend, I would turn sickly olive colour with jealousy! You understand me well, don't you, my dear fellow!?

I received a letter from you mother yesterday and read it in the mine - on the 7th level to be exact! Yes, it does seem to me that since I left Farmington, all sorts of nasty things happened. I am awfully sorry about it: I guess I would be a lucky mascot for Farmington! I bet you are absolutely all in and looking forward to having a rest in New York. Poor Bennie, I would love to be with you to help along, if I could, and if you let me!

My work is getting on splendidly and i have heard through my roommate that the manager, Mr. Sharp, is going to promote me - to the machine work - I should imagine. It is beginning to dawn on my that I like my work very much! It wasn't as difficult to get down to it after the fine time I had in Toronto.

Thank you very much for the papers Bennie. They are always very welcome to me because they contain a lot of such interesting stuff, which I snap up with pleasure.

Well, goodbye Bennie. Give my love to mother and Auntie Lydia.

Your always loving Guigui

Levack Mine Sudbury Ont. Friday, August 30th 1929

Sweet Bennie,

You dear fellow! You still seem to thing there is a chance of me not liking your letters 100%! Hasn't the fact taht I have so often written to yo, succeeded to prove definitely how I appreciate your letters! Bear in mind Bennie, that every letter I receive from you is so much joy to me - gladness to hear from you all the news of your household, happiness to feel your dear, warm friendship. Oh Bennie, dear, I am so happy to be your friend!

I have received your book and papers. Thank you ever so much, Bennie. The book made me feel rather sad - you understand well don't you? But it is a fine book - it made me me think, as well as feel. I have recognised many people in the book - I mean I know some people that are just like the characters in it. The book was finished in something like four hours - nothing missed out - so that you can imagine how interest I was. The papers also provided the reading for the whole morning, and I have read the article about Dr. Cromwell.  The part of the paper on book-reviews is certainly interesting. Also the article on the building of the Panama Canal. That must have been wonderful! I have thought about it yesterday when I was picking and shovelling a ditch about thirty yards long, and felt sorry for the poor hundred odd cranes and dredges employed! They must have stained their coal-burning tummies, bless their mild-steel hearts.

A friend of mine has written a post card to me to tell me that I have passed Physics.  Another friend told me that I have passed Geology. And I know I have passed the rest. So that is a bit of worry off my shoulders - Rah!

I am now working underground where the work is very much harder than in the rock house. But I practice the Big Three and all goes well. I think a lit of you Bennie and remember our talks, and all that has been said.

Well, I have only half an hour to write a letter to your mother so I must stop. Love and kisses to mother and Auntie Lydia.

Your Loving Guigui

Levack Mine, Sudbury, Ont. August 25 1929

My Dear Bennie,

It seems years since I have written to you - it is disgraceful. Just a lapse though, my dear Bennie, because I love writing to you and I love receiving your letters. They make me feel so happy.

At last I have received your "second letter" with the snaps and yesterday I got your last letter with more snaps. They are simply marvelous! I love them, Bennie.

When I read your letters (the "second" and the last) I couldn't help thinking of that bit of poetry you copied for me. I admit I got quite "oily" around the eyes! I suppose anytime I shall happen to turn up at your home, I shall find the door open to retrieve me and your mother and Auntie Lyddia and yourself ready to welcome me? Gee, life is worth living with friends like this in it!

I have just written a long letter to Nenette (I received one from her the other day) and I told her during the two weeks with you not an angry thought or feeling of annoyance got into me; how my life was all smiles! Of course, I left out the stalling of cars on slopes........*@!!! Her address is c/o Mr. V. R. Hope
I can decipher your letters easily - well, not too easily but eventually every word is made out. Of course, the machine is far more efficient in this respect. You go ahead and do it exactly the way you want to. I heard you say that it is quicker on the machine. Well, use the machine. It doesn't seem a bit cold or formal - it was your fingers that pressed the keys, not a secretary's!

Owen has helped you a lot I see. Varnishing floors and fixing up stoves. You naughty fellow; you have never let me do anything for you by the way of helping you when I was over there! Except pick bugs! There, I admit, I felt satisfied when the job was over: they (bugs) were loathsome!

I am glad that you think that I have summed up Owen's personality fairly accurately. I am not much good at that sort of thing so this is a booster. Nothing like contemplating other people to make you forget your little petty annoyances and worries. You know whom I am thinking about don't you? When I read your "second" letter, I felt very depressed. When you have written it, you still had hopes, you were still struggling, you were full of determination to win, to set her right. And now...But we are better to forget it. Everything possible was done. The patient would not be cured.

I am getting a bit tired of the rock house. The work is a bit monotonous. I wander around a lot though, and worry poor fellows by requests for information. They are always please to tell me "all about it".

While I write this letter you have already sent me the duplicates of the snaps with the "second letter". I am afraid, but hope not because it is base extravagance to have duplicates. By the word "cluck" I no doubt you meant "cheque", but have written the word "cheque" - check - chuck - cluck. Do you see: (a) simple spelling mistake, (b) evolution of a "ch" into "cl", and simultaneous involution of "e" into "u". Thus "cheque" becomes "cluck" or Darwin is a fake!

You do not want to tire yourself Bennie. Fake it easy. Moderation, Direction, and Restraint work wonders!! I never get tired now. All my nervous energy is being slowly but steadily transformed into physical energy. Soon I shall be like an ox. Or is it possible?

The week after next, I am planning to go to Toronto for a couple of days to see the Great Yearly Exhibition there. I shall most probably stay at the friends house; you know the ones I have told you all about. The young lady of the house and I are very good friends, perhaps a bit more (wow) and she wants me to come over all right! You know Bennie, I like her an awful lot. I use the word "like" to be mild. And if you would see her [and you might some day] you would like her a lot too and would compliment me on my taste. But then, I forget, you do not care for girls much, do you? Well, you know I am not much of a shiek, but this girl is a peach. Reminds me of pieces like"Who", "She's a grand grand girl" and above all "The song of Spain". You remember I told you of that wonder piece of music I couldn't remember? Well, I saw it again in Montreal on the way here, and now I can hum it with ease. It is simply wonderful! Whenever I hum the tune I loved to pick up on your piano you know the one, it goes like this: /_.,_ _\,_ _/,__/. | | _ . _.,______ (I remember the times when I danced at Lakewood!) I wonder if you can get the rhythm I am trying to describe. It is a combination of Morse Alphabet, French accents, and ordinary commas.

I am talking a lot of rubbish! You must be thinking I am going out of my head. Well, anyway, it is too inferiority complexed. It isn't even superiority complex. It is superlative complex of super self-esteem of self satisfied-ego (Gash!) And now from the ridiculous to the sublime: How are you?............................
When will your holiday end, anyway? Here I am working hard and you are there playing with potato bugs, amusing yourself with the coroner; in fact simply wallowing in bliss! Well, a lot of healthy exercise with the  spade ought to keep you from putting on undue beef! [Please do not think me callous, dear Bennie. I must have some outlet for...er.....elfishness!] I hope it isn't Selfishness!

Kiss your mother and Auntie Lydia for me. I hope that all is very well with them both. I give you one too, my Bennie, the dearest pal on earth!

Your loving Guigui

Levark Mine Sudbury Ont. Sunday August 18th, 1929

Dear Bennie

To-day is Sunday, the day of rest and peace. The sin shines brightly, it is hot and everybody slumbers. But I , alas, am full of energy.

I have so far received six letters from you. The last one of August 15 or 16 (badly printed). It was such a sweet idea of sending me a four leaf clover - you dear Ben! You know I do not thing I have ever seen one before since once, I think, in Siberia. the letter with maps has not materialized.

Poor doctor! And Miss Stone must have felt like nothing on earth. I bet she is bordering on a break-down. Death has visited Farmington lately, it seems. How did he get one over? These connections do not seem to be very solid, either.

You poor Gravedigger! I hope are not that callous kind Shakespeare brings forward in "Hamlet". Well, well, well....I kind'a thought that the notorious word of "burglarize" would be colloquial. You must next see if there is such word as "antiburglarizationism". If there is, I'll take to drink!

I may have taken all the rust with me, but I am not so rusty (!) This work is doing me a lot of good. I am getting to be quite tough. Hard boiled Herman, in fact.

Dear old Owen! You know, he rather interests me. Externally, his a type of healthy, sporty, simple, though intelligent youngster; fond of machines, interested in all the latest inventions and in fact just what is understood by the expression of "Young America". But under that there lurks a very sensitive nature - I think. I think I see it in his searching anxious gaze in his eyes when he is talking with someone - which belies the lazy congenial smile on his lips. He is a bit of a dreamer too, I think. He sets high standards for himself. What do you think of his Phycology?

I now got well acquainted with the boys that work in the rock house. There are some very fine fellows there, in spite of their surroundings. It was rather hard for me to adapt myself at first. There were two courses for me: to remain aloof and make them understand the social difference, or to wise up and be like them - in the good sense. I certainly chose the latter. The first, due to the fact that I was just a workman, would inspire first ridicule, and then, enmity in them towards me. Besides, this is the "New World" (thank God) where the "casts" are a bit simplified. By a series of wrestling bouts and impressed the fact that it takes two small boys to get me; my reportee showed them that I could "talk to them" and above all, that in a general bit of sapping of any form, I could take the defeat  in good grace and not be over-revengeful, but still be "all square". Yesterday, we had some fine time which made the time simply fly. Fellows had handfuls of dust poured down their necks from behind; two of the fellows - French Canadians- chases me up to the beams near the ceiling. I pushed their faces as they came up; jumped down on the belt and finished up with wrestling with both of them at once. We never finished it - the boss came in...and was tickled to death! We were dusty, but soap and water put everything right.

Oh, how I would love to have been with you at Lakewood! It was sweet of Auntie Lydia to remember me! And it was so sweet of you all to think of me at the sound of jazz! Oh I love jazz! And there is none here! BOO!

Well, please kiss your mother and Auntie Lydia for me. And you, dear pal, a well controlled hug and a "loud one".

Your Guigui

Levack Mine Sudbury Ont. August 9.

My dear Bennie,

Just got your letter and I am hastening to reply to it at once.

I got your letter which you wrote while I packed - you are sweet Bennie. You see, to get our mail we have to go to the post-office - a short walk but the one I am apt to forget - not from now on tho'! Well, here goes a short diary of what's happened since I start working. My job is in the "Rock-House". No danger getting any strenuous work there! It consists of sorting out high grade, low-grade ores from a continuous line of rock debris that are moving on a rubber-belt four feet wide past you at a speed of 6"-8" per second. The hard work consists of the fact that out of 8 hours we have a chance to sit down only during a twenty minutes interval at lunch time at 12. Work is from 7AM to 3PM. I felt tired the first two days but now it has no longer any effect on me.

So Monday and Tuesday were off easily. On Wednesday, I went for a nice refreshing plunge in the river after work. The same on Thursday. By the way, on Wednesday we went to the Finn Hall. There was dancing but only four couples participated at the the accompanyment of a harmonium and we soon went home disappointment. There was no Jazzy orchestra with a "coon" rythmn, no "Wedding of the (illegible) Hall and without there - if you don't know people - you can't dance much.

Excuse please the rotten writing but I must write fast to be able to concentrate! You know me, Bennie!
.........
Yesterday (Thursday) we were loading a truck with heavy wooden beams, 10" by 10" and with cast iron weights and jaws of steel rock crushers. I did some honest sweating then all right and welcomed a change from the monotonous work in the "rock house". I'll have to do it for a week or two weeks more tho'!

To-day I have worked one hour over-time, if you please, and of course get pained for it. They don't pay us much in the rock house - only 41c per hour! Down the mine we get 59c and that's a lot better.

When I remember it, I am careful - very careful about: (1) Moderation (2) Restraint (3) Direction
and I am damned if I remember the fourth!

By the way, Bennie, it will be perfectly O.K. if you leave Mr. A.F. Sharpe's core out of my address. That way, I shall not have as wander over to his house and bother him with my correspondence.

I told you, you could beat Owen if you get brutal and slam the d-d pill from the shoulder! I bet you placed them in a mean style too! All I hope is that you won't bust Owen's morale. Go easy Ben.

To our doctor's progress is a zig-zag on the graph! I wish I was over there to put some rough stuff over! Well I'll do it when I come back and after a year's work in the mine, I ought to be quite efficient at at! But anyway, in a years time, she will be all-right!

You talk about a "couple of letters". I got only one- the one you wrote while I was packing. It's a queer climate they got here. There may be no snow till December, yet the worst snow storms are in March. The winter is "shifted" about three months later than in Siberia. I am looking forward to ski-ing and snow-shoeing; that will be some experience!

My biggest trouble is eating together with miners; some of them come down with filthy hands and faces and positively sweat dirt as they eat. It turns my insides upside down. the French Canadians and Slavs are the worst offenders, while the Finns, of whom there are a great number, are scrupulously clean. During the lunch, which I get at twelve, which consists of sandwiches, cake, fruit and tea in a thermos - and of which I partake by myself - is my best meal!

Gee, Ben, there is no piano here that I can play! Isn't it awful! I haven't had any letters from my friends but uncle has written me a letter through which I thought I detected an atmosphere of cheerfulness which gives me a vague idea that all goes well with him! That's fine!

Well Bennie, dear pal, I better close now. I have written this letter almost solely to tell you what I was doing, how I am (I am feeling fine) and all about "meself-rah"! I shall write again soon again. I shall certainly "break this life-long silence" of mine - for you.

Please give my best love to your dear mother and equally dear Auntie Lyddie and just take a hefty hug from your loving friend.

Guigui

P.S. It took No Effort to write this letter - Hurrah!!! Remember me to Freda, Owen and all the rest.

Levack, Sudbury, Ont. August 4th, 1929

Dearest Bennie,

Well, how are you, dear fellow? Gee, I was sad to leave you that night, I felt so happy at your home - life, as I said before, was like one sweet delightful dream - the only thing I got annoyed at is when I stalled the car going up-hill! Now, now, now!......"I'm playing another ball"!

Well, here I am. I have just written a letter to Mrs. Stinchfiled and therein are all the news. Now, I shall try to find something that I might have missed out.

At Montreal, I went on a two-hour bus trip all around the town. The driver explained, after pointing out all the interesting buildings. It was very delightful. It was so very funny to see what a splendid job the French Canadians have done to separate themselves socially from the English. There is a special French part of the city and the architecture of the houses struck me as being rather peculiar: the front door is on the first floor so that the wooden stairs, often winding through an angle of 90 degrees, lead to a height of over fourteen feet high above the ground level. There is another part of the city for rich French-Canadians, yet another for rich English! The Cathedral of Notre Dame is a wonderful building both inside and outside, but it is going to be totally eclipsed by the wonderful Cathedral de St Joseph de Montreal they are building now. Have you seen the wonderful collection of crutches they have there, that were left by people that are said to have been healed at the shrine? It seems too good to be true.

well, Ben, your ten dollars won't be yours yet for about a fortnight - that's when you shall get my first cheque.

I have made silly mistakes at Montreal and Toronto: at Montreal, I asked id there was any difference in fares from Montreal to Sudbury direct or through Toronto. They said there was none. So I took a ticket to Toronto. When trying to get a ticket from Sudbury, I was short of money because there was a difference of no less than five dollars. But the company soon fixed that up and all was well. Amid all this excitment, I forgot to cheque my luggage to Sudbury and arrived there with two cheques marked "Toronto". I have to wire to have them sent over for the pleasure of which the Canadian National Railways Co. retained 70c from my scanty and fast dwindling capital. Now; however, all is well.

Mr. Sharp, my manager, has changed from Garson to Laveck about three months ago, so I got a job here.

Well, Ben, this is really all the news. I can't think of anything interesting to say, not that what I said so far is especially absorbing. How is everything at home? I hope the Doctor is better, is not, I shall send a stick of dynamite post-haste with directions how to use. How do you get on with Owen at tennis? I hope that, due to my exceptional coaching, the games are close - when you are playing punk!

Well, good-bye, Bennie, I shall write to you again.

Your loving very very much

Guigui

My address:
W.H. Peacock Esq.
c/o A.F. Sharp Esq.
Levack Mine* near Sudbury, Ont.

* This link is about as useful as an outbreak of syphilus. It is a mine-cam, as in underground, in the pitch black. "Check back to see the occasion light from blasting" it says. But then I might have to take a break from my paint-drying program.

Grantleigh Hotel, Inverness Terrace, Hyde Park W2 26/3/29

My dear M. Ben,

Your letter has given me a much pleasure and i am now all a-tingling with the prospect of coming to see you at your home. I certainly wish ever so much that will be able to "pull it off"! 

My last examination this year I take on June 15th. Giving myself a week for preparation and another eight or nine days on the boat, I shall not arrive in Montreal before the beginning of July. It is a pity that i cannot possibly come a month before, as I would love to see "Noo Yarrk" with it's buildings sky-high and bustling traffic. Well, barring accident, I shall see it all sometime!

Judging from the photographs, your home and the surroundings are beautiful. How your mother and you must love it! By George, if once I get there, you'll have a job to get rid of me, M. Ben, so now you better take your choice!

Now, there is a point to clean up: whilst Venette loves writing letters in general, I loath it - in general. Please understand that I do not write letters to anybody, unless to answer or "as the spirit moves me". However, I shall write to you again and again, dear Ben. [I have omitted the "Mr." part of it, not because of the lack of respect - Heavens above us - no, but because with "Mr.", it sounds cold!]

I have passes in all my exams, but unfortunately did not do particularly well, which annoys me immensely. I shall certainly do better in the upcoming exams!

Venette's holidays start in a fortnights time while mine are already on. I shall not go away from London, as I have a lot of work to do. She shall come to London and stay about three minutes walk from here.

My uncle has not yet made himself memorable by a letter since over nine weeks weeks ago. I am getting a little impatient. You know from Venette's letters I suppose that he has married. I have seen my aunt's photograph; she is very sweet. Next year, he is going to bring her over; she is now in Harbin, Manchuria; and we shall settle down, I hope. I am yearning to have a home again.

Well, I am closing for the present. I shall write again soon. Please let me hear from you. Give my best regards to your mother.

I remain; always your friend

Guigui


Note: I screwed up the chronology, this should clearly be the 3rd letter in these installments. Furthermore, I had always assumed the Ben was one of Guigui's brothers, but I am starting to doubt that as I read on. This is getting interesting. Here is also some more information about the Grantleigh Hotel.