AN AVIATOR'S POSTBAG.

Mt Benger Mail, 18 March 1914, Page 3

AN AVIATOR'S POSTBAG.

j EMBARRASSING OVERTURES. J Every mail brings bundles of letters : to Mr Hawker, at his headquarters, at ! tlie C'.L.C. motor garage, Elstemwick the 'Melbourne Ago"). Most ot the epistles come from girls, who occasionally enclose a photograph and al- ; most invariably express an irresistible desire to "fly" with the celebrated avia- | tor. One girl concludes, "Please, dear.•st Mr Hawker, do take me up with ■ you." The object of these outbursts is quit* unmoved. Business firms write highly congratuI latory letters, and wind up with a : statement of their capacity of effecting ; repairs to aeroplanes and motors. Small i boys, burning with the youthful ardor ot emulation, write weird letters hegI gmg that Mr Hawker will take an in- ! unest in them and teach them to fly. i On? man actually wrote a poem to j "Harry Hawker, the man eagle and j sailor of the sky." whom he described i as "guardian over all the Dreadnoughts | waiting low down upon the sea line.' | The most humorous letter of all was ! perhaps written in all seriousness by its j author. It is not w + h<'!t a ring of ! pathos, it. read as fan ■: 1 am writing this to irsk you if you would undertake to solve for me a problem of no small dimensions. In other words. 1 want to prove it 1 am the victim ot a strange ser.es ot coincidences, or. a there are such persons in the world as "Jonahs," and if 1 am one. Listen to some of my experiences: 1 go out in a car with a party—who have just returned safely from a trip—and the engine runs dry and melts the bearings, the car winch picks me up tor tile run back to town has new covers, yet we have three blow outs. Every car 1 go out m suffers some misfortune. 1 and three others send every week to Tattersall's for 1months without result? i draw out. and the other three draw £IOO prize. I visit a friend at Aspendale, and hihouse 's half burnt down. 1 can produce evidence to support me when 1 say that in following the races last year 1 confined myself to hurdles and steeples, and in evofy case the horse 1 hacked met with an accident, and either had to be destroyed or to be retired. The >amo misfortune follows me everywhere. I put my little all into a concern that promised weJl, and six months after my investment it was out of existence. In these circumstances can you wonder that I regard myself as a Jonah, and at times 1 am almost tempted to give up fighting. It some cireum-tanccs could be found that 1 ou'd come through w thout mishap, it would be a new lease ot life to me. and it is for this 1 am writing to you. Would you undertake to solve the problem for me by carrying me as a passenger on one ot your trial flights.--I rusting in your kindness, \ours very silicon lv.