MAIL FROM EGYPT

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23620, 2 April 1940, Page 8

MAIL FROM EGYPT

EIRST ECHELON MEN y LETTERS EAGERLY AWAITED DUE ANY TIME NOW., Parents and other relatives and friends continue eagerly to await tlicir first letters by surface mail from the members of the first echelon in Egypt. Letters have been received from them from intermediate ports on the journey to Egypt and by air mail from Egypt itself, but none as yet from Egypt by ordinary means. The main body of the first echelon disembarked in Egypt on Monday, February 12, so that seven weeks have now elapsed. Owing to tho secrecy made necessary by war conditions the post office has no definite information in advance about mails, and the authorities i were actually expecting yesterday a mail from Egypt that did not come. "I think all anxiety will soon be relieved," a postal official said yesterday, "and once the mails start to come they will come regularly." He pointed out that even in peace time mails from Egypt took a month to reach Now Zealand, and if connections were missed they might take considerably more. He did not think there was anything in the belief that the delay was being caused by censorship, as that could bo carried through very quickly. The official believed the delay could be quite adequately accounted for by the normal length of the route, coupled with tho various delays in transit inseparable from a condition of war. "Any time now," was his forecast for the arrival of the mail which means so much to "many throughout this country.