One Who Will Not Return

IN the January “PIM” there was a set of amusing verses, “Land of the Pharaohs”, written from “a dug out in the Libyan desert”, by Private E.

H Price. For all their levity, there ran through them a note of home-hunger, a longing for the pleasant, green coun tries under the Southern Cross. The last verse was: — You can see why we’re sick of the desert, The sand and the flies and the dust.

We wouldn’t stay here for a minute— It’s simply the fact that we must.

But when ail the Nazis are finished, And our work in the army is o’er, We’ll leave all our troubles behind us, And return home to roam—never more!

The day after the verses were pub lished, we received advice from Mrs. J.

Price, of Savu Savu West, Vanua Levu, Fiji, that her son had been killed in action. Another young life sacrified in order that we, whom they left behind, may continue to live in freedom.

Miss O. M. Duder, of the Methodist Mission staff at Suva, Fiji, was in New Zealand last month spending furlough.

Rev. and Mrs. W. F. Paton, Presbyterian missionaries in the New Hebrides, are at present in Tasmania, on long furlough.

Mr. Nestor Elliott, Government Auditor in New Guinea, recently married Miss Phyllis Simpson, of Mosman, Sydney at Salamaua District Office.

Mr. A. E. Barker, who has been asso ciated with the Methodist Mission in Fiji for over 25 years, resigned in December to return to Australia. For many years, he has been the Mission’s business man ager and manager of the Book Depot.