June 1 + 

We discuss post mortem affairs quite genially and without restraint. It is the contempt bred of familiarity I suppose. E⁠⸺ says widows’ weeds have been so vulgarised by the war widows that she won’t go into deep mourning. “But you’ll wear just one weed or two for me?” I plead, and then we laugh. She has promised me that should a suitable chance arise, she will marry again. Personally, I wish I could place my hand on the young fellow at once, so as to put him through his paces⁠—show him where the water main runs and where the gas meter is, and so on. + 

You will observe what a relish I have for my own macabre, and how keenly I appreciate the present situation. Nobody can say I am not making the best of it. One might call it pulling the hangman’s beard. Yet I ought, I fancy, to be bewailing my poor wife and fatherless child. + 