Page:Diary of a Prisoner in World War I by Josef Šrámek.pdf/92



Intolerable heat. We received our wages up to today. It's Corpus Christi today. Everything must be blossoming back home, and here there is barren waste. All is burnt by the sun. Days pass by. We don't even know if it's Sunday. Remembering and longing in vain still. Will the day come when we break out of this slavery, free to enjoy the world in our homeland? I am ready to doubt that this will ever be.

The Italians read the lists of those who will leave. I am separated from Roubík and Ferdinandi. The Italians examine our underwear and our genitals. We were to leave today but no ship came. The mail works poorly now.

Finally money from home arrived. I got L25.90 out of the 36 crowns they sent. The next day money came from Kohn and Kornfeld from Ústí—I got L32 from 40 crowns. Ferdinandi got two parcels—food cans, cigarettes, chocolate. The Armenia and Regina Elena camps left. Dante got a new lieutenant who requires order and discipline from his Serbs and Croats.

Many parcels arrive daily but half of them are robbed. The Italians smoke Austrian cigars and cigarettes in public. The large ship Sinai