February 3, 1916 - GOTT MIT UNS!

Back from his trip to Hartford Joe is back on his typewriter and chatty as always. We always heard him play with language, especially French, just to irritate Helen. Now we can see that this started right at the beginning of their relationship.

February 3,1916.
Dear Helen:
After several very pleasant days in Hartford, and in spite of the severe snow storm that threatened to tie up things, we came back safely. But on my return discovered that one of the appointments in New York for tomorrow had been postponed till next Wednesday; and also that my brother would be in Winsted during the greater part of the day, requiring my presence here.
The storm has been very severe blocking traffic and making traveling very unpleasant, especially for those who lived in the country. You've heard of James Whitcomb Riley's ‘knee deep in June’, but around some parts of Shelton it looks like knee deep in snow. Who was it mentioned those July evenings during January afternoons? However, it's a relief to see the snow and now the clear weather in contrast to the miserable drizzle that has been continuous since last Sunday.
I had a good laugh, for while at a banquet last night in the Capitol City, there happened to be several French waiters in attendance, and just for a joke, when one of them asked if I'd have cream in the coffee, I answered 'wee’. I had seen the cawfee- as Bert Hubbard writes it. One of the men happened later to be discussing something or other, and rather absent mindedly I whispered 'poor kwa',and he told it over again. Well, the joke is to-day he asked me to attend a French play that would be produced in Hartford some day next week. I believe, and I very gracefully declined, for fear that he would discover that the knowledge of French is confined almost exclusively to that volume of French used by Abe Kabibble and Krazy Kat. It seems that I'm getting to be some linguist, for I also remember that 'pelele' pronounced paylaylay in Spanish means straw man. By the way, I read somewhere that in the "Western front the Germans put up a sign over a trench they had captured inscribed "GOTT MIT UNS*! The English not far away, having as large a vocabulary of German as I have of French, read the sign   and were puzzled, then posted a reply, as I remember it, "CERTAINLY WE HATE MITTENS,WHAT OF IT?"
I read in the local papers that Amato sang in concert here the other evening, and made a phenomenal success in singing the Prologue from Pagliacci. It's so long since I've heard him sing it, that I almost regret that I missed this opportunity.
Friend Cold is packing his grip and seems about ready to depart. I’ve promised to buy him a ticket, but there'll be no return coupon attached.
Sincerely,

*GOTT MIT UNS means God with us in German.
The next letter will be February 8.