"Has that man permission to leave the Parade Ground, Sergent?"

Depicts an Officer commenting to a woman beside him on a horseman going in the wrong direction, across the desert. The illustration is associated with the magazine, 'The Kia Ora Coo-ee'. It was written and illustrated by Australian and New Zealand troops serving in Egypt, Palestine, Salonica and Mesopotamia, was printed in Cairo and appeared in monthly issues between March and December 1918. With ten issues in a single year it seems to have been the service magazine with the longest and most regular record of publication. The security of the base in Cairo, and the availability of a commercial printing establishment, enabled the editors to produce a magazine which was in every respect thoroughly professional, attracting advertising revenue and making a comfortable profit. Australian soldiers wrote about all aspects of their war experience in broadsheets, newspapers and magazines which were produced on the troopships, in the trenches and back at their bases. The Kiaora Coo-ee was one of the most successful widely distributed of these publications. It was the official magazine of the Australian and New Zealand armies in the Middle East and was professionally printed by the Sphinx Press in Cairo. The average monthly distribution of The Kiaora Coo-ee was some 13,000 copies and it covered themes ranging from the quality of the food and the level of physical discomfort to irreverent digs at authority. The magazine ran poetry, prose and illustrations. There was a large pool of talent on which to draw; possibly the most famous contributor was Banjo Paterson, who contributed several poems and short stories while serving as an officer in Egypt. The Kiaora Coo-ee was keenly sought as a souvenir, and some soldiers arranged for copies to be sent directly home, with payment being deducted from their wages. This may explain why so many copies have survived. Frederick George Hoare (b. 1887) was a Sapper with the 1st Field Engineers, AIF. He served with the Engineering Unit in Moascar, Egypt 1916-1918. He was a draughtsman by trade and joined the AIF on 16.3.1916. He also served with the 2nd Field Squadron, Australian Mounted Division. He embarked back to Australia on 1 May 1919, but from June to August 1919 was in London undertaking, on full military pay, a course in 'Studio and Lithographic work' with L. Upcott Gill & Son. He provided illustrations for the publication 'The Kia Ora Cooee' in 1918.