How to find out what has happened to people sent Christmas cards

SIR – Loris Goring (Letters, December 16) asks how to avoid sending cards to the departed.

May I suggest that, if he does not already do so, he should include a return address on the envelopes of cards he sends? Then at least next of kin can inform him, albeit belatedly, of his friend’s demise so that the faux pas need not be repeated the following year.

Each year we receive a card addressed to former owners of our house for whom we have no forwarding address (earthly or heavenly) and no clue as to the address of the sender. David Johnson

Swanage, Dorset

SIR – I took some Christmas cards to the post office in Bourne yesterday. I was told by the teller behind the counter that second-class stamps were not available. Thus I had to buy first-class stamps.

Coming on a visit from a European Union state, I should be interested to know whether the local postmaster had underestimated demand for second-class stamps, or whether the Government has withdrawn them in order to increase funds available to pay for Brexit – the purchase of a stamp being the payment of tax. Mcgillycuddy of the Reeks

Nenagh, Co Tipperary, Ireland

SIR – High-street shops worried about competition from online retailers should reconsider their use of continuous loud music at this time of the year.

A diet of unending Christmas tunes for nearly a month must alienate a lot of shoppers. It is a very tempting alternative to sit in the peace and quiet of one’s home with the laptop. Neil Meaden

Alderbury, Wiltshire

SIR – I am about to ice my Christmas cake and find that the traditional decoration of green angelica is unobtainable in supermarkets and health food shops, and is only available online. Angelica used to be easy to find. What has happened? Susan Clark

Lewes, East Sussex

SIR – Where have they all disappeared to? We are struggling without any success to find a supplier of sugar mice. Has this traditional Christmas confectionery gone forever? Geoffrey Aldridge

Wingrave, Buckinghamshire

SIR – I read that, in a conference on religious freedom in Washington, the Republican senator Mario Rubio declared that, especially in the Middle East, “persecution of Christians ... has reached staggering levels”.

Surely at Christmas it is time for our Government to acknowledge this also, and to do more to help the many Christian believers forced from their homes in the Middle East as an unintended consequence of our involvements in wars there. Juliet Lloyd

Northwood, Middlesex