When my father died in 1982, I retrieved the cash box (green, metal, with a lock) on a string, hooked to the back of a cupboard. In it were cigar tins labelled Insurance, Holiday and Electric, with a sum of money in each (Cash makes surprise comeback amid 4.6% annual rise in ATM withdrawals, 7 January).
Mike Morris
London
• Besides being the basis of many languages, a knowledge of Latin, plus ancient Greek (Letters, 8 January), is at the root of solving Guardian crosswords – just look at the aliases of past and present setters: Araucaria, Arachne, Audreus and Auster – and that’s just those beginning with an A.
Tom Stubbs
Surbiton, London
