T. E. Lawrence Correspondence – Page 234

Dear R. M. F., It is one of my sins. Lucas offered me his Webster, I wrote a short note: You presented it prettily, it came; sumptuously printed, & in a very beautiful pale binding: a superb book. I have read the first volume, notes, plays & prefaces: every word: and am reading vol II. My habit is to paper-mark is a page full of notes of my own, scribbled as I read. I meant to send it to Lucas when I finished the book. Here I have lit a little time, though, & my left eye gone sort of "off", so I can only read my daylight & all the daylight goes in R A F work. I suppose that means that my book-reading days are over. However I get in some hours on Thursday & Sunday afternoons: those do for holidays. What am I to do about it? He has been lucky in finding a writer who takes his standpoint & sums up life rather in his fashion. He has edited him as nearly finally & perfectly as one man can edit another. No one will ever argue Webster well enough to tell Lucas, on his own level, how well he's done him. But I expect everybody has told him that. There is such a thing as doing too well, & getting just accepted, as an act of God, & little less, & everyone would have cared to thank him for his labour. As it is . . . ? Am glad you went to Max Gate. T.E.S.