T. E. Lawrence to his mother

My new address is
338171 A C 2 SHAW
Room 2. E.R.S.
R.A.F. Dept
Drigh Road
Karachi
India

11.1.27

I've only just got here, and cannot yet say what I think of the place. It is comfortable, almost magnificently-built, and cool. I am in room two, with fourteen fellows. It seems a quiet place, though the stone floors and high ceilings are noisy and distant, hospital-like, after the homeliness of Cranwell. The journey out here was extraordinarily uncomfortable, owing to the crowded state of the boat. Smooth seas. We stopped at Port Said, (where Newcombe came on board for me, and took me to dinner with him) and at Basra, where I did not go ashore.

Before leaving England I got my Seven Pillars finished, and sent out the early copies to specially privileged subscribers. You will laugh at me to hear that the first went to the King: but he wanted one, and I amused myself by treating him well!

Arnie has your copy, to keep till you instruct him to the contrary. Its completion takes a load off my mind.

I'll be out here, probably, till 1932. If my book is judged a failure I'll be nearly forgotten in England by then.

N.

Your old clock is being sent to Clouds Hill.