August 21 Friday – In Guildford, England Sam wrote again to Livy.

Oh, poor Livy darling, at 8 tomorrow morning your heart will break, the Lord God knows I am pitying you. Smythe & I have done what we could — cabled Mr. Rogers to have Dr. Rice there at the ship & keep all other friends prudently out of sight — for if you saw them on the dock you would know, & you would swoon before Rice could get to you to help you.

Hour by hour my sense of the calamity that has overtaken us closes down heavier & heavier upon me; & now for 48 hours there is a form of words that runs in my head with ceaseless iteration — without stop or pause — “I shall never see her again, I shall never see her again.” You will see the sacred face once more — I am so thankful for that. …

I eat — because you wish it; I go on living — because you wish it; I play billiards, & billiards, & billiards, till I am ready to drop — to keep from going mad with grief & with my resentful thinking [LLMT 323].