sufi
lala
May 6. Today I tried the experiment of taking up more than mere notebooks. I took a canvas, a dozen brushes and a full set palette. The Palette was disastrous. Within a few moments of taking off, I noticed Indian red on my sleeve. The observer crept forward to the navigator’s seat where I was, and shouted into my ear, ‘Have you got everything you want?’ ‘Yes, thank you’ I shouted back, ‘but you have got some ultramarine on your cheek. I remembered noticing an air gunner holding the palette at a dangerously acute angle as he handed it to someone. And worse. Nearly all the so carefully arranged large clumps of paint round the palette’s edge were, I saw now with dismay, gone. They had evidently slipped off or been smeared off. But I could not be Without them. They must be found, scraped up penuriously from the floor or anywhere. Then I saw the legs of the air gunner. My precious cadmium red! The observer, the pilot even, all were strangely daubed handed round proved in that cramped space more distributive than cleansing. Their hands, their faces, their flying kit were crimson, blue, white, black, yellow, or tartan. It was a great success.
