Mr. Angst, the English Consul, is a very great man, and it was a fine thing to be a friend of his in Switzerland. He and his wife showed us a great deal of hospitality, and we passed many pleasant days enjoying his collection of curios, swords, and china, which are all Swiss, for he is a patriot. A delightful excursion is by boat to Rapperswyl, calling at fifteen or sixteen stations down the lake on the left. There is a little hotel Der See, one of eight fronting the little quay. We had a delightful breakfast, after which we re-embarked and came up on the other bank. Next day there was a great Consular dinner, which lasted from twelve to six, at which Richard and Dr. Baker attended. Here we met a very nice Mr. and Mrs. Chippendale. We had a charming excursion to Uetliberg, and another to Einsiedeln up in the mountains; it is the Swiss Lourdes. The scenery was lovely, the air beautiful. We had a good dinner of blue mountain trout at the Pfau. We went all over the Cathedral, and the circle of pious shops, and drank from the fountain of fourteen spouts. We bought pious things, and the monks came in at three o'clock and sang the "Ave Maria." Our return was on a beautiful summer evening; the lake glowed in colours, there was a gentle mist and a full moon, but we arrived very, very tired.

During this Swiss trip, Richard always brought Catullus to table d'hôte, and whenever he was bored he used to pull it out and write his notes upon his Latin copy.

I did all I could to persuade him to go from Zurich to Bâle, from Bâle to England, to leave the Service and to stay in England till he was thoroughly rested and well; then we would go back and pick up our things, or let them be sent after us; but he would not hear of it. I tried this twice during this Swiss journey when we were halfway, for I saw that the frequent attacks of indigestion and nervousness and gases round the heart were on the increase, and it did not seem that any climate, or any staying still, nor yet travelling, improved them. Still he persevered in saying that he would keep on till next March, when he would be free, and be home the following September.

During the last six months of his life (to show how tired he was getting of everything), he used frequently to say to me, "Do you know, I am in a very bad way; I have got to hate everybody except you and myself, and it frightens me, because I know perfectly well that next year I shall get to hate you, and the year after that I shall get to hate myself, and then I don't know what will become of me. We are always wandering, and the places that delight you I say to myself, 'Dry rot,' and the next place I say, 'Dry rotter,' and the third place I say, 'Dry rottest,' and then da capo."

Wartenstein is a châlet-restaurant which holds about thirty visitors, and there is a lovely view. We left Ragatz when we had seen everything, and went on a new line of railway only opened a fortnight before, up to Davos-Platz, six thousand feet high. The scenery is always nice and sometimes grand. We were lodged in a fine large hotel, the Belvedere, which was not finished. The centre of the scene is a plateau swamp in the middle. The roots of the surrounding hills are covered with hotels, villas, and pines, and above them again are high mountains with snowy peaks and fine air. In winter it is dry and covered with snow; it is the great consumption focus, and people say it is full of germs. Here we met five people we knew, amongst them Father Graham, a priest from London. We had come here on purpose to make acquaintance with Mr. John Addington Symonds, but he was gone away, and he only came back on the evening before our departure, and we saw him for about an hour, which was better than nothing.

We had a delightful drive from Davos to Maloja, with a comfortable landau, two good steady grey horses, and a nice coachman; it was a truly delicious day, which I shall always remember amongst my mental treasures. We ascended the Fluela Pass through gorgeous scenery, starting at ten o'clock. In an hour and a half we stopped to give bread to the horses, and then in another hour and a half we came to the highest point, 6700 feet, where we were in deep snow; a lake was covered with ice, and two Mount St. Bernard dogs greeted us. Here we baited the horses with bread and wine, and lunched from our basket. The Schwarzhorn, 13,000 feet high, was to our right; there were glaciers and chamois, gorges and grand ravines. When we started again we descended to Süs, a large village, where we rested, had tea, and baited our horses for a couple of hours, and then we drove on two hours more to Quoz. I think Quoz one of the prettiest places I ever saw, and should like to have stayed there longer. It is a beautiful, romantic, Romansch village; the scenery is lovely, the hotel is civilized. We put up there for the night, starting at ten o'clock the next morning, and arrived at Samäden, where we were very badly treated by the landlord, who made us pay sixty-six francs for three-quarters of an hour's entertainment.

Three-quarters of an hour further we arrived at St. Moritz-Kulm, stopped our carriage, got out for a moment, and in opening the door ran up against Canon Wenham, of Mortlake, who is our spiritual pastor where I now live, and whom I had known for at least thirty-five years. He was very glad to see Richard, and we frequently met during our stay in Switzerland. Canon Wenham has since told me that when he first saw Richard at St. Moritz, that he kept saying to himself, "I wonder whether you or I will be the first to go?" Richard died two months after that, and ten months later he performed his funeral service at Mortlake. The baths and the village are below in the valley. We soon started again for Maloja, but did not get in till 4.30, owing to an accident. For the third time our horses suddenly behaved queerly; they were steady, plodding brutes, but one sprang over a low stone wall, leaving the carriage on the other side, and the other stood trembling, sweating, and sobbing as if it was going to have a fit. It was a narrow road with a sharp precipice into the lake, and very little would have sent us rolling into it. We were some time extricating ourselves. We all got out, and the horses were unharnessed and taken into a neighbouring field, where they recovered themselves. I was dreadfully frightened, but Richard was quite cool. On all these three occasions the coachman and Lisa and I thought that the horses saw something we did not see, but Richard and the doctor opined that there was some natural cause, such as a snake crossing the path. The gypsies passed, and stopped and helped us.

Maloja hotel is a luxurious palace at the head of the lake, looking down the lake on one side, and on the other down into Italy. It is the last of the Engadine plateaux, has glorious scenery and air, snow mountains, and blue sky and lake. We found here Mr. and Mrs. Stanley, accompanied by their faithful Captain Jephson, and Mr. Stanley's black boy Saleh, Dean Carington, Mr. Oscar Browning, and Mr. Welldon (Headmaster of Harrow), Sir John and Lady Hawkins, the Duchess of Leinster, Lady Mabel Fitzgerald, and Lord Elcho, Mrs. Main (lately Mrs. Fred Burnaby), Miss Emily Blair Oliphant, Mr. and Mrs. Bancroft and son, Lord Dunraven, and other pleasant people.

There were all sorts of amusements—a large ball-room, beautiful band, theatricals, concerts, alpining, fishing, and kodaking, picnics, glee-singing by a chorus of workmen, who sang at the church in the morning—everything that could be desired, but our chief amusement was driving. We used to go over to St. Moritz Kulm, where we met Mr. Strickland, who edited the St. Moritz news, and Father Wenham.

At Maloja Richard talked to me a great deal about the possibilities of what might happen in case of his death—"Not," he said, "that I am thinking of dying;" and I told him that I thought he should leave literary executors. I mentioned four people who I thought would expect to have a "finger in the pie," so to speak, in case of his death, but he absolutely declined to let anybody but myself search into his papers, and desired me to see to it if any necessity arose. He said, "No one has helped me but you during thirty—I may say thirty-five—years; who is likely to know so well now? Besides, I know that you will do everything for me, body and soul—that you would wish done for yourself." A little while after this he called me into his room and said, "I may very likely live for years, but I should like to leave three papers, which I am now going to sign in your presence." The first concerned religion, the second his private papers and manuscripts, and the third his money and mining affairs, and I have carried them all out to the very letter from the day he died till now.

The lake was very grand in a storm, black, green, and yellow, with lowering black clouds, enveloping mountain and lake, lit up by dark red lightning. We had great fun in being photographed by the Rev. Mr. Stewart, who was here with two charming sisters, Mr. and Mrs. Stanley, Richard and myself, and Saleh the black boy, and Mrs. Bancroft placed us. Mrs. Bancroft made us all laugh just as we were going to be taken, by seizing up a long broom-handle and poising it as a lance, saying, "Won't you have me as Tippoo Tib?" Mrs. Stanley did a very amusing thing; she got a piece of paper, and turning part of it down, said to my husband, "Will you give me your autograph, Sir Richard?" which he readily did, in English and Arabic. She then turned up the back of the paper, on which she had written, "I promise to put aside all other literature, and as soon as I return to Trieste, to write my own autobiography." So we all signed underneath him, and since I have had it framed.

On the 31st of August he deplores the death of his friend, General Studholm Hodgson.

The next day we left Conradi's to get to Como. The train was an hour late; we had to go in the third-class with forty-eight people, and the boat was late too. The lake was looking lovely, with its villages, especially Gravedona, Varenna, and Bellagio, which reminded us of Madeira. We were about seven hours doing twenty miles. We had delightful drives through the trees above the Villa Lervelloni to the ruined castle which overlooks Como with all its three arms of the lake, and listened to the bees and the birds, smelled the forest, and were glad we were alive. We also went to Como itself. In the evening we met Sir Frederick Napier Broome, late Governor of Western Australia. We were now reading Sinnett's "Kârma." We left Bellagio early, a couple of days later, and went down the other side of the lake (Lago di Lecco) on a very pleasant morning. You take a branch railway, and join the main line (Milan to Venice) at Rovato for Venice. We went to the Grand Hôtel, but soon left, as the gondola music used to drive Richard wild. There is one man, if he still exists, who sings as if he would burst, like the cicala.

On the 7th of September we left for Trieste, sauntering down the Gran Canale in gondola the last thing. We had a comfortable journey, and were glad to get home that evening after ten weeks out, which we had thoroughly enjoyed, except on the occasions when Richard was suffering. But how sorrowful it would have been, could we but have foreseen that it was the last journey we should ever take together in this life! If we could but look forward, we should not be able to bear it.

Home for the Last Few Weeks.

The few following weeks at Trieste we continued to write together in the evening, he being engaged all day with his "Scented Garden," his "Catullus," "Ausonius," "Apuleius, or the Golden Ass," and other things, as he had been since his last Supplementals came out (November 13th, 1888); and in early morning we used to take a list of all the manuscripts published and unpublished, their destinations when packed for England, and sorting the correspondence into years; and Dr. Baker took a great many photographs, as he had done all this year in the garden, of us and the views and friends, which I am having formed into two lamp-shades on gelatine.

These last few weeks Richard kept saying to me, "When the swallows form a dado round the house, when they are crowding on the windows, in thousands, preparatory to flight, call me;" and he would watch them long and sadly. Strange to say, after his death seven of them took up their abode at his window, and only departed in December. They are building again at "our cottage" at Mortlake. It seems as if he were watching.

On the 11th of September he deplores in his journal the death of Sir William Hardman, of the Morning Post.

On the 20th of September, a month before he died, in his diary he writes, "I feel too well," and another paragraph, "The house covered with swallows;" and then he says that night, "Sat on balcony—perfect evening, perfect day." He was then taking papaine for his gout.

On the 27th we had gentle earthquakes late at night, but which were prolonged till dawn.

In October he complains of liver and biliousness in his journal, but remarks that his cure was working well.

On the 15th of October we paid together our official visit to the Governor and his wife, and we had friends to breakfast at the Hôtel de la Ville, where he was very gay. He was not very well in the evening, but nothing particular, and a glass of hot brandy and water seemed to set him quite right. I had begun partly to dismantle the house, and to put away things to make it easier for packing on return, in order to hurry matters when we came back, previous to leaving for good. We were going to start on the 15th of November for Greece and Constantinople, and we were already sorting out what we would take, having our saddlery looked to, and writing letters to the Ministers of these countries to ask their advice on certain points, and getting letters of introduction.

On the 18th of October, Dr. Baker photographed us in the garden. Richard was always better when he first got home, and then got tired of it after. When he first arrived, 8th of September, he only weighed 70 kilos, but by the 2nd of October he had increased to 72.5 kilos.

On the 18th of October he was a little inclined to gout, and complained that he had no pleasure in walking.

On the 19th (the day before he died) he complains of a little lumbago.

CHAPTER XVI.

This was the day that we were to have sailed for Greece, but, alas! for human foresight, human misery, it was the day of the third and the last great Church ceremonial or dirge for the repose of his soul. Some circumstances that were unavoidable, not important but irritating, for the past few months had annoyed him, and he was always saying, "What a blessing it would be, and that he could hardly wait for the moment, when we two would be settled quietly in England together again, and independent of the Government, and of all the world besides!" And it will always comfort me to remember that during spring and summer, after our return from Algiers, I begged of him to throw up the Service, and instead of going any farther on small travels, to let us at once set to, pack up and return to England for good, and to defer Greece and Constantinople till we had settled ourselves in England. Also that during our Swiss tour, when we got to Zurich in August, and were so near Bâle, I said, "We are halfway to England; let us go on, let the things go; we will send back a trusty person to bring them on;" but he said, "No, he should like to brave it out till the end." Little did we think that—

"The cast-off shape that, years since, we called 'I'
Shall sudden into nothingness
Let out that something rare which could conceive
A Universe and its God."[1]

We had occasion sometimes to go into the English Protestant burial-ground at Trieste—poor Charles Lever lies buried there, and by him is a cold, melancholy corner which at that particular time seemed to be a sort of rubbish corner of stray papers and old tin pots. He shuddered at it, and said, as he had often said before, "If I die here, don't bury me there. They will insist on it; will you be strong and fight against it?" I said, "Yes; I think I shall be strong enough to fight against that for your sake! Where would you like to be buried?" He said, "I think I should like you to take my body out to sea in a boat, and throw me into the water; I don't like the ground, nor a vault, nor cremation." And I said, "Oh, I could not do that; won't anything else do?" "Yes," he said; "I should like us both to lie in a tent side by side."

He was very fond of kittens, and always had one on his shoulder. When he lay dead, his kitten would not leave him, and fought and spat to be allowed to remain. Three days before he died, he told me that a bird had been tapping at his window all the morning, saying, "That is a bad omen, you know?" I said I could not agree with him, because he had the habit of feeding the birds of the garden on his window-sill at seven every morning. He replied, "Ah, it was not that window, but another." And I found afterwards this little verse scribbled on the margin of his journal—

"Swallow, pilgrim swallow,
Beautiful bird with purple plume,
That, sitting upon my window-sill,
Repeating each morn at the dawn of day
That mournful ditty so wild and shrill,—
Swallow, lovely swallow, what would'st thou say,
On my casement-sill at the break of day?"

The day before his death (Sunday afternoon), the 19th of October, the last walk he ever took, he saw a little robin drowning in a tank in the garden. Crowds of birds were sitting around it on the trees, watching it drown, and doing nothing for it. He got Dr. Baker to get it out, and warmed it in his own hands, and put it in his fur coat, and made a fuss till it was quite restored, then put it in a cage to be kept and tended till well enough to fly away again.

The last night, the chief talk at dinner was about General Booth's article—the first that came out in the Pall Mall Budget—of "How to relieve the Millions." He took the greatest possible interest in it, because (as he said) they could get at people that no clergyman of any Church could get at, and it sounded such a sensible plan. He said to me, "When you and I get to London, and are quite free and settled, we will give all our spare time to that." This is the man who is supposed to have killed and crushed everything as he went about in triumph over the world.

In point of fact, the "Richard Burton" described by part of the press, notably by the Saturday Review—the Richard Burton quoted by a great portion of the people who professed to know him so well, and really hardly knew him at all, never existed—was a man I never knew and never saw.

To the last breath, there was never a saner, or a sounder, or a truer judgment in any man who walked this earth. He saw and knew all the recesses of men's minds and actions.

All those six weeks I was very uneasy to hear him talking more than ever agnostically at the table, and to our surroundings, and to witness the conflict going on within himself in the privacy of our own rooms, because I had been warned by people who have experience in these matters, that it would be the case the nearer he was to death; and yet his health seemed so well. It never struck me that death could be so near. He said once to me, after an unusual burst at tea, which had made me sad, "Do I hurt you when I talk like that?" And I smiled, and said rather sadly, "Well, yes; it always appears to me like speaking against our very best friend." He got a little pale, and said, "Well, I promise you that, after I am free from the Government and from our present surroundings, I won't talk like that any more." And I said, "How I long for that time to come!" And he answered, "So do I."

I realized the following quotation about prayer:—

"The time may be delayed, the manner may be unexpected, but the answer is sure to come. Nor a tear of sacred sorrow, not a breath of holy desire poured out in prayer to God, will ever be lost; but in God's own time and way it will be wafted back again, in clouds of mercy, and fall in showers of blessings on you, and those for whom you pray."

The nightingales were very beautiful in our garden at Trieste, and after dinner, it being unusually fine weather in September and October, we used to sit out on our verandah smoking, taking our coffee, looking at the beautiful moonlit sea and mountains, and the moon and stars through a large telescope that stood there for the purpose, And one day I found the following on the margin of his journal:—

"THE NIGHTINGALE.

"'Sweet minstrel of the younger year,
Small Orpheus of the woody hill,
Say why far more delight my soul
That artless note, that untaught trill,
Than all that tuneful art can find
To charm the senses of mankind?'

"'Listen!' the Nightingale replied.
'The notes which thus thy feelings move
By perfect Nature were supplied,
To praise the Lord and sing of love.
Hath Art ne'er taught mankind to sing
High praises of a meaner thing?'"

The End.

Let me recall the last happy day of my life. It was Sunday, the 19th of October, 1890. I went out to Communion and Mass at eight o'clock, came back and kissed my husband at his writing. He was engaged on the last page of the "Scented Garden," which had occupied him seriously only six actual months, not thirty years, as the Press said. He said to me, "To-morrow I shall have finished this, and I promise you that I will never write another book on this subject. I will take to our biography." And I said, "What a happiness that will be!" He took his usual walk of nearly two hours in the morning, breakfasting well. People came to tea; he had another walk in the garden, when the robin incident occurred.

"How oft we've wandered by the stream,
Or in the garden's bound,
Our hands and hearts together join'd;
Pure happiness have found!
But now we linger there no more,
Beside the woods or burn,
And all that I can utter now
Is, 'When wilt thou return?'"

That afternoon we sat together writing an immense number of letters, which, when we had finished, I put on the hall table to be posted on Monday morning. Each letter breathed of life and hope and happiness, for we were making our preparations for a delightful voyage to Greece and Constantinople, which was to last from the 15th of November to the 15th of March. We were to return to Trieste from the 15th of March till the 1st of July. He would be a free man on the 19th of March, and those three months and a half we were to pack up, make our preparations, wind up all our affairs, send our heavy baggage to England, and, bidding adieu to Trieste, we were to pass July and August in Switzerland, arrive in England in September, 1891, look for a little flat and a little cottage, unpack and settle ourselves to live in England.

We had now been back in Trieste six weeks from Maloja, in the Engadine, and during those six weeks my husband did several things, with a difference that would have struck me, except for his improved health and spirits. How we should break our hearts could we see ahead, and yet how one regrets not seeing!

"What part has death or has time in him
Who rode life's lists as a God might ride?"
——Swinburne.

During this time, in spite of his having his Agnostic-talking tendencies worse upon him than ever, at table and in company, in privacy he used to lock our outer doors for a short while twice daily and pray. Our six rooms ran round in a square, cut off from the rest of the house, and as his bedroom and mine were corner rooms, I had, quite accidentally, a large full-length mirror in my corner, that gave me command of three rooms, including the chapel, so that though he was alone I could see him. And I did not alter it, lest he might have a seizure of any sort. In the chapel was a large crucifix, and he would at times come in, and remain before it for half an hour together, and go away with moist, sad eyes, and sometimes look over the books or papers.

The only difference remarkable on this particular Sunday, 19th of October, was, that whereas my husband was dreadfully punctual, and with military precision as the clock struck we had to be in our places at the table, at half past seven he seemed to dawdle about the room, putting things away. He said to me, "You had better go in to table;" and I answered, "No, darling, I will wait for you;" and we went in together. He dined well, but sparingly; he laughed, talked, and joked. We discussed our future plans and preparations, and he desired me on the morrow to write to Sir Edmund Monson, and several other letters, to forward the preparations. We talked of our future life in London, and so on. About half-past nine he got up and went to his bedroom, accompanied by the doctor and myself, and we assisted him at his toilette. I then said the night prayers to him, and whilst I was saying them, a dog began that dreadful howl which the superstitious say denotes a death. It disturbed me so dreadfully, that I got up from the prayers, went out of the room, and called the porter to go out and see what was the matter with the dog. I then returned, and finished the prayers, after which he asked me for a novel. I gave him Robert Buchanan's "Martyrdom of Madeline." I kissed him, and got into bed, and he was reading in bed.

"I hear a voice you cannot hear,
Which says I must not stay;
I see a hand you cannot see,
Which beckons me away."
——Thos. Tickell.


"Sunset and evening star,
And one clear call for me!
And may there be no moaning of the bar
When I put out to sea.

"But such a tide as moving seems asleep,
Too full for sound and foam,
When that which drew from out the boundless deep
Turns again home.

"Twilight and evening bell,
And after that the dark!
And may there be no sadness of farewell
When I embark.

"For tho' from out our bourne of Time and place
The flood may bear me far,
I hope to see my Pilot face to face
When I have crossed the bar."
——Tennyson.

At four o'clock he got more uneasy, and I said I should go for the doctor. He said, "Oh no, don't disturb him; he cannot do anything." And I answered, "What is the use of keeping a doctor if he is not to be called when you are suffering?" The doctor was there in a few moments, felt his heart and pulse, found him in perfect order—that the gout was healthy. He gave him some medicine, and went back to bed. About half-past four he complained that there was no air. I flew back for the doctor, who came and found him in danger. I went at once, called up all the servants, sent in five directions for a priest, according to the directions I had received, hoping to get one, and the doctor, and I and Lisa under the doctor's orders, tried every remedy and restorative, but in vain.

What harasses my memory, what I cannot bear to think of, what wakes me with horror every morning from four till seven, when I get up, is that for a minute or two he kept on crying, "Oh, Puss, chloroform—ether—or I am a dead man!" My God! I would have given him the blood out of my veins, if it would have saved him, but I had to answer, "My darling, the doctor says it will kill you; he is doing all he knows." I was holding him in my arms, when he got heavier and heavier, and more insensible, and we laid him on the bed. The doctor said he was quite insensible, and assured me he did not suffer. I trust not; I believe it was a clot of blood to the heart.

My one endeavour was to be useful to the doctor, and not impede his actions by my own feelings. The doctor applied the electric battery to the heart, and kept it there till seven o'clock, and I knelt down at his left side, holding his hand and pulse, and prayed my heart out to God to keep his soul there (though he might be dead in appearance) till the priest arrived. I should say that he was insensible in thirty minutes from the time he said there was no air.

It was a country Slav priest, lately promoted to be our parish priest, who came. He called me aside, and told me that he could not give Extreme Unction to my husband, because he had not declared himself, but I besought him not to lose a moment in giving the Sacrament, for the soul was passing away, and that I had the means of satisfying him. He looked at us all three, and asked if he was dead, and we all said no. God was good, for had he had to go back for the holy materials it would have been too late, but he had them in his pocket, and he immediately administered Extreme Unction—"Si vivis," or "Si es capax"—"If thou art alive"—and said the prayers for the dying and the departing soul. The doctor still kept the battery to the heart all the time, and I still held the left hand with my finger on the pulse. By the clasp of the hand, and a little trickle of blood running under the finger, I judged there was a little life until seven, and then I knew that, unless that happened which had happened to me,[2] that I was alone and desolate for ever.

I sat all day by Richard, watching him, and praying and expecting him also to come to. I thought the mouth and left eye moved, but the doctor told me it was imagination. But what was no imagination, was that the brain lived after the heart and pulse were gone;[3] that on lifting up the eyelids, the eyes were as bright and intelligent as in life, with the brilliancy of a man who saw something unexpected and wonderful and happy; and that light remained in them till near sunset, and I believe that soul went forth with the setting sun, though it had set for me for ever. I was so convinced of his happiness, that I lifted up my heart to God in a fervent thanksgiving for him, and I knelt down with my broken heart and said my "Fiat voluntas tua," and when I rose up I said, "Let the world rain fire and brimstone on me now." It has!

"So nigh is glory unto dust,
So near is God to man,
When Christ whispers low, 'Thou must,'
The heart replies, 'I can.'"

Before twelve o'clock that morning, eight Masses were said for him in the churches. My confessor came to pray by his side. Burials here take place very soon, but I had sixty hours conceded to me; and there were prayers going on in that room, offered up by priests, pious people, and the orphans from our orphanage, who passed the night by him from eight p.m. till six a.m., watching and praying and reciting the office for the dead, the rosary, and singing hymns; and all day there were good people doing the same, and myself always. It was I who closed his eyes and who bound up the jaw, and the doctor who straightened the limbs. He looked in a peaceful sleep, with adorable dignity and repose—a very majesty in his death—every inch a man, a soldier, and a gentleman.

"Weep no more about my bed;
Weep no more, be comforted.
Where I am ye soon shall come;
This, this only, is our home.
I am only gone before,
Just a moment's little space;
Soon upon the painless shore
You shall see me face to face;
Then will smile and wonder why
You should weep that I should die."
——Charles A. Reade.


"Jesus, I have not loved Thee best,
Nor given my heart to Thee;
But let my truant bosom rest
On meaner things than Thee.
'Twas love that led Thy hand to part,
That cherished idol from my heart."

Mr. Albert Letchford, sculptor and artist, who had been working in our house for nearly a year, painted a most striking picture (natural size) of my husband after death, which is now my dearest treasure. He also took a plaster bust, and his hand and foot, which were beautifully formed and small. The hand and foot are mine; the bust was purchased by Richard's friend, F. F. Arbuthnot, but broke in the casting. All day friends flocked in, as the custom is, to say a prayer, and to sprinkle the body with holy water—not counting those who stayed there. The idea was suggested to me that I need not bury him at Trieste, and so exile myself from home for the remainder of my days; that the Austrian Government in its great kindness and delicacy would make a way open for me; and when I reflected how he longed to reach England, and to lay his bones in his native land, I determined that it should be so, though not in the manner we had hoped and wished, and that my home should still be "our cottage." For a sure test of real death, I requested that the left ulnar vein should be opened, and a strong charge of electricity should be applied for two hours; and then the embalmers came, and I was turned out of the room.

There are two ways of embalming. The one is disembowelling, and filling with spices as in the old days, but that would have necessitated the body being removed from the house. The other, a more modern way, is the injection of some substance in the veins, which, if a success, makes the body look like white marble. This latter was the one chosen. Only I was not allowed to kiss him after, and everything in the room that was used, even to the mattress, had to be burnt. The embalming was done by the Protofisico, Dr. Constantini, and Dr. Merlato, with three assistants, our doctor and Mr. Letchford being present. Our ritual enjoins the observance of the customs of the country in which we live; he was therefore laid out in full uniform, the room dressed like a chapelle ardente, surrounded with candles, and covered with wreaths sent by friends.

"His dews drop mutely on the hill,
His cloud above it saileth still,
Though on its slopes men sow and reap:
More softly than the dew is shed,
Or cloud is floated overhead,
'He giveth His belovèd sleep.'"
——Mrs. Browning.

I find something so horrible, so repulsive, in the people who frequently abandon the dead, because they cannot bear to see them die, and leave them alone; who leave the corpse in its winding-sheet in a darkened chamber, which the household and family rush by, as if some dreadful horror was there; where no prayers or sacrifices follow to help the soul, which sees its abandonment by those whom it held dear. It seems to me that the consignment of the body to a low dark place, and the glad flying away from it, is something fearful. It makes one think of the Saviour when He descended to the Garden of Gethsemane, when Time was over for Him, and all whom He loved and trusted fled from Him. Judas betrayed, Peter denied, Thomas disbelieved, they all slept, they all hid, they all ran away from Him; and whilst He sweated blood for us, not one watched and prayed with Him. So with the soul.

"When from the trammels of this life terrestrial
The Glorifier, Death, shall set us free,
The pure expansion of a love celestial
Shall bind me closer, O my love, to thee."

The Protestant clergyman, a most charming gentleman, earnest in his profession, and a staunch friend, soon came in. I asked him if he would like to do anything, but he said, "No, there was nothing to be done." But he himself knelt down and said a very beautiful prayer.