NOTES:

1. Gondokoro was the seat of Government of the Province of the Equator. 2. Sir Samuel Baker, whom Gordon succeeded as Governor of the tribes which inhabit the Nile Basin in 1874. 3. Romalus Gessi (Gessi Pasha), a member of Gordon's staff. 4. Mtesa, King of Uganda. 5. Mr. Rivers Wilson. 6. Nevertheless he permitted Dr. Birkbeck Hill to edit and publish his letters in 1881, which give a good account of his work in Central Africa. 7. Johannis, King of Abyssinia. 8. Colonel Prout, of the American army, for some time in command of the Equatorial Provinces. 9. King of Unyoro, a powerful and treacherous savage. Sir Samuel Baker attempted to depose him, but Kaha Rega maintained his power. 10. Life of Sir Richard Burton, by Isabel his wife, col. ii., p. 177.



CHAPTER XXVI. THE SWORD HANGS. (1885-1890).

Life is no holiday: therein Are want and woe and sin, Death with nameless fears; and over all Our pitying tears must fall.

The hour draws near, howe'er delayed or late, When, at the Eternal Gate, We leave the words and works we call our own, And lift void hands alone.

For love to fill. Our nakedness of soul Brings to that gate no toll: Giftless we come to Him who all things gives; And live because He lives.

WHITTIER.

In May, 1885, Isabel started with her husband for England. They travelled together as far as Venice, and here as often, they parted, and went their separate ways. Burton was ordered to go by sea for his health, and his wife arranged to proceed by land. She went round by way of Bologna, and thence travelled via Milan and Paris, and arrived in London on June 2. Her husband joined her twelve days later.

They had two objects in coming to London at this time—one was to consult physicians concerning Burton's health, the other to make arrangements concerning The Arabian Nights. The production of this book may be described as a joint affair; for though the lion's share of the work of translating, writing, and correcting proofs devolved upon Burton alone, the financial part of the work fell upon his wife, and that it was a big thing no one who has had any experience of writing or publishing would deny. There were several editions in the field; but they were all abridged or "Bowdlerized" ones, adapted more or less for "family and domestic reading." Burton's object in bringing out this great work was not only to produce a literal translation but to reproduce it faithfully in the Arabian manner. He preserved throughout the orientation of the verses and figures of speech instead of Anglicising them. It is this, combined with his profound oriental scholarship, his fine old-world style, and the richness, variety, and quaintness of vocabulary, which has given to his original edition its unique value.

In Burton the immortal tales had at last found a translator who would do them justice, and who was not afraid of prejudices of Anglo-Saxon Puritanism. Burton's view of this matter is sufficiently expressed in the following speech: "I do not care a button about being prosecuted; and if the matter comes to a fight, I will walk into court with my Bible and my Shakspeare and my Rabelais under my arm, and prove to them that before they condemn me they must cut half of them, and not allow them to be circulated to the public."[1] He expressed his views in this matter to his wife; and though at his wish she did not read the original edition of The Arabian Nights, she set to work to help him in every way that she could. In fact it may be truly said that it was she who did all the difficult work of evading the "vigilance" of certain persons, and of arranging for the publication of this important book. In order that her husband's original text might be copyrighted, she herself brought out an expurgated edition, which was called the "Household Edition." By this means she was enabled to copyright three thousand pages of her husband's original text, and only excluded two hundred and fifteen. She says, "Richard forbade me to read these pages until he blotted out with ink the worst words, and desired me to substitute not English but Arab society words, which I did to his complete satisfaction." Of course to bring out a work of this kind, and to bear the whole burden of the labour and initial expense of it, was no ordinary task, and it is to Isabel's efforts and to her marvellous business capacity that the credit of publishing the book is due. From a financial point of view the Burtons had no reason to regret their venture. At the beginning a publisher had offered Burton 500 pounds for the book; but Isabel said, "No, let me do it." It was seventeen months' hard work, and during that time they had to find the means for printing and binding and circulating the volumes as they came out. The Burtons were their own printers and their own publishers, and they made between September, 1885, and November, 1888, sixteen thousand guineas, six thousand of which went towards the expenses of publishing and ten thousand guineas into their own pockets. Isabel writes, "It came just in time to give my husband the comforts and luxuries and freedom which gilded the last five years of his life. When he died there were four florins left, which I put into the poor-box."

They had a very pleasant season in London. They were mainly occupied in preparing The Arabian Nights; but their labours over for the day, they went out in society a great deal. Perhaps the most noteworthy event at this time was that Isabel made a long speech at St. James's Hall at a meeting for the purpose of appealing to the Pope for a Circular Letter on the subject of the protection of animals. The meeting was in vain.

The first volume of The Arabian Nights came out on December 12, 1885, and the sixteenth volume, the last of the Supplementals, on November 13, 1888. Thus in a period of three years they produced twenty-two volumes—namely, ten Originals, six Supplementals, and Lady Burton's six volumes of the Household Edition.

In October, 1885, they went down to Hatfield on a visit to Lord and Lady Salisbury. A week before this Burton, having heard that Sir John Drummond Hay, Consul at Morocco, was about to retire, applied for the post. It was the one thing that he had stayed on in the Consular Service in hope of obtaining. He wrote a letter to the Foreign Secretary, which was backed up by about fifty of the best names in England, whom his wife had canvassed; and indeed it seemed that the post was as good as assured to him. In the third week in November Burton started for Morocco in order to spy out the promised land, or rather the land which he hoped would have been his. Isabel was left behind to bring out some volumes of The Arabian Nights. She brought them out up to the seventh volume, and then made ready to join her husband at Gibraltar on his way to Tangiers in January. She says a propos of her labours in this respect: "I was dreadfully spied upon by those who wished to get Richard into trouble about it, and once an unaccountable person came and took rooms in some lodgings which I took after Richard left, and I settled with the landlord that I should leave or that person should not have the rooms, and of course he did not have any hesitation between the two, and I took the whole of the rooms during my stay."

In January, 1886, just as she was leaving London, she received a telegram from her husband saying that there was cholera at Gibraltar, and she could get no quarantine there, and would not be allowed to land. But she was not a woman to be stopped; so she at once telegraphed to Sir John Ayde, who was then commanding Gibraltar, and asked if he would allow a Government boat to take her off the P. & O. and put her straight on the Morocco boat. He telegraphed back, "Yes," whereat she rejoiced greatly, as she wanted especially to reach her husband in time for them to celebrate their Silver Wedding together. When she arrived at Gibraltar, Burton, who was staying there, came off in a boat to meet her, and they called together on Sir John Ayde to thank him for his kindness. A few days later the news came to them that the Government had at last recognized Burton's public services. It came in the form of a telegram addressed to "Sir Richard Burton." Isabel says: "He tossed it over to me, and said, 'Some fellow is playing me a practical joke, or else it is not for me. I shall not open it, so you may as well ring the bell and give it back again.'" His wife said, "Oh no; I shall open it if you don't." So it was opened. It was from Lord Salisbury, conveying in the kindest terms that the Queen, at his recommendation, had made him K.C.M.G. in reward for his services. He looked very serious and quite uncomfortable, and said, "Oh, I shall not accept it." She said, "You had better accept it, Jemmy, because it is a certain sign that they are going to give you the place—Tangiers, Morocco."

There is only one thing to be said about this honour—it came too late. Too late for him, because he had never at any time cared much for these things. "Honour, not honours" was his motto; and now the recognition of his services, which might have been a great encouragement ten of fifteen years earlier, and have spurred him on to fresh efforts, found him broken by sickness, and with life's zest to a great extent gone. Too late for her because her only pleasure in these things was that they reflected credit upon her husband; and if he did not appreciate them, she did not care. Yet of course she was glad that at last there had come some return for her unceasing efforts, and some admission, though tardy, of the services which her husband had rendered. It was a sign too that the prejudice against him in certain quarters was at last lived down. She wrote to a friend:

"You will have seen from the papers, and I know what pleasure it will give you, that the Conservatives on going out made Dick Sir Richard Burton, K.C.M.G. . . . . The Queen's recognition of Dick's forty-four years of service was sweetly done at last, sent for our Silver Wedding, and she told a friend of mine that she was pleased to confer something that would include both husband and wife."

The Burtons crossed over to Morocco from Gibraltar in a flat-bottomed cattle-tug, only fit for a river; and as the sea was exceedingly heavy, and the machinery had stopped, the sailors said for want of oil, the seas washed right over the boat, and the passage was prolonged from two hours to five. They made many excursions round about Tangiers; but on the whole they were disappointed with Morocco. They disliked Tangiers itself, and the Consulate seemed to them a miserable little house after the palazzo at Trieste. Lady Burton had expected to find Tangiers a second Damascus; but in this she was sorely disappointed. She wrote to a friend from there, "Trieste will seem like Paris after it. It has none of the romance or barbaric splendour of Damascus. Nevertheless," she says, "I would willingly have lived there, and put out all my best capabilities, if my husband could have got the place he wanted, and for which I had employed every bit of interest on his side and mine to obtain." They received a great deal of hospitality in Tangiers, and inspected the place and the natives thoroughly. Most of the people looked forward to welcoming them.

On their departure they went to Genoa, which they reached after a rough voyage, and thence they proceeded by easy stages to Trieste. Lady Burton arrived home alone at ten o'clock in the evening; and as she was accustomed to be met by a crowd of friends on her return, she was surprised to find no one to meet her. When she got to the house, their absence was explained. Three telegrams were handed to her. The first was, "Father very ill; can you come?" the second was, "Father died to- day"; the third, "Father buried to-day at Mortlake." As her friends were unaware of her address the telegrams had not been forwarded, and they had kept away, so as not to intrude on her grief. The blow was not altogether unexpected, for Mr. Arundell had been ill for some time; but it was none the less severe, for she had always been devotedly attached to her father, and his house had been made a rallying-point for them when they were wont to return home.

They remained at Trieste three months, during which time the English colony presented them with a silver cup and congratulations on their hardly earned honours. Then, as Burton had to consult a particular manuscript which would supply two volumes of his "Supplemental" Arabian Nights, they left again for England. On their return to London they took up their work where they had left it a few months before. In July they had the mortification of finding that Lord Rosebery had given away the coveted post of Morocco, which had been as good as promised to them by Lord Salisbury, to some one else. It was during their few months' absence from England that the change of Government had taken place, and Lord Salisbury's brief-lived Administration of 1886 had yielded place to a Liberal Government. Such are the vicissitudes of official life. Had Lord Salisbury been in office, Sir Richard would probably have got Morocco. It was perhaps all for the best that he did not get the post, although it was a sore disappointment to them at the time. Even Lady Burton came to take this view. She writes: "I sometimes now think that it was better so, and that he would not have lived so long had he had it, for he was decidedly breaking up. The climate did not appear to be the one that suited him, and the anxiety and responsibilities of the post might have hurried on the catastrophe. . . . It was for the honour of the thing, and we saw for ourselves how uneasy a crown it would be."

Perhaps there was another reason too, for when Lady Burton remonstrated a Minister wrote to her in friendly chaff: "We don't want to annex Morocco, and we know that you two would be Emperor and Empress in about six months." This was an evident allusion to the part which they had played during their brief reign at Damascus. At Trieste there was no room for the eagles to soar; their wings clipped.

Seeing that the last hope was over, and the one post which Sir Richard Burton had coveted as the crown of his career was denied him, his wife set to work to induce the Government to allow him to retire on his pension four years before his time. She had good grounds for making this request, for his health was breaking, and this last disappointment about Morocco seemed to have broken him even more. When he told her that it was given to another man, he said, "There is no room for me now, and I do not want anything; but I have worked forty-four years for nothing. I am breaking up, and I want to go free." So she at once set to work to draw up what she called "The Last Appeal," enumerating the services which her husband had rendered to his country, and canvassing her friends to obtain the pension. The petition was backed as usual by forty-seven or fifty big names, who actively exerted themselves in the matter. It was refused notwithstanding that public feeling and the press seemed unanimously in favour of its being granted. The ground on which it was refused, apparently, was that it was contrary to precedent, and that it was not usual; but then the case was altogether an unusual one, and Sir Richard Burton was altogether an unusual man. Even supposing that there had been a difficulty about giving him full Consular pension, it would have been easy for the Government, if they had been so minded, to have made up to him the sum—only a few hundred pounds a year—from the Civil List, on the ground of his literary and linguistic labours and services. It should be added that this petition was refused both by Liberal and Conservative Governments, for Lord Salisbury's second Administration came into office before the Burtons left England. But there was this difference: whereas Lord Rosebery reprimanded Burton for his frequent absence from his post, Lord Salisbury was very indulgent in the matter of leave. He recognized that Burton's was an exceptional case, and gave him exceptional privileges.

They remained in London until the end of the year, and on January 4., 1887, they left England for Cannes, where they spent a few pleasant weeks, rejoicing in the sun and blue sea and sky. They enjoyed a good deal of society at Cannes, where they met the Prince of Wales and many friends. On Ash Wednesday occurred the earthquake which made such a commotion on the Riviera at the time, and of which Sir Richard Burton gave the following account:

"A little before 6 a.m., on the finest of mornings, with the smoothest of seas, the still sleeping world was aroused by a rumbling and shaking as of a thousand express trains hissing and rolling along, and in a few minutes followed a shock, making the hotel reel and wave. The duration was about one minute. My wife said to me, 'Why, what sort of express train have they got on to-day?' It broke on to us, upheaving and making the earth undulate, and as it came I said, 'By Jove! that is a good earthquake.' She called out, 'All the people are rushing out into the garden undressed shall we go too?' I said, 'No, my girl; you and I have been in too many earthquakes to show the white feather at our age.' 'All right,' she answered; and I turned round and went to sleep again."

The result of the earthquake was a great and sudden exodus from Cannes, and indeed from all the Riviera. Visitors fled in panic, but Sir Richard and Lady Burton went about their usual business, and were amused at seeing the terrified people rush off to the railway-station, and the queer garments in which they were clad. Shortly after Lady Burton was terribly frightened from another cause. Her husband had an epileptic fit, and it was some time before she and the doctors could bring him round again. Henceforth it became necessary for them to have always with them a resident doctor. They both of them disliked the idea of having a stranger spying about them very much; but it was inevitable, for the epilepsy was a new development, and as Burton says, "My wife felt, though she had successfully nursed me through seven long illnesses since our marriage, that this was a case beyond her ken." So Dr. Ralph Leslie was telegraphed for, and came out from England to Cannes, where he joined them. Then commenced what they called their Via Crucis to Trieste. Lady Burton thus describes her troubles at that time:

"On February 23 we were shaken to a jelly by the earthquakes—three strong shocks and three weeks of palpitating earth in the Riviera. On February 26 my poor darling Dick had an epileptic fit, or, more properly speaking, an epileptiform convulsion, which had lasted about half an hour, and endangered his life. I had six doctors and two nurses, and we watched and tended him for fifteen days; and I telegraphed for an English doctor to England by express, who came, and lives and travels with us, as Richard insisted on coming to Trieste, not to England, and will return with us. It took us, after his arrival, twenty- eight days to accomplish the twenty-eight hours of express between Cannes and Trieste in toil, anguish, and anxiety. We arrived April 5 at home in rest and comfort. He has been making daily progress to health. He is now out walking with his doctor. We had a consultation a few days ago. He will always require great care and watching all his life—diet and internal health; must not climb, as his heart is weak, nor take Turkish baths, nor overwork; and he may so live fifteen years, but he may die any moment of heart disease. And I need not say that I shall never have a really happy, peaceful moment again. In the midst of this my uncle,[3] who was like my father to me, was found dead in his bed. Then I have had a bad lip and money losses, and altogether a bad time of it."[4]

At Trieste Burton led the life of a confirmed invalid, and his wife attended him with unfailing devotion, which was in no way abated by the presence of the resident doctor "a disagreeable luxury," as she called him. They used to sit a good deal under their favourite linden tree in the garden and receive visitors. Burton's love for his wife, always deep, though never demonstrative, seems to have shown itself more at this time; and in the few remaining years he came to lean on her more and more, making her his confidante in all things. In June they celebrated the Jubilee of Queen Victoria, and owing to her husband's illness, nearly all the arrangements fell upon Lady Burton. It was she who drew up the address which was sent to Her Majesty, and she also prepared the speech to deliver in case her husband was too unwell to attend the public dinner in celebration of the event. As Lady Burton has been accused of being such a bigoted Roman Catholic, it is only fair to mention that on this auspicious occasion she accompanied her husband to the official service in the Anglican Church. Her loyalty to her Queen was unswerving. She was not required to make the speech, as Burton was well enough to be carried down to the dinner, and he delivered the oration. It was the only occasion on which he ever wore his Order of St. Michael and St. George. The effort was so great that he had to be carried upstairs again the moment his speech was over.

The rest of 1887 was chiefly taken up by a dreary record of failing health. The Burtons went away for a summer holiday as usual, and during their absence from Trieste many English Royalties arrived there with the squadron; but they were unable to receive them. On their return Dr. Leslie had to leave them, and his place was supplied by another doctor. It became more than ever necessary that a medical man should be in attendance, for Lady Burton seemed to suffer in sympathy with her husband, and as he got worse she became worse too. She writes about this time: "I am unable to take anything which might be called a walk. Driving was sometimes very painful to him, and it would not have been safe to let him go alone." It was one of her sorest trials that she could not minister to her husband as formerly; but disease had laid its hand on her too. Their life at Trieste at this time was naturally uneventful. Instead of getting up, as they used to do, and beginning their labours in the small hours of the morning, the Burtons now rose at seven, and did as much literary work as they could until nine, when the doctor would come in. At twelve o'clock they had breakfast, and after that the time was devoted either to more literary work or recreation. At four they would receive any friends who came to see them. At half- past seven they dined no longer at the hotel as formerly, but at home; and at nine o'clock they retired to rest. It was about this time that Sir Richard finished the last volume of his "Supplemental" Arabian Nights. The weather was so bad at Trieste, and his health so uncertain, that the Foreign Office again gave him leave.

He and his wife came by a roundabout route to England, and saw many old friends. On October 15 they went down to Folkestone, where they stayed a few days with his relatives. They crossed on October 26 to Boulogne. It was Sir Richard's last visit to England; he never saw his country again.

At Boulogne they visited once more the old haunts where they had met for the first time years ago, and renewed acquaintance with the scenes of their vanished youth. It is worthy of notice how often husband and wife went to Boulogne together during their married life. It seemed as though the place was endeared to them by the recollection that it was here that they had first come together. From Boulogne they went to Switzerland, where they passed Christmas. When they were at Montreux they celebrated their wedding day (January 22), and the people in the hotel overwhelmed them with presents and flowers and pretty speeches. Lady Burton says, "I got quite choky, and Richard ran away and locked himself up." A rather ludicrous incident occurred here. They were expecting a visit from the famous Elisee Reclus. Lady Burton prepared herself to receive him with honour, and she had beforehand been warned of his little peculiarities. Suddenly the door was thrown open, and some one was announced whose name she did not catch. She greeted the new-comer with effusion, saying, "Dear Monsieur Reclus, I am so delighted to make your acquaintance; such a pleasure to know such a distinguished man." Her greeting was acknowledged with equal effusion by her visitor, who then proceeded to pull a key out of his pocket, and went up to the clock. Lady Burton was somewhat surprised, but she put it down to a great man's peculiarity; so she went on talking to him, and explaining the pleasure which it would give Sir Richard to make his acquaintance, when the door was opened again,and the servant announced, "Monsieur Reclus." The man she had been talking to was the clockwinder.

From Montreux they toured about Switzerland for some few weeks, and in March they returned again to Trieste, where they remained off and on until November.

During the summer Burton's health, fortified by continual change of air and scene, improved a good deal. The Foreign Office was most indulgent in the amount of liberty which it gave to him. Lord Salisbury was now at the head of affairs; and though the Government did not see their way to allowing Burton to retire on full pension, they granted him what was almost the same thing—frequent and extended leaves; and it must be remembered too the time of his Consular service was now fast drawing to a close. Lady Burton always said that, next to Lord Derby, Lord and Lady Salisbury were their best friends. About this time Lady Salisbury wrote to her:

"HATFIELD HOUSE, HATFIELD, HERTS, July 21, 1880.

"MY DEAR LADY BURTON,

"I am very glad to hear so good an account of you and Sir Richard. We are here as busy as usual at this time of year. We have had great doings for the Shah, who is still in this country. He dined and slept here one night about a fortnight ago, and we had a garden-party for him next day. He behaved very well, and gives me the idea of being an able man; though whether he will think England a stronger friend than Russia remains to be seen. I sometimes fear he will carry away a greater idea of our riches and luxury than of our strength, but qui vivra, verra.

"We are now up to our lips in a royal marriage. It is to take place next Saturday, and will I dare say be a very pretty sight. The young lady[5] is very happy by all accounts, and looks quite radiant. Politics are pretty quiet, and there are as few mistakes made as you can expect in the fourth year of a government. I think we are rather losing in London, but are gaining in other places. On the whole all things are very quiet. With kind regards to Sir Richard,

"Believe me, "Yours very sincerely, "G. SALISBURY."

In November the Burtons started, via Brindisi, for Malta, where they passed a pleasant month, met many friends, and enjoyed themselves very much. From Malta they went to Tunis, and renewed their acquaintance with the Bedawin and the Arab tents. It was their last glimpse of the desert life which they loved so well. Among other places they visited the ruins of Carthage, and made as many excursions into the interior as it was possible, considering the state of Sir Richard's health. From Tunis they went by train to Algiers, starting on the journey at 5.15 on a cold January morning. When they reached Algiers, they were delighted with it at first; but they soon tired. Even an expedition to the baths of Hammam R'irha did not reconcile them to the place, and they left it early in March, going by boat to Marseilles, and then travelling homewards by way of the Riviera to Genoa, and thence to Venice. They crossed to Trieste the following day, having been absent more than four months.

They remained at Trieste until July 1, when they started for their last summer trip. The heat in Trieste during July and August is almost insupportable. They went to Innsbruck, Zurich, Davos Platz, Regatz, and other places. They were counting the months to the day when Burton would complete his term in the Consular Service, and would be permitted to retire on his pension. From Zurich Lady Burton wrote to a friend[6]:

"We go back (D.V.) September 1 or thereabouts, stay three months, and then winter in Greece and Constantinople. In March Dick's service is ended, and between that and August we pack up, settle our affairs, and come home for good. In one sense I am glad, because he yearns for a little flat in London; we shall be in the land of good advice and nourishment; and, God willing, I shall have brought him home safe and sound after thirty years' perils and dangers by health and land and sea. On the other hand, it is a wrench to give up my nice home. I have the whole of the second and top floor now, and I have made it so pretty, and I love Trieste and the life of my friends. I don't know how I shall concentrate myself and my belongings into a vulgar little flat—on small means. If you see any flat likely to suit us, let me know."

It was during this time in Switzerland that Burton made his wife his literary executrix. He called her into his room one day, and dictated to her a list of private papers which he wished to be burned in the event of his death, and gave her three signed documents, one of which ran as follows:

"In the event of my death, I bequeath especially to my wife, Isabel Burton, every book, paper, or manuscript, to be overhauled and examined by her only, and to be dealt with entirely at her own discretion, and in the manner she thinks best, having been my sole helper for thirty years.

(Signed) "RICHARD F. BURTON."

On September 7 they returned to Trieste together for the last time. They were both very much better for the good air in Switzerland, and settled down again to their quiet literary life, full of occupations for the present and plans for the future. Lady Burton was especially busy during these six weeks in helping her husband to sort and arrange his manuscripts and papers, and he worked as usual at three or four books at a time, especially his Scented Garden, which was now nearing completion.

I should like to interpolate here a beautiful and characteristic letter Lady Burton wrote, on October 10, to a friend, Madame de Gutmansthal- Benvenuti, who had just lost her husband:

"You need no letter from me to tell you how my heart is grieving for you, and with you, in this greatest trial woman can ever know—the trial before which my own head is ever bowed down, and my heart shrinking from in terror. And it has fallen on you, my best and dearest friend. But you have such consolations. He was a religious man, and died with the Sacraments, and you are sure of a happy meeting, just as if he had gone on a journey to wait for you; but more surely to meet than if he had gone on an earthly journey. You have your dear children to live for, and that must now be your only thought, and taking care of your health for that purpose. All of us, who love you, are thinking of you and praying for you."

Ten days later the trial she so much dreaded had come upon her. And here for a space Lady Burton will speak in her own words.

NOTES:

1. He actually compiled a book of quotations from the Bible and Shakspeare for use in case of need, which he called The Black Book. 2. Letter to Miss Bishop from Tangiers, Morocco, February 16, 1886. 3. The late Lord Gerard. 4. Letter to Miss Bird from Trieste, April 10, 1887. 5. The Duchess of Fife. 6. Letter to Miss Bishop, July 21, 1890.



CHAPTER XXVII. THE SWORD FALLS. 1890.

Life is a sheet of paper white, Whereon each one of us may write His word or two, and then comes night.

LOWELL.

"Let me recall the last happy day of my life. It was Sunday, October 19, 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 the 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.

"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 November 15 to March 15. We were to return to Trieste from march 15 till July 1. He would be a free man on March 19, 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.

"The only difference remarkable on this particular Sunday, October 19, 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 toilet. 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 Madeleine. I kissed him and got into bed, and he was reading in bed.

"At twelve o'clock, midnight, he began to grow uneasy. I asked him what ailed him, and he said, 'I have a gouty pain in my foot. When did I have my last attack?' I referred to our journals, and found it was three months previously that he had had a real gout, and I said, 'You know that the doctor considers it a safety-valve that you should have a healthy gout in your feet every three months for your head and your general health. Your last attack was three months ago at Zurich, and your next will be due next January.' He was then quite content; and though he moaned and was restless, he tried to sleep, and I sat by him magnetizing the foot locally, as I had the habit of doing, to soothe the pain, and it gave him so much relief that he dozed a little, and said, 'I dreamt I saw our little flat in London, and it had quite a nice large room in it.' Between whiles he laughed and talked and spoke of our future plans, and even joked.

"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[1] 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 no 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 . . . I was alone and desolate for ever."[2]

* * * * * * * * *

I have given the foregoing in Lady Burton's own words, as unfortunately a fierce controversy has raged round her husband's death-bed, and therefore it is desirable to repeat her testimony on the subject. This testimony was given to the world in 1893, when all the witnesses of Sir Richard Burton's death were living, and it was never publicly contradicted or called into question until December of last year (1896), eight months after Lady Burton's death, when Miss Stisted's book made its appearance. In consequence of the attack made upon Lady Burton by her niece, which has been repeated and echoed elsewhere, it is necessary to defend Lady Burton on this point, since she is no longer able to defend herself. But I should like to reiterate that the question of Sir Richard Burton's religion did not enter into the original scheme of this book. I only approach it now with reluctance, and that not so much for the purpose of arguing as to what was Sir Richard Burton's religion (that was a matter for himself alone) as of upholding the good faith of his wife. In view also of the peculiar bitterness of the odium theologicum, perhaps it may be permitted me to say at the outset that I have no prejudice on this subject. I am not a Roman Catholic, and therefore cannot be accused of approaching the controversy with what Paley was wont to call an "antecedent bias."

In this I have the advantage of Miss Stisted, who appears to be animated by a bitter hostility not only against her aunt but against the Church of Rome. In her book she asserts that Sir Richard Burton died before the priest arrived on the scene, and that the Sacrament of Extreme Unction was administered to a corpse. She also goes on to say:

The terrible shock of so fatal a termination to what seemed an attack of little consequence, would have daunted most Romanists desirous of effecting a death-bed conversion. It did not daunt Isabel. No sooner did she perceive that her husband's life was in danger, than she sent messengers in every direction for a priest. Mercifully, even the first to arrive, a man of peasant extraction, who had just been appointed to the parrish, came too late to molest one then far beyond the reach of human folly and superstition. But Isabel had been too well trained by the Society of Jesus not see that a chance yet remained of glorifying her Church—a heaven-sent chance which was not to be lost. Her husband's body was not yet cold, and who could tell for certain whether some spark of life yet lingered in that inanimate form? The doctor declared that no doubt existed regarding the decease, but doctors are often mistaken. So hardly had the priest crossed the threshold than she flung herself at his feet, and implored him to administer Extreme Unction. The father, who seems to have belonged to the ordinary type of country-bred ecclesiastic so common abroad, and who probably in the whole course of his life had never before availed himself of so startling a method of enrolling a new convert, demurred. There had been no profession of faith, he urged; there could be none now, for—and he hardly liked to pronounce the cruel words—Burton was dead. But Isabel would listen to no arguments, would take no refusal; she remained weeping and wailing on the floor, until at last, to terminate a disagreeable scene, which most likely would have ended in hysterics he consented to perform the rite. Rome took formal possession of Richard Burton's corpse, and pretended, moreover, with insufferable insolence, to take under her protection his soul. From that moment an inquisitive mob never ceased to disturb the solemn chamber. Other priests went in and out at will, children from a neighbouring orphanage sang hymns and giggled alternately, pious old women recited their rosaries, gloated over the dead, and splashed the bed with holy water; the widow, who had regained her composure, directing the innumerable ceremonies. . . . After the necessary interval had elapsed, Burton's funeral took place in the largest church in Trieste, and was made the excuse for an ecclesiastical triumph of a faith he had always loathed.[3]

These statements of Lady Burton and Miss Stisted have been placed one after another, in order that the dispassionate reader may be able to judge not only of their conflicting nature, but of the different spirit which animates them. Lady Burton writes from her heart, reverently, as a good woman would write of the most solemn moments of her life, and of things which were to her eternal verities. Would she be likely to perjure herself on such a subject? Miss Stisted writes with an unconcealed animus, and is not so much concerned in defending the purity of her uncle's Protestantism as in vilifying her aunt and the faith to which she belonged. It may be noted too that Miss Stisted has no word of womanly sympathy for the wife who loved her husband with a love passing the love of women, and who was bowed down by her awful sorrow. On the contrary, with revolting heartlessness and irreverence, she jeers at her aunt's grief and the last offices of the dead. We may agree with the doctrines of the Church of Rome, or we may not; the solemn rites may be unavailing, or they may be otherwise; but at least they can do no harm, and the death-chamber should surely be sacred from such vulgar ribaldry! Good taste, if no higher consideration, might have kept her from mocking the religious convictions of others.

Miss Stisted's indictment of Lady Burton on this point falls under three heads:

First, that Sir Richard was dead before the priest arrived.

Secondly, that he was never a Catholic at all, and so his wife acted in bad faith.

Thirdly, that he "loathed" the Catholic religion.

It is better to deal with these charges seriatim.

With regard to the first, we have the positive and public testimony of Lady Burton, which was never contradicted during her lifetime, to the effect that her husband was alive when the Sacrament of Extreme Unction was administered to him. As, however, this testimony had been publicly called in question, though not until eight months after her death, we obtained through the kindness of the Baroness Paul de Ralli, a friend of Lady Burton at Trieste, the following written attestation from the priest who attended Sir Richard Burton's death-bed, and who is still living:

DECLARATION.[4]

"On October 20, 1890, at six o'clock in the morning, I was called in to assist at the last moments of Sir Richard Burton, British Consul.

"Knowing that he had been brought up, or born in, the Evangelical religion, before repairing to his house I went to see Dr. Giovanni Sust, the Provost of this Cathedral, in order to find out from him what I was to do in the matter. He replied that I should go, and act accordingly as the circumstances might seem to require.

"So I went.

"Entering into the room of the sick man, I found him in bed with the doctor and Lady Burton beside him.

"At first sight it seemed that I was looking, not at a sick man, but rather at a corpse. My first question was, 'Is he alive or dead?' Lady Burton replied that he was still living, and the doctor nodded his head, to confirm what she had said.

"And in fact the doctor was seated on the bed holding in his hands the hand of Sir Richard Burton to feel the beat of his pulse, and from time to time he administered some corroborante,[5] or gave an injection. Which of these two things he did I cannot now recollect, but it was certainly one or the other of them. These are things which one would certainly not do to a corpse, but only to a person still living; or if these acts were performed with knowledge that the person in question was already dead, they could not be done without laying oneself open to an accusation of deception, all the more reprehensible if put in operation at such a solemn moment.

"In such a case all the responsibility would fall upon the doctor in charge, who with a single word, or even a sign given secretly to the priest, would have been able to prevent the administration of the Holy Sacrament of Extreme Unction.

"The second observation which I made to Lady Burton was one concerning religion—namely, "That whoever was of the Evangelical persuasion could not receive the Holy Sacraments in this manner."

"To this observation of mine she answered that some years ago he had received Extreme Unction, being, if I mistake not, at Cannes, and that on this occasion he had abjured the heresy and professed himself as belonging to the Catholic Church. On such a declaration from Lady Burton, I did that which a minister of God ought to do, and decided to administer to the dying man the last comforts of our holy religion. As it seemed to me that there was not much time to lose, I wished to administer the Extreme Unction by means of one single anointing on the forehead, as is done in urgent cases; but Lady Burton said that death was not so imminent; therefore she begged me to carry out the prescribed ceremony of Extreme Unction.

"This completed, together with the other customary prayers for the dying, I took my departure. I returned to the house of the Provost, Dr. Sust, and laid everything before him, and he said I had done quite right.

"In a certificate of death drawn up by the Visitatore dei Morti,[6] Inspector Corani, in the register, under the head of religion, is written 'Catholic.' The funeral also was conducted according to the rites of the Catholic Church. I am convinced that Sir Richard Burton really became a Catholic, but that outwardly he did not wish this to be known, having regard to his position as a Consul to a Government of the Evangelical persuasion; and I have built up the hope that the innumerable prayers for her husband's conversion and good works of his pious wife Lady Burton will have been heeded by that Lord who said unto us, 'Pray, and your prayers shall be answered,' and that his soul will now have been received by the good God, together with that of the saintly lady his wife.

"One question I permit myself to ask of those who have now published the Life of Sir Richard Burton, which is this, 'Why did they not publish it during the lifetime of Lady Burton? Who better than she would have been able to enlighten the world on this point of much importance? Why publish it now when she is no longer here to speak?'

"Trieste, January 12, 1897, "PIETRO MARTELANI,

"Formerly Parish Priest of the B.V. del Soccorso, now Prebenday and Priest of the Cathedral of Triest."[7]

I am further able to state that the gross travesty of Lady Burton's grief —"her weeping and wailing on the floor," etc., etc.—is the outcome of a malevolent imagination, from which nothing is sacred, not even a widow's tears. Lady Burton bore herself through the most awful trial of her life with quietude, fortitude, and resignation.

And now to turn to the second charge—to wit, that Sir Richard was never a Catholic at all; from which, if true, it follows that he was in fact "kidnapped" by his wife and the priest on his death-bed.

If this charge did not involve a suggestion of bad faith on the part of Lady Burton, I should have ignored it; for I hold most strongly that a man's religion is a matter for himself alone, a matter between himself and his God, one in which no outsider has any concern. Burton himself took this view, for he once said: "My religious opinion is of no importance to anybody but myself. No one knows what my religious views are. I object to confession, and I will not confess. My standpoint is, and I hope ever will be, the Truth, as it is in me, known only to myself."[8] This attitude he maintained to the world to the day of his death; but to his wife he was different. Let me make my meaning quite clear. I do not say Burton was a Catholic or that he was not; I offer no opinion. But what I do assert with all emphasis is that he gave his wife reason to believe that he had become a Catholic; and in this matter she acted in all good faith, in accordance with the highest dictates of her conscience and her duty. Burton knew how strongly his wife felt on this subject, and how earnest were her convictions. He knew that his conversion to Catholicism was her daily and nightly prayer. These considerations probably weighed with him when he signed the following paper (reproduced in facsimile on the opposite page). He signed it on the understanding that she was to keep it secret till he was a dying man:

"GORIZIA, February 15, 1877.

"Should my husband, Richard Burton, be on his death-bed unable to speak I perhaps already dead—and that he may wish to have the grace to retract and recant his former errors, and to join the Catholic Church, and also to receive the Sacraments of Penance, Extreme Unction, and Holy Eucharist, he might perhaps be able to sign this paper, or make the sign of the cross to show his need.

(signed) "RICHARD F. BURTON."

I do not analyse the motives which led Burton to sign this paper. He may have done it merely to satisfy his wife (for, from the Agnostic point of view, the Sacraments would not have mattered much either way), or he may have done it from honest conviction, or from a variety of causes, for human motives are strangely commingled; but that he did sign it there is no doubt. Lady Burton, at any rate, took it all in good faith, and acted accordingly in sending for the priest; the priest, on receiving her assurance, acted in good faith in administering to Sir Richard Burton the last rites of the Church; and the Bishop of Trieste also acted in good faith in conceding to him a Catholic funeral. It is difficult to see how any of them could have acted otherwise.

Lastly, it has been asserted that Sir Richard Burton "loathed" the Roman Catholic Church; and though he was indifferent to most religions, he entertained a "positive aversion" to this one, and therefore to "kidnap" him on his death-bed was peculiarly cruel. I have read most of Burton's writings, and it is true, especially in his earlier books, that he girds against what he conceives to be certain abuses in the Roman Catholic Church and her priesthood in out-of-the-way countries; but then he attacks other forms of Christianity and other religions too. He had a great hatred of cant and humbug under the cloak of religion, and denounced them accordingly. There is nothing remarkable in this. We all denounce cant and humbug in the abstract, often most loudly when we are humbugs ourselves. If Burton attacked Christianity more than other religions, and Catholicism more than other forms of Christianity, he probably did so because they came more in his way. His religious acts generally appear to have been guided by the principle of "When one is at Rome, do as Rome does." He was a Mohammedan among Mohammedans, a Mormon among Mormons, a sufi among the Shazlis, and a Catholic among the Catholics. One thing he certainly was not in his later years—a member of the Church of England. He was baptized and brought up in the Anglican Communion. He entered at Trinity College, Oxford, and he joined the Indian army as a member of the Church of England; but when he was at Goa in 1847 he left off "sitting under" that garrison chaplain and betook himself to the Roman Catholic chapel, and availed himself of the ministrations of the Goanese priest. From that time, except officially, he never seems to have availed himself of the services of the Church of England. I do not unduly press the point of his attendance at the Roman Catholic chapel at Goa, for it may simply have meant that Burton merely went to the chapel and worshipped as a Catholic among Catholics, just as when he was at Mecca he worshipped as a Mohammedan among the Mohammedans; but it tells against the theory that he "loathed" Catholicism, as the same necessity did not exist at Goa as at Mecca. It was a purely voluntary act on his part. Henceforward it would seem that, so far from being prejudiced against Catholicism, Burton was always coquetting with it; and if he took any religion seriously at all, he may be said to have taken this one seriously. The following facts also go to prove this theory. He married a Catholic wife, of whose strong religious views he was well aware. Before the marriage he signed a paper to the effect that his children, if any, should be brought up in the Roman Catholic faith. He obtained and used the following letter from Cardinal Wiseman, with whom he was on friendly terms:

"LONDON, June 28, 1856.

"DEAR SIR,

"Allow me to introduce to you Captain Burton, the bearer of this note, who is employed by the Government to make an expedition to Africa, at the head of a little band of adventurers. Captain Burton has been highly spoken of in the papers here; and I have been asked to give him this introduction to you as a Catholic officer.

"I am, dear Sir, "Yours sincerely in Christ, "N. CARD. WISEMAN.

"COLONEL HAMMERTON," etc., etc., etc.

He habitually wore a crucifix, which his wife had given him, next his skin; he championed the cause of the Catholic converts in Syria; and when staying with his wife's family, he would frequently attend a service in a Roman Catholic church, and behave in all things as a Catholic worshipper. I am not saying that these things prove that Burton was a Catholic, but they afford strong presumptive evidence that he had leanings in the direction of Catholicism; and undoubtedly they go to prove that he did not "loathe" the Catholic religion. One thing is certain, he was too much of a scholar to indulge in any vulgar prejudice against the Roman Catholic Church, and too much of a gentleman to insult her priests.

After all there is nothing inherently improbable in Burton's conversion to Catholicism. Most of his life had been spent in countries where Catholicism is practically the only form of Christianity; and such a mind as his, if on the rebound from Agnosticism, would be much more likely to find a refuge in the bosom of the Roman Catholic Church than in the half-way house of Evangelical Protestantism. To a temperament like Burton's, steeped in Eastern mysticism and Sufiism, Catholicism would undoubtedly have offered strong attractions; for the links between the highest form of Sufiism and the Gospel of St. John, the Ecstasis of St. Bernard, and other writings of the Fathers of the Church who were of the Alexandrian school, are well known, and could hardly have been ignored by Burton, who made a comparative study of religions.

This, however, is by the way, and has only an indirect bearing on his wife's action. She, who knew him best, and from whom he had no secrets, believed that, in his later years at least, her husband was at heart a Catholic. He gave her ample grounds for this belief, and she acted upon it in all good faith. That he may have deceived her is possible, though not probable; but that she would have deceived a priest of her Church at the most solemn moment of her life, and on one of the most sacred things of her religion, is both impossible and improbable. The whole nature of the woman, her transparent truthfulness, her fervent piety, rise up in witness against this charge, and condemn it. And to what end would she have done this thing? No one knew better than Lady Burton that there is One whom she could not deceive; for with her the things invisible were living realities, and the actualities of this life were but passing things which come and fade away.

NOTES:

1. Lady Burton's maid, now dead. 2. Life of Sir Richard Burton, by Isabel his wife, vol. ii., pp. 410-414. This work was published in May, 1893. 3. Miss Stisted's Life of Burton, pp. 409-414. 4. Translated from the Italian. 5. A tonic, a strengthening restorative. 6. An official (generally a physician) who visits the dead, and assures himself that the death is real, and not an apparent one. 7. The Baroness Paul de Ralli, who procured the above attestation from the priest, sent it in the first instance to Cardinal Vaughan together with the following letter:

"TRIESTE, AUSTRIA, January 19, 1897.

"MY LORD CARDINAL,

"There has lately been published a so-called 'true' Life of the late Sir Richard Burton, written by his niece. Since my letter to The Catholic Times, which appeared in the issue of December 24, it has been pointed out to me that it would be well if I could procure a written attestation of the priest who gave Extreme Unction to the late Sir Richard Burton. I am authorized by Monseigneur Sterk to place in the hands of your Eminence the enclosed manuscript, written by Monseigneur Martelani, who is now Prebendary of the Cathedral here. As an intimate friend of the Burtons, I beg to say that everything said about the life of the Burtons at this place in the 'true' life has been written by dictation, and, furthermore, that I could name the authoress's informant, which makes the book worthless for those who know the source from which the authoress has gathered her information—the same source which has made Lady Burton's life hideous from the day of her husband's death to the time she left this place. As regards those who claim to have known all about Sir Richard Burton—'They knew the man well,'etc.—allow me to point out that the exoteric subtleties of his character were only exceeded by the esoteric; and to what an extent this is true is only known to those who were at the same time his friends and his wife's intimate friends, of whom there are several here beside myself. My position at the Villa Gosslett was perhaps a little exceptional. Having come here from England in 1875 after my marriage, I was looked upon by the Burtons as a sort of ex-subject of theirs.

"Believe me to be, my Lord Cardinal, "Yours faithfully, "CATHERINE DE RALLI."

8. Speech at the Anthropological Society, London, 1865.



BOOK III. WIDOWED. (1890-1896).

"El Maraa min ghayr Zaujuga mislaha tayaran maksus el Jenakk." ("The woman without her husband is like a bird with one wing.")



CHAPTER I. THE TRUTH ABOUT "THE SCENTED GARDEN."

Now I indeed will hide desire and all repine, And light up this my fire that neighbours see no sign: Accept I what befalls by order of my Lord, Haply he too accept this humble act of mine.

ALF LAYLAH WA LAYLAH (Burton's "Arabian Nights").

Sir Richard Burton's funeral was attended by a great crowd of mourners and representatives of every class in Trieste. The Austrian authorities accorded him military honours, and the Bishop of Trieste conceded all the rites of the Church. His remains were laid, with much pomp and circumstance, in their temporary resting-place—a small chapel in the burial-ground—until his widow could take them back with her to England. The funeral over, Lady Burton returned to her desolate house— a home no longer, for the loved presence which had made the palazzo a home, as it would have made a home to her of the humblest hut on earth, was gone for ever. The house was but an empty shell. Sir Richard Burton's death had been so sudden and unexpected that none of Lady Burton's near relatives, her sisters, were able to reach her in time; and though they had telegraphed to her offering to come at once, she had replied asking them not to undertake the journey. And so it came about that, in this hour of sorest trial, she was absolutely alone. She had no one to turn to in her grief; she had no children's love to solace her; she had no son to say, "Mother, lean on me"; no daughter to share her sorrow. Friends she had in plenty, and friends such as the world rarely gives, but they could not intrude their sympathy overmuch at such a time as this. Moreover, she had concentrated all her affections on her husband; she had lived so entirely for him, and in him, that she had not formed any of those intimate friendships in which some women delight. She had, in short, put all her earthly happiness in one frail barque, and it had foundered.

Hitherto we have followed her through her wedded life, that beautiful union which was more like a poem than an ordinary marriage. We have seen how the love which she bore her husband had sanctified her life, and his, lifting it above and beyond the ordinary love of men and women, glorifying all things, even her meanest tasks, for they were done in love's holy name. We have seen how she knew no fear, spared herself no pain, heeded no rebuff in the service of the man she loved. We have followed her in journeyings often, in perils of sea, in perils of robbers, in perils of the heathen, in perils of the wilderness, in weariness and sorrow, in watchings often, in hunger and thirst, and besides these things that were without, bearing those secret sorrows— "my beloved secret cross," she called them—which are known only to the soul and its God. We have seen all this, the full, perfect glorious life which she lived by the side of the man she loved; in the brief survey of the few broken years left to her on earth, we shall henceforth see her alone—alone, yet not alone, for the Divine love went with her, and with her also was ever present the memory of an earthly love, a love purified and holy, growing nearer and nearer to the love of the perfect day.

If we were to search the wide world over, ransack history, dive deep into the annals of the past, I doubt if there would be found any more perfect example of unselfish love than that which is exemplified in the wedded life of this woman. With her it was always "Richard only." It is with this thought in our minds that we approach her crowning act of self- sacrifice, her last supreme offering on the altar of love. I refer to the act whereby she deliberately sacrificed the provision her husband had made for her, and faced poverty, and the contumely of her enemies, for the sake of his fair memory.

Lady Burton's first act after her husband's death was to lock up his manuscripts and papers to secure them against all curious and prying eyes—a wise and necessary act under the circumstances, and one which was sufficient to show that, great though her grief was, it did not rob her for one moment of her faculties. As soon as her husband's funeral was over, she went back to his rooms, locked the door securely, and examined carefully all his books and papers, burning those which he had desired to be burnt, and sorting and classifying the others. Among the manuscripts was Sir Richard's translation of the notorious Scented Garden, Men's Hearts to Gladden, of the Shaykh el Nafzawih, which he had been working at the day before his death, completed all but one page, and the proceeds of which he had told his wife were to form her jointure. As his original edition of The Arabian Nights had brought in 10,000 pounds profit, the Scented Garden, beside which The Arabian Nights was a "baby tale," might reasonably have been expected to have produced as much, if not more. Indeed, a few days after Sir Richard's death, a man offered Lady Burton six thousand guineas down for the manuscript as it stood, and told her that he would relieve her of all risk and responsibility in the matter. She might, therefore, easily have closed with this offer without any one being the wiser, and if she had been inclined to drive a bargain, she would doubtless have had no difficulty in securing double the price. As her husband's death had reduced her to comparative poverty, the temptation to an ordinary woman, even a good and conscientious woman, would have been irresistible; she could have taken the money, and have quieted her conscience with some of those sophistries which we can all call to our aid on occasion. But Lady Burton was not an ordinary woman, and the money side of the question never weighed with her for one moment. How she acted at this crisis in her life is best told by herself.

"My husband had been collecting for fourteen years information and materials on a certain subject. His last volume of The Supplemental Nights had been finished and out on November 13, 1888. He then gave himself up entirely to the writing of this book which was called The Scented Garden, a translation from the Arabic. It treated of a certain passion. Do not let any one suppose for a moment that Richard Burton ever wrote a thing from the impure point of view. He dissected a passion from every point of view, as a doctor may dissect a body, showing its source, its origin, its evil, and its good, and its proper uses, as designed by Providence and Nature, as the great Academician Watts paints them. In private life he was the most pure, the most refined and modest man that ever lived, and he was so guileless himself that he could never be brought to believe that other men said or used these things from any other standpoint. I, as a woman, think differently. The day before he died he called me into his room and showed me half a page of Arabic manuscript upon which he was working, and he said, 'To-morrow I shall have finished this, and I promise you after this I will never write another book upon this subject. I will take to our biography.' I told him it would be a happy day when he left off that subject, and that the only thing that reconciled me to it was, that the doctors had said that it was so fortunate, with his partial loss of health, that he could find something to interest and occupy his days. He said, 'This is to be your jointure, and the proceeds are to be set apart for an annuity for you'; and I said, 'I hope not; I hope you will live to spend it like the other.' He said, 'I am afraid it will make a great row in England, because The Arabian Nights was a baby tale in comparison to this, and I am in communication with several men in England about it.' The next morning, at 7 a.m., he had ceased to exist. Some days later, when I locked myself up in his rooms, and sorted and examined the manuscripts, I read this one. No promise had been exacted from me, because the end had been so unforeseen, and I remained for three days in a state of perfect torture as to what I ought to do about it. During that time I received an offer from a man whose name shall be always kept private, of six thousand guineas for it. He said, 'I know from fifteen hundred to two thousand men who will buy it at four guineas, i.e. at two guineas the volume; and as I shall not restrict myself to numbers, but supply all applicants on payment, I shall probably make 20,000 pounds out of it.' I said to myself, 'Out of fifteen hundred men, fifteen will probably read it in the spirit of science in which it was written; the other fourteen hundred and eighty-five will will read it for filth's sake, and pass it to their friends, and the harm done may be incalculable.' 'Bury it,' said one adviser; 'don't decide.' 'That means digging it up again and reproducing at will.' 'Get a man to do it for you,' said No. 2; 'don't appear in it.' 'I have got that,' I said. 'I can take in the world, but I cannot deceive God Almighty, who holds my husband's soul in His hands.' I tested one man who was very earnest about it: 'Let us go and consult So-and-so'; but he, with a little shriek of horror, said, 'Oh, pray don't let me have anything to do with it; don't let my name get mixed up in it, but it is a beautiful book I know.'

"I sat down on the floor before the fire at dark, to consult my own heart, my own head. How I wanted a brother! My head told me that sin is the only rolling stone that gathers moss; that what a gentleman, a scholar, a man of the world may write when living, he would see very differently to what the poor soul would see standing naked before its God, with its good or evil deeds alone to answer for, and their consequences visible to it for the first moment, rolling on to the end of time. Oh for a friend on earth to stop and check them! What would he care for the applause of fifteen hundred men now—for the whole world's praise, and God offended. My heart said, 'You can have six thousand guineas; your husband worked for you, kept you in a happy home with honour and respect for thirty years. How are you going to reward him? That your wretched body may be fed and clothed and warmed for a few miserable months or years, will you let that soul, which is part of your soul, be left out in cold and darkness till the end of time, till all those sins which may have been committed on account of reading those writings have been expiated, or passed away perhaps for ever? Why, it would be just parallel with the original thirty pieces of silver!' I fetched the manuscript and laid it on the ground before me, two large volumes' worth. Still my thoughts were, Was it a sacrilege? It was his magnum opus, his last work that he was so proud of, that was to have been finished on the awful morrow—that never came. Will he rise up in his grave and curse me or bless me? The thought will haunt me to death, but Sadi and El Shaykh el Nafzawih, who were pagans, begged pardon of God and prayed not to be cast into hell fire for having written them, and implored their friends to pray for them to the Lord, that He would have mercy on them. And then I said, 'Not only not for six thousand guineas, but not for six million guineas will I risk it.' Sorrowfully, reverently, and in fear and trembling, I burnt sheet after sheet, until the whole of the volumes were consumed."[1]

As to the act itself I am not called upon to express any opinion. But there can be no two opinions among fair-minded people as to the heroism, the purity, and the sublime self-sacrifice of the motives which prompted Lady Burton to this deed. Absolutely devoted to her husband and his interests as she had been in his lifetime, she was equally jealous of his honour now that he was dead. Nothing must tarnish the brightness of his good name. It was this thought, above all others, which led her to burn The Scented Garden. For this act the vials of misrepresentation and abuse were poured on Lady Burton's head. She was accused of the "bigotry of a torquemada, the vandalism of a John Knox." She has been called hysterical and illiterate. It has been asserted that she did it from selfish motives, "for the sake of her own salvation, through the promptings of a benighted religion," for fear of the legal consequences which might fall upon her if she sold the book, for love of gain, for love of notoriety, for love of "posing as a martyr," and so on, and so on. She was publicly vilified and privately abused, pursued with obscene, anonymous, and insulting letters until the day of her death. In fact, every imputation was hurled at her, and she who might have answered all her persecutors with a word, held her peace, or broke it only to put them on another track. It was not merely the act itself which caused her suffering; it was the long persecution which followed her from the day her letter appeared in The Morning Post almost to the day she died. How keenly she felt it none but those who knew her best will ever know. A proud, high-spirited woman, she had never schooled herself to stay her hand, but generally gave her adversaries back blow for blow; but these cowardly attacks she bore in silence, nay more, she counted all the suffering as gain, for she was bearing it for the sake of the man she loved.

And this silence would never have been broken, and the true reasons which led Lady Burton to act as she did would never have been told to the world, had it not been that, after her death, a woman, whom she had never injured by thought, word, or deed, has seen fit to rake up this unpleasant subject again, for the purpose of throwing mud on her memory, impugning her motives, and belittling the magnitude of her sacrifice. It is solely in defence that the truth is now told.

I have never read Sir Richard's translation of The Scented Garden, for the simple reason there is none in existence (notwithstanding all that has been said to the contrary); the only two copies were destroyed by his widow. But I have read another translation of the book, mainly the work of a man who was also an Orientalist and a distinguished soldier, which, though doubtless inferior to Burton's, is more than sufficient to give one full knowledge of the character of the book. I have read also Burton's original and unexpurgated edition of Alf Laylah wa Laylah and his Terminal Essay, including the Section which is omitted in all later editions, and certain other unpublished notes of his on the same subject. Lady Burton also talked with me freely on the matter. I know therefore of what I speak, and am not in the same position as Lady Burton's latest accuser, who declares with quite unnecessary emphasis that she has never read The Arabian Nights, and of course never saw the burnt manuscript of The Scented Garden. She is therefore obviously disqualified to express any opinion on the subject.

So far as I can gather from all I have learned, the chief value of Burton's version of The Scented Garden lay not so much in his translation of the text, though that of course was admirably done, as in the copious notes and explanations which he had gathered together for the purpose of annotating the book. He had made this subject a study of years, though his actual translation of it only took him eighteen months. The theme of The Scented Garden is one which is familiar to every student of Oriental literature. Burton, who was nothing if not thorough in all he undertook, did not ignore this. In fact, one may say that from his early manhood he had been working at it, as he commenced his inquiries soon after his arrival in India. Lady Burton, it will be seen, says he "dissected a passion from every point of view, as a doctor may dissect a body, showing its source, its origin, its evil, and its good, and its proper uses, as designed by Providence and Nature"; that is, Burton pursued his inquiries on this subject in the same spirit as that which has animated Kraft-Ebbing and Moll, and other men of science. But from what I have read in The Arabian Nights and elsewhere, it seems to me that Burton's researches in this direction were rather of an ethnological and historical character than a medical or scientific one. His researches had this peculiarity, that whereas most of the writers on this subject speak from hearsay, Burton's information was obtained at first hand, by dint of personal inquiries. Thus it came about that he was misunderstood. For a man, especially a young soldier whose work is not generally supposed to lie in the direction of scientific and ethnological investigation, to undertake such inquiries was to lay himself open to unpleasant imputations. His contemporaries and comrades in India did not understand him, and what people do not understand they often dislike. In his regiment he soon incurred odium, and a cloud of prejudice enveloped him. Unfortunately, too, he was not overwise; and he had a habit of telling tales against himself, partly out of bravado, which of course did not tend to improve matters. People are very apt to be taken at their own valuation, especially if their valuation be a bad one. It must not be supposed that I am giving countenance, colour, or belief to these rumours against Burton for a moment: on the contrary, I believe them to be false and unjust; but false and unjust though they were, they were undoubtedly believed by many, and herein was the gathering of the cloud which hung over Burton's head through the earlier part of his official career. To prove that I am not drawing on my own imagination with regard to this theory, I quote the following, told in Burton's own words:—

"In 1845, when Sir Charles Napier had conquered and annexed Sind, . . . it was reported to me that Karachi, a townlet of some two thousand souls, and distant not more than a mile from camp. . . . Being then the only British officer who could speak Sindi, I was asked indirectly to make inquiries, and to report upon the subject; and I undertook the task on the express condition that my report should not be forwarded to the Bombay Government, from whom supporters of the conqueror's policy could expect scant favour, mercy, or justice. Accompanied by a Munshi, Mirza Mohammed Hosayn Shiraz, and habited as a merchant, Mirza Abdullah the Bushiri passed many an evening in the townlet, visited all the porneia, and obtained the fullest details, which were duly dispatched to Government House. But the 'Devil's Brother' presently quitted the Sind, leaving in his office my unfortunate official; this found its way with sundry other reports to Bombay, and produced the expected result. A friend in the Secretariat informed me that my summary dismissal had been formally proposed by one of Sir Charles Napier's successors, whose decease compels me parcere sepulto, but this excess of outraged modesty was not allowed."[2]

Burton was not dismissed from the Service, it is true, but the unfavourable impression created by the incident remained. He was refused the post he coveted—namely, to accompany the second expedition to Mooltan as interpreter; and seeing all prospect of promotion at an end for the present, he obtained a long furlough, and came home from India under a cloud. Evil rumour travels fast; and when he went to Boulogne (the time and place where he first met Isabel), there were plenty of people ready to whisper ill things concerning him. When he returned to India two years after, notwithstanding his Mecca exploit, he found prejudice still strong against him, and nothing he could do seemed to remove it. His enemies in India and at home were not slow to use it against him. One can trace its baleful influence throughout his subsequent career. Lady Burton, whose vigilance on her husband's behalf never slept, and who would never rest until she confronted his enemies, got to know of it. When I know not, in what way I know not, but the fact that sooner or later she did get to know of it is indisputable. How she fought to dispel this cloud none but herself will ever know. Official displeasure she could brave, definite charges she could combat; but this baseless rumour, shadowy, indefinite, intangible, ever eluded her, but eluded her only to reappear. She could not grasp it. She was conscious that the thing was in the air, so to speak, but she could not even assume its existence. She could only take her stand by her husband, and point to his blameless life and say, "You are all the world to me; I trust you and believe in you with all my heart and soul." And in this her wisdom was justified, for at last the calumny died down, as all calumnies must die, for lack of sustenance.

When _The Arabian Nights_ came out, at which she had worked so hard to manage the business arrangements, Lady Burton did not read the book throughout; she had promised her husband not to do so. She had perhaps a vague idea of some of its contents, for she raised objections. He explained them away, and she then worked heart and soul to ensure its success. The success which the book achieved, and the praise with which it was greeted, were naturally gratifying to her, and did much to dispel any objections which she might have had, especially when it is remembered that this book yielded profits which enabled her to procure for her husband every comfort and luxury for his declining years. It has been urged against her that she was extravagant because, when Burton died, only four florins remained of the 10,000 pounds which they had netted by _The Arabian Nights; but when it is borne in mind that she spent every penny upon her husband and not a penny upon herself, it is not possible that the charge of extravagance can be maintained against her—certainly not in a selfish sense.

When Burton took to translating The Scented Garden, he acquainted his wife to some extent with its contents, and she objected. But he overcame her objections, as he had done before, and the thought that the money would be needed to maintain her husband in the same comfort as he enjoyed during the last few years weighed down her scruples; besides which, though she had a general idea that the book was not virginibus purisque, she had no knowledge of its real character. When therefore she read it for the first time, in the lonely days of her early widowhood, with the full shock of her sudden loss upon her, and a vivid sense of the worthlessness of all earthly gain brought home to her, she naturally did not look at things from the worldly point of view. She has told with graphic power how she sat down with locked doors to read this book, and how she read it through carefully, page by page; and it must be remembered that it was not Burton's translation alone which she read, but also the notes and evidence which he had collected on the subject. Then it was that the real nature of its contents was brought home to her, and she determined to act. It has been said that she only "half understood" what she read. Alas! she understood but too well, for here was the nameless horror which she had tried to track to earth leaping up again and staring her in the face. She knew well enough what interpretations her husband's enemies—those enemies whom even the grave does not silence—would place upon this book; how they would turn and twist it about, and put the worst construction upon his motives, and so blur the fair mirror of his memory. Burton wrote as a scholar and an ethnologist writing to scholars and ethnologists. But take what precautions he would, sooner or later, and sooner rather than later the character of his book would ooze out to the world, and the ignorant world judges harshly. So she burnt the manuscript leaf by leaf; and by the act she consummated her life sacrifice of love.

I repeat that her regard for her husband's memory was her supreme reason for this act. That there were minor reasons is not denied: she herself has stated them. There was the thought of the harm a book of this kind might do; there was the thought of her responsibility to God and man; there was the thought of the eternal welfare of her husband's soul. She has stated, "It is my belief that by this act, if my husband's soul were weighed down, the cords were cut, and it was left free to soar to its native heaven." It is easy to sneer at such a sentiment as this, but the spiritual was very real with Lady Burton. All these minor considerations, therefore, weighed with her in addition to the greatest of them all. On the other hand, there came to her the thought that it was the first time she had ever gone against her husband's wishes, and now that he was dead they were doubly sacred to her. The mental struggle which she underwent was a terrible one: it was a conflict which is not given to certain lower natures to know, and not knowing it, they can neither understand nor sympathize. I make bold to say that the sacrifice which she made, and the motives which prompted her to make it, will stand to her honour as long as her name is remembered.