Tuesday, May 22.—I had struck a Turk, one of the servants, with a stick over his shoulders; but, in so doing, I forgot the penalty attached to striking a Mussulman. Formerly such an act, done by a Christian hand, was punished with death, or the alternative of becoming a renegado of one’s faith. Even now the old Mussulman servants muttered threats against me, as I was told, and I really think would have done me harm, if they could. For all Lady Hester’s power hardly went farther than to have her people punished by the instrumentality of another Turk; but the moment I thought proper to chastise a fellow’s insolence with my own hand, she did not hesitate to tell me that I must be wary how I repeated it again; assuring me that a blow from a Christian never could be pardoned by them.
Thursday, May 24.—In reading the newspapers, Lord Byron’s name occurred. “I think,” said Lady Hester, “he was a strange character: his generosity was for a motive, his avarice for a motive: one time he was mopish, and nobody was to speak to him; another, he was for being jocular with everybody. Then he was a sort of Don Quixote fighting with the police for a woman of the town; and then he wanted to make himself something great. But when he allowed himself to be bullied by the Albanians, it was all over with him; you must not show any fear with them. At Athens, I saw nothing in him but a well-bred man, like many others: for, as for poetry, it is easy enough to write verses; and as for the thoughts, who knows where he got them? Many a one picks up some old book that nobody knows anything about, and gets his ideas out of it. He had a great deal of vice in his looks—his eyes set close together, and a contracted brow, so”—(imitating it). “Oh, Lord! I am sure he was not a liberal man, whatever else he might be. The only good thing about his looks was this part,” (drawing her hand under the cheek down the front of her neck), “and the curl on his forehead.”
Saturday, May 26.—About eleven at night, Lady Hester went into the bath, previous to which I passed two or three hours with her. The conversation ran on the arrival of some Europeans at Sayda, who, by the report of a servant returning from the town, had lost two of their number by the plague, and, in consequence, had been put into quarantine at Sheemaôony, the Turkish mausoleum spoken of in a former page, about a quarter of a mile from the city gate. Lady Hester had heard of their distressed situation about four o’clock in the afternoon, it being said they were pilgrims who had applied for permission to be lodged at Dayr el Mkhallas, the monastery at Jôon, which had been acceded to by the monks but forbidden by the health officers, owing to a foul bill of health they brought with them. Subsequently it was given out that they were poor Germans; and she, with her accustomed humanity, thinking they might be in want of some little comforts, had made up a couple of baskets of violet and rose syrups, capillaire, lemons, &c., and despatched a man with a note, in these words:—“The humble offering of Lady Hester Stanhope to the sick Germans, with her request that they will make known their wants to her, whether for medicines, or for whatever they may need.”
The servant had hardly set off, when an express arrived with a letter to her ladyship from one of the strangers, to the effect that, one of the party being ill, the writer requested she would be kind enough to send down her doctor. It was signed Charles Baron de Busech, Knight of Malta. On asking me whether I was afraid of the plague, I answered, “Yes; and as it appeared they were men of rank, and could not fail of obtaining medical advice from Sayda, where there were four or five army surgeons, and two or three physicians, I thought it best not to go until more clear information had been obtained respecting them.” Lady Hester approved of this, and wrote the following reply:—
To the Baron Charles de Busech, Knight of Malta, in
quarantine on the seashore, Sayda.
Jôon, May 26, 1838.
Sir Baron,
Although I myself have no fear of the plague, or of persons infected with it, almost all the Franks have. The physician who is with me happens to be of the number; therefore, it does not depend on me to cure people of what I consider prejudices. Our days are numbered, and everything is in the hands of God.
Your letter is without a date, and comes from I know not where. At the moment that I received it I had sent a servant with a few cooling syrups to some sick Germans, guarded by a ring of soldiers outside of the town, of whose names and class in life I am ignorant, although the peasants give out that there are some of very high quality among them: for I feared that, in a strange country, and thus surrounded by fever or perhaps plague, they would not be able to procure the drinks necessary in such maladies. I hope not to have offended any one, although I have made a blundering business, not knowing who I addressed myself to. But, having understood that they had yesterday demanded an asylum at Dayr Mkhallas, which had been refused them, I was uneasy on their account.
I have ordered my purveyor at Sayda, Captain Hassan Logmagi, to come up to-morrow, that I may get a right understanding in this confused affair, and may see if it is in my power, by any trifling service, to be useful to them. Allow me to remark that, if, in any case, symptoms of plague, or even of the ardent fevers of the country, manifest themselves, the Frank doctors understand but little about it. The barbers of the country are those who have the most knowledge on the subject.