At nine o'clock on Tuesday, the 22nd of January, 1861, my cab was at the door with my box on it. I had to go and wish my father and mother good-bye before leaving. I went downstairs with a beating heart, after I had knelt in my own room, and said a fervent prayer that they might bless me, and if they did, I would take it as a sign. I was so nervous, I could scarcely stand. When I went in, mother kissed me and said, "Good-bye, child, God bless you." I went to my father's bedside, and knelt down and said good-bye. "God bless you, my darling," he said, and put his hand out of the bed and laid it on my head. I was too much overcome to speak, and one or two tears ran down my cheeks, and I remember as I passed down I kissed the door outside.
I then ran downstairs and quickly got into my cab, and drove to a friend's house (Dr. and Miss Bird, now of 49, Welbeck Street), where I changed my clothes—not wedding clothes (clothes which most brides of to-day would probably laugh at)—a fawn-coloured dress, a black-lace cloak, and a white bonnet—and they and I drove off to the Bavarian Catholic Church, Warwick Street, London. When assembled we were altogether a party of eight. The Registrar was there for legality, as is customary. Richard was waiting on the doorstep for me, and as we went in he took holy water, and made a very large sign of the Cross. The church doors were wide open, and full of people, and many were there who knew us. As the 10.30 Mass was about to begin, we were called into the Sacristy, and we then found that the Cardinal in the night had been seized with an acute attack of the illness which carried him off four years later, and had deputed Dr. Hearne, his Vicar-general, to be his proxy.
After the ceremony was over, and the names signed, we went back to the house of our friend Dr. Bird and his sister Alice, who have always been our best friends, where we had our wedding breakfast.
RICHARD BURTON. (PRESENTED TO HIM, WITH HIS WIFE'S PORTRAIT, AS A WEDDING GIFT.) By Louis Desanges.
During the time we were breakfasting, Dr. Bird began to chaff him about the things that were sometimes said of him, and which were not true. "Now, Burton, tell me; how do you feel when you have killed a man?" Dr. Bird (being a physician) had given himself away without knowing it. Richard looked up quizzically, and drawled out, "Oh, quite jolly! How do you?"
ISABEL BURTON AS A BRIDE. By Louis Desanges.
We then went to Richard's bachelor lodgings, where he had a bedroom, dressing-room, and sitting-room, and we had very few pounds to bless ourselves with, but were as happy as it is given to any mortals out of heaven to be. The fact is that the only clandestine thing about it, and that was quite contrary to my desire, was that my poor mother, with her health and her religious scruples, was kept in the dark, but I must thank God that, though paralysis came on two years later, it was not I that caused it.