Richard as a "Celebrity at Home."
As I said, we stayed the first six months at the hotel, and we disliked the place very much, until we got thoroughly used to it; and, when we got used to it, I cannot give a better description of our lives than to cut out from the World the "Celebrity at Home, Captain R. F. Burton at Trieste," 1877, with Alfred Bates Richards's comments on the same; and that was the life we led from 1872 to 1882-83.
"CAPTAIN RICHARD F. BURTON AT TRIESTE.
"It is not given to every man to go to Trieste. The fact need not cause universal regret, inasmuch as the chief Austrian port on the Adriatic shares with Oriental towns the disagreeable character of presenting a fair appearance from a distance, and afflicting the traveller who has become for the time a denizen, with a painful sense of disenchantment. Perhaps the first glimpse of Trieste owes something to contrast, as it is obtained after passing through a desolate stony wilderness called the Karso. As the train glides from these inhospitable heights towards Trieste, the head of the Adriatic presents a scene of unrivalled beauty. On the one side rise high, rugged, wooded mountains, on a ledge of which the rails are laid; on the other is a deep precipice, at whose base rolls the blue sea, dotted with lateen sails, painted in every shade of colour, and adorned with figures of saints and other popular devices. The white town staring out of the corner covers a considerable space, and places its villa-outposts high up the neighbouring hills, covered with verdure to the water's edge.
"Trieste is a polyglot settlement of Austrians, Italians, Slavs, Jews, and Greeks, of whom the two latter monopolize the commerce. It is a City dear and unhealthy to live in, over-ventilated and ill-drained. It might advantageously be called the City of Three Winds. One of these, the Bora, blows the people almost into the sea with its fury, rising suddenly, like a cyclone, and sweeping all before it; the second is named the Scirocco, which blows the drainage back into the town; and the third is the Contraste, formed by the two first-named winds blowing at once against each other. Alternating atmospherically between extremes of heat and cold, Trieste is, from a political point of view, perpetually pushing the principles of independence to the verge of disorder.
"Arrived at the railway station, there is no need to call a cab and ask to be driven to the British Consul's, since, just opposite the station and close to the sea, rises the tall block of building in which the Consulate is situated. Somewhat puzzled to choose between three entrances, the stranger proceeds to mount the long series of steps lying beyond the particular portal to which he is directed. There is a superstition, prevalent in the building and in the neighbourhood, that there are but four stories, including but one hundred and twenty steps. Whoso, after a protracted climb, finally succeeds in reaching Captain Burton's landing, will entertain considerable doubts as to the correctness of the estimate. A German damsel opens the door, and inquires whether the visitor wants to see the Gräfin or the Herr Consul.
"Captain and Mrs. Burton are well, if airily, lodged on a flat composed of ten rooms, separated by a corridor adorned with a picture of our Saviour, a statuette of St. Joseph with a lamp, and a Madonna with another lamp burning before it.[2] Thus far the belongings are all of the Cross; but no sooner are we landed in the little drawing-rooms than signs of the Crescent appear. Small but artistically arranged, the rooms, opening into one another, are bright with Oriental hangings, with trays and dishes of gold and silver, brass trays and goblets, chibouques with great amber mouthpieces, and all kinds of Eastern treasures mingled with family souvenirs. There is no carpet, but a Bedouin rug occupies the middle of the floor, and vies in brilliancy of colour with Persian enamels and bits of good old china. There are no sofas, but plenty of divans covered with Damascus stuffs. Thus far the interior is as Mussulman as the exterior is Christian; but a curious effect is produced among the Oriental mise en scène by the presence of a pianoforte and a compact library of well-chosen books. There is, too, another library here, greatly treasured by Mrs. Burton, to wit, a collection of her husband's works in about fifty volumes. On the walls are many interesting relics, models, and diplomas of honour, one of which is especially prized by Captain Burton. It is the brevet de pointe earned in France for swordsmanship. Near this hangs a picture of the Damascus home of the Burtons, by Frederick Leighton.
"As the guest is inspecting this bright bit of colour, he will be roused by the full strident tones of a voice skilled in many languages, but never so full and hearty as when bidding a friend welcome. The speaker, Richard Burton, is a living proof that intense work, mental and physical, sojourn in torrid and frozen climes, danger from dagger and from pestilence, 'age' a person of good sound constitution far less than may be supposed. A Hertfordshire man, a soldier and the son of a soldier, of mingled Scotch, Irish, and French descent, his iron frame shows in its twelfth lustre no sign of decay. Arme blanche and more insidious fever have neither dimmed his eye nor wasted his sinews.
"Standing about five feet eleven, his broad deep chest and square shoulders reduce his apparent height very considerably, and the illusion is intensified by hands and feet of Oriental smallness. The Eastern, and indeed distinctly Arab, look of the man is made more pronounced by prominent cheek-bones (across one of which is the scar of a sabre-cut), by closely cropped black hair just tinged with grey, and a pair of piercing black, gipsy-looking eyes. A short straight nose, a determined mouth partly hidden by a black moustache, and a deeply bronzed complexion, complete the remarkable physiognomy so wonderfully rendered on canvas by Leighton only a couple of seasons ago. It is not to be wondered at that this stern Arab face, and a tongue marvellously rich in Oriental idiom and Mohammedan lore, should have deceived the doctors learned in the Korán, among whom Richard Burton risked his life during that memorable pilgrimage to Mecca and Medinah, on which the slightest gesture or accent betraying the Frank would have unsheathed a hundred khanjars.
"This celebrated journey, the result of an adventurous spirit worthy of a descendant of Rob Roy Macgregor, has never been surpassed in audacity or in perfect execution, and would suffice to immortalize its hero if he had not, in addition, explored Harar and Somali-land, organized a body of irregular cavalry in the Crimea, pushed (accompanied by Speke) into Eastern Africa from Zanzibar, visited the Mormons, explored the Cameroon Mountains, visited the King of Dahomey, traversed the interior of Brazil, made a voyage to Iceland, and last but not least, discovered and described the Land of Midian.
"Leading the way from the drawing-rooms or divans, he takes us through bedrooms and dressing-rooms, furnished in Spartan simplicity with little iron bedsteads covered with bearskins, and supplied with reading-tables and lamps, beside which repose the Bible, the Shakespeare, the Euclid and the Breviary, which go with Captain and Mrs. Burton on all their wanderings. His gifted wife, one of the Arundells of Wardour, is, as becomes a scion of an ancient Anglo-Saxon and Norman Catholic house, strongly attached to the Church of Rome; but religious opinion is never allowed to disturb the peace of the Burton household, the head of which is laughingly accused of Mohammedanism by his friends. The little rooms are completely lined with rough deal shelves, containing, perhaps, eight thousand or more volumes in every Western language, as well as in Arabic, Persian, and Hindustani. Every odd corner is piled with weapons, guns, pistols, boar-spears, swords of every shape and make, foils and masks, chronometers, barometers, and all kinds of scientific instruments. One cupboard is full of medicines necessary for Oriental expeditions or for Mrs. Burton's Trieste poor, and on it is written, 'The Pharmacy.' Idols are not wanting, for elephant-nosed Gunpati is there cheek by jowl with Vishnu.
"The most remarkable objects in the rooms just alluded to are the rough deal tables, which occupy most of the floor-space. They are almost like kitchen or ironing tables. There may be eleven of them, each covered with writing materials. At one of them sits Mrs. Burton, in morning négligé, a grey choga—the long loose Indian dressing-gown of soft camel's hair—topped by a smoking-cap of the same material. She rises and greets her husband's old friend with the cheeriest voice in the world. 'I see you are looking at our tables. Every one does. Dick likes a separate table for every book, and when he is tired of one he goes to another. There are no tables of any size in Trieste, so I had these made as soon as I came. They are so nice. We may upset the ink-bottle as often as we like without anybody being put out of the way. These three little rooms are our "den," where we live, work, and receive our intimes, and we leave the doors open that we may consult over our work. Look at our view!' From the windows, looking landward, one may see an expanse of country extending for thirty or forty miles, the hills covered with foliage, through which peep trim villas, and beyond the hills higher mountains dotted with villages, a bit of the wild Karso peering from above. On the other side lies spread the Adriatic, with Miramar, poor Maximilian's home and hobby, lying on a rock projecting into the blue water, and on the opposite coast are the Carnian Alps capped with snow.
"'Why we live so high up,' explains Captain Burton, 'is easily explained. To begin with, we are in good condition, and run up and down the stairs like squirrels. We live on the fourth story because there is no fifth. If I had a campagna and gardens and servants, horses and carriages, I should feel tied, weighted down, in fact. With a flat, and two or three maidservants, one has only to lock the door and go. It feels like "light marching order," as if we were always ready for an expedition; and it is a comfortable place to come back to. Look at our land-and-sea-scape: we have air, light, and tranquillity; no dust, no noise, no street smells. Here my wife receives something like seventy very intimate friends every Friday—an exercise of hospitality to which I have no objection, save one, and that is met by the height we live at. There is in every town a lot of old women of both sexes, who sit for hours talking about the weather and the cancans of the place, and this contingent cannot face the stairs.'
"In spite of all this, and perhaps because of it—for the famous Oriental traveller, whose quarter of a hundred languages are hardly needed for the entry of cargoes at a third-rate seaport, seems to protest too much—one is impelled to ask what anybody can find to do at Trieste, an inquiry simply answered by a 'Stay and see,' with a slap on the shoulder to enforce the invitation. The ménage Burton is conducted on the early-rising principle. About four or five o'clock our hosts are astir, and already in their 'den,' drinking tea made over a spirit-lamp, and eating bread and fruit, reading and studying languages. By noon the morning's work is got over, including the consumption of a cup of soup, the ablution without which no true believer is happy, and the obligations of Frankish toilette. Then comes a stroll to the fencing-school, kept by an excellent broadswordsman, an old German trooper. For an hour Captain and Mrs. Burton fence in the school, if the weather be cold; if it is warm, they make for the water, and often swim for a couple of hours.
"Then comes a spell of work at the Consulate. 'I have my Consulate,' the Chief explains, 'in the heart of the town. I don't want my Jack-tar in my sanctum; and when he wants me, he has usually been on the spree and got into trouble.' While the husband is engaged in his official duties, the wife is abroad promoting a Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, a necessary institution in Southern countries, where—on the purely gratuitous hypothesis that the so-called lower animals have no souls—the uttermost brutality is shown in the treatment of them. 'You see,' remarks our host, 'that my wife and I are like an elder and younger brother living en garçon. We divide the work. I take all the hard and scientific part, and make her do all the rest. When we have worked all day, and said all we have to say to each other, we want relaxation. To that end we have formed a little "Mess," with fifteen friends at the table d'hôte of the Hôtel de la Ville, where we get a good dinner and a pint of the country wine made on the hillside for a florin and a half. By this plan we escape the bore of housekeeping, and are relieved from the curse of domesticity, which we both hate. At dinner we hear the news, if any, take our coffee, cigarettes, and kirsch outside the hotel, then go homewards to read ourselves to sleep; and to-morrow da capo.'
"To the remark that this existence, unless varied by journeys to Midian and elsewhere, would be apt to kindle desires for fresher woods and newer pastures, Captain Burton replies, 'The existence you deprecate is varied by excursions. We know every stick and stone for a hundred miles round, and all the pre-historic remains of the country-side. Our Austrian Governor-General, Baron Pino de Friedenthal, is a first-rate man, and often gives us a cruise in the Government yacht. It is, as you say, an odd place for me to be in; but recollect, it is not every place that would suit me' (1877).
"The man, who, with his wife, has made this pied à terre in Trieste is a man unlike anybody else—a very extraordinary man, who has toiled every hour and minute for forty-four and a half years, distinguishing himself in every possible way. He has done more than any other six men in her Majesty's dominions, and is one of the best, noblest, and truest that breathes.
"While not on active service or on sick leave, he has been serving his country, humanity, science, and civilization in other ways, by opening up lands hitherto unknown, and trying to do good wherever he went. He was the pioneer for all other living African travellers. He first attempted to open up the Sources of the Nile. He 'opened the oyster for the rest to take the pearl'—his Lake Tanganyika is the head basin of the Nile.
"He has made several great expeditions under the Royal Geographical Society and the Foreign Office, most of them at the risk of his life. His languages, knowledge, and experience upon every subject, or any single act of his life, of which he has concentrated so many into forty-four and a half years, would have raised any other man to the top of the ladder of honour and fortune.
"We may sum up his career by their principal heads.
"Nineteen years in the Bombay Army, the first ten in active service, principally in the Sindh Survey on Sir Charles Napier's staff. In the Crimea, Chief of the Staff to General Beatson, and the chief organizer of the Irregular Cavalry.
"Several remarkable and dangerous expeditions in unknown lands. He is the discoverer and opener of the Lake Regions of Central Africa, and perhaps the Senior Explorer of England.
"He has been nearly twenty-six years in the Consular service in the four quarters of the globe (always in bad climates—Africa, Asia, South America, and Europe), doing good service everywhere. It would be impossible to enumerate all that Captain Burton has done in the last forty-four years; but we cannot pass over his knowledge of twenty-nine languages, European and Oriental—not counting dialects—and now that Mezzofante is dead, we may call him the Senior Linguist. Nor can we omit the fact that he has written about fifty standard works, a list of which will appear at the end of this Memoir. (See [Appendix A].)
"He is a man incapable of an untruth or of truckling to what finds favour. His wife tells us in her 'Inner Life of Syria' that 'humbug stands abashed before him,' that he lives sixty years before his time, and that, 'born of Low Church and bigoted parents, as soon as he could reason he began to cast off prejudice and follow a natural law.' Grace aiding the reason of man—upright, honourable, manly, and gentlemanly, but professing no direct form of belief, except in one Almighty Being, God—the belief that says, 'I do that because it is right—not for hell nor heaven, nor for religion, but because it is right—a natural law of Divine grace, which such men unconsciously ignore as Divine intelligence: yet such it is.'
"Perhaps this is the secret of our finding so distinguished a soldier, Government envoy, Foreign Office commissioner, author, linguist, benefactor to science, explorer, discoverer, and organizer of benefits to his country and mankind at large, standing before the world on a pedestal as a plain unadorned hero, sitting by his distant fireside in a strange land, bearing England's neglect, and seeing men who have not done a tithe of his service reaping the credit and reward of his deeds—nay, of the very ideas and words that he has spoken and written. For years he has thought, studied, and written, and in all the four quarters of the globe has been a credit to his country. For years he has braved hunger, thirst, heat, and cold, wild beasts, savage tribes; has fought and suffered, carrying his life in his hand, for England's honour and credit, and his country's praise and approbation, and done it nobly and successfully. But, like many of the greatest heroes that have ever lived, his country will deny him the meed of success whilst he lives, and erect marble statues and write odes to his memory when he can no longer see and hear them—when God, who knows all, will be his reward."
Articles by Alfred Bates Richards.
"Burton's lamented college friend, Alfred Bates Richards, the author of this biography, also wrote two leading articles expressing his opinions in the following outspoken and manly words, and, if I quote them here, it is not by way of advertising any claim Burton may have, or of intoning any grumble against any Government, for to the best of my belief the Burtons have taken up a line of their own. I quote them merely to show the estimation in which I believe him to be held by the whole Press of England, since every article is more or less written in the same tone, with scarcely a dissentient pen, and I have selected these as two of the best specimens:—
"'The best men in this world, in point of those qualities which are of service to mankind, are seldom gifted with powers of self-assertion in regard to personal claims, rewards, and emoluments. Pioneers, originators, and inventors are frequently shunted and pushed aside by those who manage, by means of arts and subtleties (utterly unknown to men of true genius and greatness of character), to reap benefits and honours to which they are not in the slightest degree entitled. Sometimes a reaction sets in and the truth is discovered—when it is too late. There is no country which neglects real merit so frequently and so absolutely as England—none which so liberally bestows its bounties upon second and third rate men, and sometimes absolute pretenders. The most daring explorer cannot find his way up official back-stairs; the most heroic soldier cannot take a salon or a bureau by storm. There are lucky as well as persevering individuals who succeed in the most marvellous way in obtaining far more than their deserts. We have heard of a certain foreigner, now dead, who held a lucrative position for many years in this country, that he so pestered and followed up the late Lord Brougham that he at last obtained the post he sought by simple force of boredom and annoyance. Some men think they ought not to be put in the position of postulants; but that recognition of their services should be spontaneous on the part of the authorities. They are too proud to ask for that which they consider it is patent they have so eminently deserved, that it is a violation of common decency to withhold it; and so they 'eat their hearts' in silence, and accept neglect with dignity, if not indifference.
"'We do not intend to apply these remarks strictly to the occasion which has suggested them. If we did not state this, we should possibly injure the cause which we are anxious to maintain. We have watched the career of an individual for some thirty-five years with interest and admiration, and we frankly own that we now think it time to express our opinion upon the neglect with which the object of that interest and admiration has been treated. We alone are responsible for the manner in which we record our sentiments. Captain Richard Burton, now her Majesty's Consul at Trieste, is, in our judgment, the foremost traveller of the age. We shall not compare his services or exploits with those of any of the distinguished men who have occupied a more or less prominent position, and whose services have been recognized by the nation.
"'He has been upwards of thirty years actively engaged in enterprises, many of them of the most hazardous description. We pass over his career in the Bombay army for nearly twenty years, during which time he acquired that wonderful knowledge of Eastern languages, which is probably unequalled by any living linguist. We shall not give even the catalogue of his varied and interesting works, which have been of equal service to philology and geography. His system of Bayonet Exercise, published in 1855, is, we may observe, en passant, the one now in use in the British army. He suffered the fate of too many of his brother officers of the Indian army when it was reduced, on changing hands, and when he was left without pension or pay.
"'He was emphatically the first great African pioneer of recent times. It is not our intention to speak disparagingly of the late Captain Speke—far from it; but it should be remembered that Speke was Burton's lieutenant, chosen by him to accompany him in his Nile researches, and that when Burton was stricken down by illness that threatened to prove fatal, Speke pushed on a little way ahead, and reaped nearly the whole credit of the discovery. Lake Tanganyika was Burton's discovery, and it was his original theory that it contained the Sources of the Nile. Never was man more cruelly robbed by fate of his just reward. Could Speke have arrived where he did without even the requisite knowledge of languages, manners of the people, etc., save under Burton's guidance? Burton's pilgrimage to Mecca and Medinah was one of the most extraordinary on record.
"'In the expedition to Somali-land, as well as that to the Lake regions of Central Africa, Speke was second in command. In the former, both were severely wounded, and cut their way out of surrounding numbers of natives with singular dash and gallantry, one of the party—Lieutenant Stroyan—being killed. Nor should the wonderful expedition, undertaken alone, to the walled town of Harar, where no European had even been known to penetrate before, be forgotten. On this occasion Captain Burton actually added a grammar and vocabulary of a language to the stores of the philologists. His journey and work on California and the Mormon country preceded that of Mr. Hepworth Dixon. He explored the West Coast of Africa from Bathurst, on the Gambia, to St. Paulo de Loanda in Angola, and the Congo River, visiting the Fans. But his visit to Dahomey was still more important, as he exposed the customs of that blood-stained kingdom, and gave information valuable to humanity as well as to civilization and science. This alone ought to have obtained for him some high honorary distinction; but he got nothing beyond a private expression of satisfaction from the Government then in power. During his four years' Consulship in Brazil his work was simply Herculean. He navigated the river San Francisco fifteen hundred miles in a canoe, visited the gold and diamond mines, crossed the Andes, and explored the Pacific Coast, affording a vast fund of information, political, geographical, and scientific, to the Foreign Office. Next we find him Consul at Damascus, where he did good work in raising English influence and credit. Here he narrowly escaped assassination, receiving a severe wound. He explored Syria, Palestine, and the Holy Land, protected the Christian population from a massacre, and was recalled by the effete Liberal Government because he was too good a man, Damascus being reduced to a Vice-Consulate in accordance with their policy of effacement. He is now shelved at Trieste, but has still managed to embellish his stay here by some valuable antiquarian discoveries.
"'If a Consulate is thought a sufficient reward for such a man and such services, we have no more to say. If he has been fairly treated in reference to his Nile explorations, we have no knowledge of the affair—which we narrowly watched at the time—no discernment, and no true sense of justice. When the war with Ashanti broke out, we expressed our opinion that Captain Burton should have been attached to the expedition. During the Crimean War he showed his powers of organization under General Beatson, whose Chief of the Staff he was, in training four thousand irregular cavalry, fit, when he left them, to do anything and go anywhere. In short, he has done enough for half a dozen men, and to merit half a dozen K.C.B.'s. We sincerely trust that the present Government will not fail, amidst other acts of justice and good works, to bestow some signal mark of her Majesty's favour upon Captain Richard Burton, one of the most remarkable men of the age, who has displayed an intellectual power and a bodily endurance through a series of adventures, explorations, and daring feats of travel, which have never been surpassed in variety and interest by any one man, and whose further neglectful treatment, should it take place, will be a future source of indignant regret to the people of England.'
"The following article appeared when Burton wrote his 'Nile Basin.' I quote that part of it which refers to Burton, and expunge that which does not regard my immediate subject:—
"'About a quarter of a century ago Richard Burton, who had gained only a reputation for eccentricity at Oxford, left that University for India and entered the Bombay army. There he devoted his spare time to the acquisition of Oriental languages, science, and falconry, in company with the Chiefs of Sind, and, amongst other things, wrote works on the language, manners, and sports of that country. We cannot trace his career, but it is well known that he has become one of the greatest linguists of the age, gifted with the rare if not unique capacity of passing for a native in various Oriental countries. In addition to this, he is a good classical scholar, an accomplished swordsman, and a crack shot. His "Pilgrimage to Mecca and Medina" was a wonderful record of successful daring and wonderful impersonation of Oriental character.
"'As an Afghan, and under the name of Mirza Abdullah, he left Southampton on his mission, after undergoing circumcision, and during the voyage on board the P. and O. steamer was only known to be a European to the captain and attaché of the Turkish Embassy returning to Constantinople. His pilgrimage was successful, and he is the only European ever known to have performed it. Perhaps, however, the story of the most remarkable of his performances is contained in his 'First Footsteps in Eastern Africa,' telling how, alone and unaccompanied, during the latter stages, even by his attendants, he penetrated the hitherto almost fabulous walled city of Harar, hobnobbed with its ferocious and exclusive Sultan, and bestowed on philologists a grammar of a new language. The description of his lying down to sleep the first night in that walled city of barbaric strangers, ignorant of the reception he might receive at the Sultan's levée in the morning, is well worth perusal.
"'Then came the episode which first gave the name of Speke to the world—the expedition in the country of the Somali, on the coast of the Red Sea, when the cords of the tent of Burton, Speke, Herne, and the hapless Stroyan were cut by a band of a hundred and fifty armed Somali during the night, after the desertion of their Eastern followers. The escape of Burton was characteristic of the man. Snatching up an Eastern sabre, the first weapon he could grasp, he cut his way by sheer swordsmanship through the crowd, escaping with a javelin thrust through both cheeks. Speke, after receiving seventeen wounds, was captured, and also subsequently escaped, and Stroyan was killed. At this time Burton had taken Speke under his especial patronage, and made him lieutenant of his expeditions. Subsequently came the search after the Sources of the Nile, in which both Burton and Speke figured; next, Burton's expedition to Utah; his Consulship at Fernando Po, and the exploration of the Cameroon Mountains; and, finally, his world-famed mission to the blood-stained Court of Dahomey. Such is Captain Richard Burton, and such his work, briefly and imperfectly described.
"'It is known, at least to the geographical world, that between Burton and his quondam lieutenant, Speke, a feud existed after the latter had proclaimed himself the discoverer of the Sources of the Nile. The outline of the story is this. On the exploring expedition under Burton's command he was seized with a violent and apparently fatal illness which compelled him to pause on the path of discovery at an advanced point. Speke went on, and, returning first to England, succeeded in getting the ear of the Geographical Society and the Foreign Office, and organized another expedition independently of Burton. On his return from this he proclaimed at once to the world that he had solved the great mystery, and the news was received with universal congratulation and belief. In the race for fame—if 'honor est à Nilo' be deemed, as it must be, the common motto of our daring travellers—Burton, shaken to the backbone by fever, disgusted, desponding, and left behind, both in the spirit and the flesh, was, in racing parlance, 'nowhere.' He had the sense to retire from the contest during the first burst of excitement, and let judgment go by default. He went to visit the Mormons, and thence, by an ascending scale in respect to the objects of his search, to leave a card or two in the forest residences of the Gorillas. In the mean time Speke became one of the lions of the day, and ignored the services of his able Chief and Pioneer. To him the good fortune, the honour, the success—to Burton, nothing. The very name and existence of the latter were, as far as possible, ignored. Yet he had commenced all, organized all, arranged all, and discovered Tanganyika. His Oriental acquirements and experiences had paved the way to at least within the last few stages of the discovery of the Nyanza. This is a matter to be regretted. Much more to be regretted was the sad and singular catastrophe of Captain Speke's untimely death. On that very day a great passage, not of Arms, but of intellect and knowledge, was fixed to take place. Burton had challenged Speke to a discussion before a select public tribunal. The subject was the Nile, its sources, and Speke's claim to their discovery.
"'On the fatal afternoon of the 16th of September, 1864, when Speke perished, Burton had met him at 1.30 p.m. in the rooms of Section E of the Bath Association. Their meeting was silent and ominous. Speke, who, as we are informed, had been suffering for some time from nervousness and depression of spirits, probably arising from the trials to his health in an Eastern climate, left the room to go out shooting, and never returned alive! Much cause had Richard Burton to lament that untimely end. His lips were, to a great extent, immediately sealed. Humanity, feeling, and decency—nay, imperious necessity—demanded this. What he has written is argumentative and moderate. He speaks of his deceased rival with commendation for those good qualities which he allows him to have possessed. Burton is as dignified in his style as if he were a true Oriental. Unhappily, Speke is now no more, but Burton has maintained throughout a chivalrous tone towards his deceased adversary.'"
Cicci.
There is a very peculiar and wild race of men who in Trieste are called Cicci; they are Wallachians of the old Danube, and they dress in the Danubian dress, and live in Inner Istria. They are wild people, and have their own breed of wild dogs, which are of a very savage nature. A real Cicci dog costs what is for Trieste a good sum of money, if he is of pure breed; he is secured as a house-guard, and has to be tied up except at night, and, in a general way, only the person who feeds him is able to go near him. These Cicci do not live in Trieste; they live up in the Karso, or Karst, in a remote spot, in their own separate wild villages, where they have the bare necessities of life, and their occupation is charcoal-burning. Richard determined he would become acquainted with this unruly and isolated race, and he made his way to their villages alone, and stayed with them for five days, leading naturally a perfectly comfortless life, sleeping on the floor, and eating their black bread and olives. They were very pleased with him, and very civil to him; but when he came back no man in Trieste would believe that he had done it, till accidentally they saw a party of Cicci coming down to sell their charcoal, and rushing up and claiming him as an old friend. He never could resist seeing a curious and, so to speak, Ishmaelitic race, i.e. severed away from the whole world, without going to live with it, and learn it.
Opçina.
The first thing Richard always did when he arrived in a new place, was to look for a sanitarium to which he might go for change in case of being seedy. There is a Slav village, one hour from and twelve hundred feet above Trieste, called Opçina. You can drive up on a good road by zigzag wooded ways in an hour, or you may climb also in an hour by five other different rugged paths up the cliff. Once arrived at the top, Trieste, the Adriatic, and all the separate points of land, with their villages, churches, towers, villas, and objects of interest, lies before you like a raised map. There are ranges of wooded hills, cliffs dotted with churches and villages, which seem to cling to them. Sometimes banks of clouds cover the whole scene, and you can imagine yourself isolated at the north pole, the white, woolly clouds representing the snow and ice. You see nothing below you, but in the distance you see the Carnian Alps topped with snow. The house you inhabit is Daneu's old-fashioned rural country inn, on the edge of the declivity, and is a sort of outpost to the village of Opçina; and its terrace commands all this lovely view—the finest in the world. The back of the inn has shrubberies and fields, and a view of the Karso, backed by mountains. The air is splendid. We used to take the most delightful walks when up here, or make excursions in little country carts called gripizzas.
It is exceedingly pretty on festival days. Every house in the village, from the big house, the school, and Daneu's inn, to the smallest shed, hangs out its gayest drapery from the windows, and is decorated with flowers and flags. The poorest have at least a jug of large white lilies. All the villages around pour in—the Slav peasant men, in their big boots and knickerbocker-trousers, slouch hat, brown velveteen jacket, one ear-ring, and one flower jauntily cocked behind the ear.
Women with straight features, tow-coloured hair, and blue eyes, dress very like a glorified Sister of Charity, only of all the colours of the rainbow, and a white head-dress deep with lace. In short, fine linen, fine lace, white head-dress, embroidered bodice, stout shoes, and ribbons round waist and down the petticoat of all different colours, one shorter than the other, and the last a big sash, over a final petticoat, opening behind like an all-round apron, a kerchief over the shoulders, real massive gold ornaments, and flowers form the costume. The dresses are most expensive, of all colours, but nothing in bad taste.