This summer (1874) we got very bad Asiatic cholera, which lasted some three or four months. It killed sixteen daily, and many of them (in fact, I believe most) were ill a very short time; some cases that I know were dead in about half an hour, turning black. When its virulence was going off, I was very bad for fifteen hours; but Richard treated me, and we did not tell anybody what it was, as these things are not advisable, or, at least, were not in those days. At Venice they used to put a gendarme at the door, and, by way of stamping it out, nobody was allowed either to come in or to go out. We had seen so much of it in other countries that we knew quite well what to do if anything could save us, and Richard did not then catch it at all.
This is one of the notes in my journal: "We all felt quite poisoned to-day by a sudden hurricane of wind and dust, which set people howling and running, blew the sea-baths to pieces, and upset the little steamer." These are the sort of delightful surprises that the weather gives one from time to time.
We always had plenty of visitors from England in spring and autumn. At that time Lord Henry Percy, Lord Antrim, and Lord Lindsay came to see us, and Mr. Henry Matthews, our late Home Secretary, Sir Charles Sebright, and Mr. Peyton, popularly known as "Jack Peyton."
One interesting inland excursion was to Prevald, a day's drive. We slept at a peasant's house, and supped on bread and butter, olives, sardines, sausage, and cheese. Next day being Sunday, we went to the village church; the Slav peasants were there in their costumes; the sermon was in Slav, the church clean, and the peasants, though untaught, sang in perfect harmony, with no false notes. Afterwards we ascended the Nanos, a high mountain with snow on it. Prevald, a bright little white Slav village, consists of one street, every house of which is of different shape, with thatched or tiled roofs and wood. It owns a long three-cornered square, a little white church with its pepperbox steeple, its shady grassy graveyard, and wooded hills and mountains; and this description would do for most of the villages. The Nanos is like a big dome, backing the village, from the top of which is a wonderful view.
From here we drove on through splendid mountain scenery to Vipach; there is a village and a castle on a peak, containing a local Marquis de Carabbas. The river rises from under a rock. We drove through a wild, desolate part of the Karso; the heat was burning, the drive jolting, and on the road Richard had a small attack of cholera.
This summer I unearthed my material, and wrote "Inner Life of Syria," which occupied me sixteen months; and we made excursions to Pinguete and San Canziano, where there are also interesting caves on a minor scale than Adelsberg, and where a river dives into the earth.
On the 21st of September there were public prayers and Communion in the churches to stay the cholera; about five hundred went to Communion at a time.
This year also we first had the opera Aïda. We always get our operas in Trieste fresh from La Scala many years before England gets them.