Richard and I were exceedingly comfortable, as we always were, and it amused us to hear "our boys," as we called our English fellow-passengers, swearing at the Triestine stewards in Hindostani, and talking louder and louder in the hopes of being understood. We used to hear all day shouts of, "Where is Captain Burton? where is Mrs. Burton?" We were wanted to interpret. We were the connecting link between Austrian-Lloyd's and the discontented Britishers. But at last we all became exceedingly jolly. We slept on deck in rows, and read and talked. In the evening we sang glees and duets. We women abolished toilette for white tea-gowns.
After a very pleasant time, albeit very rough weather, Richard and I left the ship at Suez, and were soon surrounded by a little band of Richard's old friends of Mecca days. We put off, with them, afterwards to the Arabian shore, to rest after our journey at "Moses' Wells," about three miles in the Arabian desert—the scene of poor Palmer, Gill, and Charington's departure. It was a lovely scene, with its blue sea, yellow sands, azure sky, and pink and purple mountains. The sun was hot, but the pure desert air blew in our faces, as we went across the sand to the picturesque spot. The wells or springs are surrounded by tropical verdure, intermingled with Fellah huts. The most romantic spot of all is a single tiny spring, under an isolated palm tree, standing all alone on a little hillock of sand and desert, far from all else, as if that tree and that spring had been created for each other to live alone. It was delightful after India and the rough voyage. We took our kayf there with the Arabs, who gave us delicious coffee and narghílehs, and we rode camels. We were there at the time of Abdul Assiz's death.
After a Stay in Egypt, to Trieste.
After stopping some time at Cairo, Alexandria, and Ramleh, we embarked for Trieste on another Lloyd's, which carried Jamrach and his menagerie. During our stay in Cairo, we saw a great deal of poor Marquis de Compiègne (afterwards shot in a duel), Dr. Schweinfürth, and Marietta Bey and the Bulak Museum; poor John Wallis, legal Consul, once editor of the Tablet; Baron de Kremer, our old Austrian colleague at Damascus, afterwards Minister of Finance at Vienna (now dead). We found the voyage very cold, even in July, after India. We first went to Candia, passing Gavdo, Cape Spaltra, the two islands Cerigotto and Cerigo.
We glide by Cape Matapan on the Greek coast. We passed Cabrera and Sapienza. We leave the lighthouse on Strophades to the left, and reach Zante, which is a lovely island, with a large picturesque town, and where mareschino is made. We run between Cephalonia and Ithaca (of Ulysses); then we change the Greek coast for Acarnania, and pass Santa Maura, or Leucadia, with "Sappho's Leap." We changed then to the Albanian coast, gloriously green to the water's edge, with, cliff and cave, with the Cimariote hills, and its wild people and their lawless legends behind them. We passed two islands, Anti Paxo and Paxo, to Corfú. After we leave Corfú, we coast along Albania, passing Capo Linguetta and Isole Sasseno; then we changed to the Dalmatian coast, to Bocca di Cattaro and Ragusa, afterwards the islands of Lagosta and Cazza; then Lissa, where two great battles were fought, one 13th of March, 1811, and the other 20th of July, 1866. Then we passed the islands of Spalmadore, Lesina, Incoronati, and Grossa; then Punta Biancha, and the island of Sansego. Here we changed to Istria, and are upon our own ground, beginning with Punta di Promontore and Pola, our great Austrian naval station, with its Coliseum and interesting ruins. Then Rovigno and Parenzo, harbour towns on the coast. At Punto Salvore we enter our own "Gulf of Trieste," passing Pirano, which we can see from our own windows, and finally Trieste. The coming into Trieste is very sweet from the sea. The beautiful little City, nestled in its corner in the mountains at the very top of the Adriatic, seemed to us the greenest and most beautiful spot we had ever beheld, after hot India and barren Egypt and Arabia. The hills plumaged to the sea, dotted with white villages and villas; Miramar standing well out to sea in the warm haze; the splendid Carniola Mountains on the opposite side, still slightly tipped with snow, were most refreshing to our eyes, and we settled down in our little home with a feeling of rest, and enjoyed our ever-warm reception from our Trieste friends after our sea voyage.
[1] I put this story in the New Review last November. Hardly had I done so when it was claimed by an American for Professor Henry, of the Smithsonian Institute at Washington. It could hardly have happened to two men, and Richard was much too witty to need to copy. It happened at eleven o'clock on the 22nd of April, 1876. I was present, saw it with my own eyes, heard it with my own ears, and thinking it too good to be forgotten wrote it down there and then. The Archbishop and I mentioned it in letters a few months ago.—I. B.
[2] Richard always took Goanese boys on his wildest travels, and they were always true to him.
[3] "Goa and the Blue Mountains," which will later be in the "Uniform Library."—I. B.