[[10]] The O'Sullivan Beare, a graduate of Dublin University, had had an interesting career. He had served in the Egyptian War of 1885, had been medical officer on the Gold Coast and at Zanzibar, a Vice-consul in East Africa, engaged in the suppression of the slave-trade, and later Consul at Bahia and S. Paulo. He was Consul-general at Rio de Janeiro during a great part of the European War. Col. O'Sullivan Beare died in 1921.
[[11]] See, however, post, page [202].
CHAPTER XI
1910-1911
The first news that reached me on my landing at Southampton on July 17, 1910, was that my nephew, Alan Boyle, the intrepid young airman, had been seriously hurt at Bournemouth—not in the "central blue," but through the wheels of his "Avis" catching in a clover-field. His life had probably been saved by the chance of his having borrowed (for he always as a rule flew bareheaded) an inflated rubber cap from a friend just before the disaster; but, as it was, his head was badly injured.[[1]] After telegraphing sympathy and inquiries to the Glasgows, I went straight to London, to interview doctor and oculist, who both advised consultation with the famous Wiesbaden specialist, Pagenstecher. My brother and I accordingly left England next day, staying a night at Cologne to visit the Cathedral, which D. had never seen, and which, marvellous as it is, struck me once again as the most uninspired of all the great churches of Europe. We reached Wiesbaden next evening; and I was soon established in the comfortable klinik devoted to the cosmopolitan clients of the great oculist. Our party included patients from America, Australia, Mexico and Ceylon, as well as from every country in Europe, and I found myself at table next to a wealthy Catholic gentleman from Yucatan, who told me much about that little-known and marvellous country, and gave me an album of most interesting photographs. I had feared to be caged in a dark room, but escaped this fate, and was able to enjoy of an afternoon the excellent music in the Kurhaus gardens. The internal decorations of the Kurhaus were too hideous for words; but it stood charmingly among shady groves, lakes and fountains, and there were 350 newspapers in the huge rococo reading-room. I had some pleasant walks with my new friend from Yucatan—one to the top of the Neroberg, where we enjoyed a really magnificent prospect, and partook of iced coffee and kirschen-küchen in a rustic summerhouse. Another glorious view was from the Greek Chapel, erected by a Grand Duke of Nassau to the memory of his Russian wife, with an extraordinarily sumptuous and beautiful interior: I was greatly struck by it, though I could not help thinking that when the guide said it cost £700,000 he meant marks, for it is of no great size.
Meanwhile I continued the prescribed "treatment" (unpleasant as it was) at the hands of the eminent oculist, a mysterious-seeming old gentleman who reminded me uncomfortably of Uncle Silas in Le Fanu's blood-curdling novel. Our party at the Klinik was a remarkably cheerful one, everybody seeming quite confident of being cured, or at least greatly benefited. Personally, I soon made up my mind to the permanent loss of one eye (even though, as Dickens remarked of Mr. Squeers, "popular prejudice runs in favour of two"); and in this anticipation I was confirmed by the verdict of Pagenstecher's clever son Adolf, a much more simpatico person than his distinguished parent. Anyhow I was out of the surgeons' hands (for this relief much thanks!), and to celebrate my emancipation I dined at the Kurhaus, listened to the admirable "Doppel-Orchester" (it was an Italian Opera night, recalling many memories), witnessed the illuminations, and felt quite dissipated.
I was cheered, in the midst of these preoccupations, by a very hopeful letter from my sister, fortified by Sir Victor Horsley's favourable prognosis of Alan's case.[[2]] Interesting news, too, came from Lady Lovat (doubly interesting to me) that Simon, now nearly thirty-nine, was engaged to my pretty young kinswoman Laura Lister.[[3]] And on the same day I heard of the betrothal of a favourite niece to a brigadier-general, with a command in West Africa (whither, I imagine, his bride could not accompany him), and a little place in Lincolnshire. In both cases, curiously enough, the bridegroom-expectant was more than double the age of the bride-to-be; but I saw no reason, if they knew their own minds, why this discrepancy should militate against their happiness.
Bethinking myself that I had never yet gone down the Rhine by water, I boarded a steamer at Biebrich, and steamed down the yellow turbid river for eight hours in mist and rain, wishing all the time that I was in the train. A female fellow-passenger introduced herself to me as a former governess of the Glasgow children in the Antipodes, said she had lost her party and her purse, and requested a small loan! I spent two pleasant days at Cologne (Sunday and the festa of August 15 next day), was edified by the immense and devout congregations and the beautiful music in the vast cathedral, and pleased to see the simple holiday-making of the good Rhinelanders in their pretty river-side gardens. Brussels, my next halting-place, was crammed with visitors to the Exhibition, or rather to the smoking ruins of what had been the exhibition, the greater part of which had been burned down the night before my arrival. I walked through the cheerful city, of which the only new feature (to me) was the colossal Palace of Justice, which seemed to dominate Brussels as the heaven-piercing spires of the Dom dominate Cologne; but the gigantic mass of the Brussels building seemed rather to be heaven-defying, and too suggestive of the Tower of Babel to please me.