THE LIFE OF SIR RICHARD BURTON
By Thomas Wright
Author of "The Life of Edward Fitzgerald," etc.
Two Volumes in One
This Work is
Dedicated to
Sir Richard Burton's Kinsman
And Friend,
Major St. George Richard Burton,
The Black Watch.
CONTENTS
[
Chapter I. 19th March 1821-October 1840 ][ 3. Death of Richard Baker, 16th September 1824. ]
[ 4. At School, Richmond, 1829. ]
[
Chapter II. October 1840-April 1842, Oxford ][ 6. Trinity College, October 1840. ]
[
Chapter III. April 1842-20th February 1847, Sind ][ 8. To Bombay, 18th June 1842. ]
[ 10. Karachi. Love of Disguise. ]
[ 11. A Dangerous Mission, 1845. ]
[
Chapter IV. 20th February 1847-1849. Under the Spell of Camoens ][ 16. "Would you a Sufi be?" ]
[ 17. Letter to Sarah Burton, 14th Nov. 1848. ]
[
Chapter V. 1849 to 3rd April, 1853, Chiefly Boulogne ][ 20. Isabel Arundell & "My Dear Louisa." 1851. ]
[ 21. Forster FitzGerald Arbuthnot 1853. ]
[
Chapter VI. 3rd April 1853 to 29th October 1854, Pilgrimage to Mecca ][ 22. The Man Wants to Wander. ]
[ 24. The Pilgrim Ship, 6th July 1853. ]
[ 27. Burton's Delight in Shocking. ]
[
Chapter VII. 29th October 1854—9th February, 1855 To Harar ][ Bibliography: 13. Pilgrimage to Al-Madimah and Meccah. 3 vols. 1855-1856. ]
[ 29. At Aden. The Arabian Nights. Oct. 1854. ]
[ 30. From Zeila to Harar, 27th November 1854 to 2nd January 1855. ]
[ 32. From Harar to Berbera. 13th Jan. 1855-5th Feb. 1855. ]
[ 33. The Fight at Berbera, 22nd April, 1855. ]
[
Chapter VIII. 9th February 1855-October 1856, The Crimea ][ 35. Engaged to Isabel Arundell, August 1856. ]
[
Chapter IX. December 1856-21st May 1859, The Unveiling of Isis ][ 36. To Fuga. January to March 1857. ]
[ 37. Zanzibar to Tanganyika, 26th June 1857 to 26th May 1858. ]
[ 38. The Return Journey, 26th May 1858 to 13th February 1859. ]
[
Chapter X. 22nd January 1861-to August 1861, Mormons and Marriage ][ 39. We rushed into each other's arms. 22nd May, 1860. ]
[ 40. Brigham Young. April 1860 to November 1860. ]
[ 41. Marriage. 22nd January 1861. ]
[
Chapter XI. August 1861-November 1863, Fernando Po ][ 46. The Anthropological Society, 6th Jan. 1863. ]
[
Chapter XII. 29th November 1863 to 15th September 1865, Gelele ][ 47. Whydah and its Deity. 29th November 1863. ]
[ 50. Death of Speke, 15th September 1864. ]
[
Chapter XIII. September 1865-October 1869 Santos, Burton's Second Consulate ][ 52. Aubertin. Death of Steinhauser, 27th July 1866. ]
[ 53. The Facetious Cannibals. ]
[ 54. Down the Sao Francisco. ]
[ 55. In Paraguay. August 15th to September 15th 1868. April 4th to April 18th 1869. ]
[
Chapter XIV. October 1869-16th August 1871, "Emperor and Empress of Damascus." ][ 56. Archbishop Manning and the Odd Fish. ]
[ 57. 3rd Consulate, Damascus. ]
[ 60. Palmer and Drake. 11th July 1870. ]
[ 63. The Recall. 16th August 1871. ]
[
Chapter XV. 16th August 1871-4th June 1872, "The Blackness of Darkness" ][ 64. With Sir H. Stisted at Norwood. August 1871. ]
[ 66. An Orgie at Lady Alford's. 2nd November 1871. ]
[ 68. Khamoor at the Theatre. ]
[
Chapter XVI. 4th June 1872-24th October 1872, In Iceland ][ 69. In Edinburgh Again, 4th June 1872. ]
[ 70. Wardour Castle, 5th July 1872. ]
[ 71. St. George and Frederick Burton. ]
[
Chapter XVII. 24th October 1872-12th May 1875, Trieste ][ 75. Burton at Trieste, 24th October 1872. ]
[ 76. At the Vienna Exhibition, 1873. ]
[ 77. A Visit from Drake, June 1873. ]
[ 78. Khamoor returns to Syria, 4th December 1874. ]
[
Chapter XVIII. 12th May 1875-18th June 1876, The Trip to India ][ 79. Visit to England, 12th May 1875. ]
[ 81. A Trip to India, December 1875, 18th June 1876. ]
[ 82. Arbuthnot Again. Rehatsek. ]
[
Chapter XIX. 18th June 1876-31st March 1877, Colonel Gordon ][ 86. Death of Rashid Pasha, 24th June 1876. ]
[ 88. Jane Digby the Second. ]
[ 89. The Old Baronetcy. 18th January 1877. ]
[
Chapter XX. 31st March 1877 to 27th December 1879, Midian ][ 90. "The New Joseph." 31st March 1877-21st April 1877. 19th October 1877-20th April 1878. ]
[ 91. More Advice to "Lazybones." 8th May 1877. ]
[ 94. Letter to Sir Henry Gordon, 4th July 1878. ]
[ 95. Death of Maria Stisted, 12th November 1878. ]
[ 96. Burton's "Six Senses." ]
[ 97. Still thinking of Midian. April-December 1879. ]
[
Chapter XXI. 27th December 1879-August 1881, Camoens ][ 99. At Ober Ammergau, August 1880. ]
[ 100. Mrs. Burton's Advice to Novelists. 4th September 1880. ]
[
Chapter XXII. August 1881-May 1882, John Payne ][ 103. With Cameron at Venice, August 1881. ]
[ 104. John Payne, November 1881. ]
[ 105. To the Gold Coast, 25th November 1881-20th May 1882. ]
[
Chapter XXIII. 20th May 1882-July 1883, The Meeting of Burton and Payne ][ 106. Mrs. Grundy begins to roar. May 1882. ]
[ 107. The Search for Palmer, October 1882. ]
[
Chapter XXIV. July 1883-November 1883, The Palazzone ][ 109. Burton and Mrs. Disraeli. ]
[ 110. "I am an Old English Catholic." ]
[ 111. Burton begins his Translation, April 1884. ]
[ 112. The Battle over the Nights. ]
[ 113. Completion of Mr. Payne's Translation. ]
[
Chapter XXV. 1883 to May 1885, The Kama Shastra Society ][
Chapter XXVI. The Ananga Ranga or Lila Shastra ][ 116. The Ananga Ranga. [403] ]
[ 117. The Beharistan, 1887. ]
[ 120. Letters to Payne, 19th January 1884. ]
[ 121. At Sauerbrunn, 12th August 1884. ]
[ 122. Burton's Circulars, September 1884. ]
[ 123. The Book of the Sword. ]
[ 124. The Lyrics of Camoens, 1884. ]
[ 125. More Letters to Payne, 1st October 1884. ]
[ 126. Death of Gordon, January 1885. ]
[ 127. W. F. Kirby, [418] 25th March 1885. ]
[
Chapter XXVII. May 1885-5th Feb. 1886, A Glance through "The Arabian Nights" ][ 128. Slaving at the Athenaeum, May 1885. ]
[ 129. A Visit to Mr. Arbuthnot's. ]
[ 132. The Pentameron. Burton and Gladstone. ]
[ 133. A Brief Glance through the Nights. ]
[
Chapter XXVIII. The Two Translations Compared ][ 134. The Blacksmith Who, etc. ]
[
Chapter XXIX. Burton's Notes ][ 140. Mr. Swinburne on Burton. ]
[
Chapter XXX. 21st November 1885-5th June 1886 K. C. M. G. ][ 141. In Morocco, 21st November 1885. ]
[ 142. K.C.M.G., 5th February 1886. ]
[
Chapter XXXI. Burton's Religion ][
Chapter XXXII. 5th June 1886-15th April 1888, Burton and Social Questions: Anecdotes ][ 147. The Population Question. ]
[ 149. Mr. A. G. Ellis and Professor Blumhardt. 5th June 1886-5th April 1887. ]
[ 150. Dr. Leslie and Dr. Baker: Anecdotes. April 1887. ]
[ 151. Three Months at Abbazia. 1st Dec. 1887-5th March 1888. ]
[ 152. Meeting with Mr. Swinburne and others, 18th July 1888-15th October 1888. ]
[ 155. The Gypsy, August 1888. ]
[ 156. The Supplemental Nights. 1st December 1886-1st August 1888. ]
[
Chapter XXXIV. "The Scented Garden" ][ 159. Origin of The Scented Garden. ]
[ 160. Contents of The Scented Garden. ]
[ 161. Sir Richard Burton's Translation. ]
[ 162. Switzerland 15th October 1888. ]
[ 163. Mr. Letchford, August and September 1889. ]
[ 165. To Mr. Kirby 15th May 1889. ]
[ 166. Tunis and Algiers, November 1889 to March 1890. ]
[
Chapter XXXVI. "The Priapeia" ][ 169. Catullus and the Last Trip, July—September 1890. ]
[ 170. At Maloja, July 1890. ]
[
Chapter XXXVII. Death of Sir Richard Burton ][ 173. Death. 20th October 1890. ]
[
Chapter XXXVIII. 20th October 1890-December 1890, The Fate of "The Scented Garden" ][ 173. The Fate of The Scented Garden. ]
[ 174. Discrepancies in Lady Burton's Story. ]
[ 175. The Fate of the Catullus. ]
[ 176. Lisa Departs, November 1890. ]
[
Chapter XXXIX. January 1891 to July 1891, Lady Burton in England ][ Bibliography (Posthumous works): ]
[ 177. Lady Burton in England. ]
[ 178. The Funeral at Mortlake, 15th June 1891. ]
[ 179. The Scented Garden Storm, June 1891. ]
[
Chapter XL. July 1891-December 1893, O Tomb, O Tomb! ][ 180. A Letter to Miss Stisted. ]
[ 181. The writing of the Life August 1892-March 1893. ]
[ 182. The Library Edition of The Nights 1894. ]
[
Chapter XLI. Death of Lady Burton ][ 183. Lady Burton at Eastbourne. ]
[ 184. Death of Lady Burton, 22nd Mar. 1896. ]
[ 185. Miss Stisted's "True Life." ]
[ 186. Mr. Wilkins's Work, 1897. ]
[ Verses on the Death of Richard Burton [703] By Algernon Charles Swinburne ]
Preface.
Fifteen years have elapsed since the death of Sir Richard Burton and twelve since the appearance of the biography of Lady Burton. A deeply pathetic interest attaches itself to that book. Lady Burton was stricken down with an incurable disease. Death with its icy breath hung over her as her pen flew along the paper, and the questions constantly on her lips were "Shall I live to complete my task? Shall I live to tell the world how great and noble a man my husband was, and to refute the calumnies that his enemies have so industriously circulated?" She did complete it in a sense, for the work duly appeared; but no one recognised more clearly than herself its numerous shortcomings. Indeed, it is little better than a huge scrap-book filled with newspaper cuttings and citations from Sir Richard's and other books, hurriedly selected and even more hurriedly pieced together. It gives the impressions of Lady Burton alone, for those of Sir Richard's friends are ignored—so we see Burton from only one point of view. Amazing to say, it does not contain a single original anecdote [1]—though perhaps, more amusing anecdotes could be told of Burton than of any other modern Englishman. It will be my duty to rectify Lady Burton's mistakes and mis-statements and to fill up the vast hiatuses that she has left. Although it will be necessary to subject her to criticism, I shall endeavour at the same time to keep constantly in mind the queenliness and beauty of her character, her almost unexampled devotion to her husband, and her anxiety that everyone should think well of him. Her faults were all of the head. Of the heart she had absolutely none.
As the Richard Burton whom I have to pourtray differs considerably from Lady Burton's "Earthly God," [2] I have been very careful to give chapter and verse for all my statements. The work has been written on the same lines as my Life of Edward FitzGerald; that is to say, without any aim except to arrive at the precise truth. But although I have regarded it as no concern of mine whether any particular fact tells for or against Sir Richard Burton, I do think that when the reader rises from the last page he will feel that he has been in the company not only of one of the greatest, noblest and most fearless of Englishmen, but also of one who, without making much profession of doing so, really loved his fellow-men, and who, despite his inability to put himself in line with religionists, fought steadily on the side of righteousness. We are aware that there are in his books a few observations which call for vehement and unqualified denunciation; but against them must be placed the fundamental goodness of the man, to which all who knew him intimately have testified. In not a few respects Sir Richard Burton's character resembled Edward FitzGerald's. Burton, indeed, hailed the adapter of Omar Khayyam as a "fellow Sufi."
Lady Burton, too, comes extremely well out of the fire of criticism. The reader may object to her religious views, he may smile at her weaknesses, he may lament her indiscretions, but he will recognise that at bottom she was a God-fearing, noble-minded woman; and he will, we think, find himself really in love with her almost before knowing it.
The amount of absolutely new information in this work is very large. Thus we are telling for the first time the history of Burton's friendships with Mr. F. F. Arbuthnot, Mr. John Payne, and others; and we are giving for the first time, too, a complete and accurate history of the translation of The Arabian Nights, The Scented Garden, and other works. Hundreds of new facts are recorded respecting these and other absorbing topics, while the citations from the unpublished letters of Burton and Lady Burton will, we are sure, receive a welcome. We are able to give about fifty entirely new anecdotes—many of them extremely piquant and amusing. We also tell the touching story of Burton's brother Edward. In our accounts of Burton's travels will be found a number of interesting facts and some anecdotes not given in Burton's works.
The new material has been derived from many sources—but from ten in particular.
(1) From two hundred unpublished letters of Sir Richard Burton and Lady Burton.
(2) From interviews with Mrs. E. J. Burton [3] and Mr. F. Burton (Burton's cousins), Mr. John Payne, Mrs. Arbuthnot, Mr. Watts-Dunton, Mr. W. F. Kirby, Mr. A. G. Ellis, Dr. Codrington, Professor James F. Blumhardt, Mr. Henry R. Tedder (librarian and secretary of The Athenaeum, Burton's club), Mrs. Baddeley (mother of Burton's friend, St. Clair Baddeley), Madame Nicastro (sister of the late Mr. Albert Letchford, illustrator of The Arabian Nights), Dr. Grenfell Baker (Burton's medical attendant during the last three years of his life), and many other ladies and gentlemen.
(3) From letters received from Major St. George Burton (to whom I have the pleasure of dedicating this work), Lady Bancroft, Mr. D. MacRitchie, Mr. E. S. Mostyn Pryce (representative of Miss Stisted), Gunley Hall, Staffordshire, M. Charles Carrington, of Paris, who sent me various notes, including an account of Burton's unfinished translation of Apuleius's Golden Ass, the MS. of which is in his possession, the Very Rev. J. P. Canon McCarthy, of Ilkeston, for particulars of "The Shrine of our Lady of Dale," Mr. Segrave (son of Burton's "dear Louisa"), Mrs. Agg (Burton's cousin), and Mr. P. P. Cautley (Burton's colleague at Trieste). Nor must I omit reference to a kind letter received from Mrs. Van Zeller, Lady Burton's only surviving sister. [4]
(4) From the Burton collections in the Free Libraries of Camberwell and Kensington.
(5) From unpublished manuscripts written by Burton's friends.
(6) From the church registers of Elstree. By examination of these and other documents I have been able to correct many mistakes.
(7) From the manuscripts of F. F. Arbuthnot and the Oriental scholar, Edward Rehatsek. These are now in the possession of the Royal Asiatic Society.
(8) From Mr. Arbuthnot's typewritten and unpublished Life of Balzac now in my possession. This contains many notes throwing light on the Burton and Arbuthnot friendship.
(9) From the Genealogical Table of the Burtons of Shap, very kindly sent me by Mr. E. S. Mostyn Pryce.
(10) From various persons interviewed during many journeys. One of these journeys (June 1905) took me, of course, to the Tomb of Mortlake, and I was gratified to find that, owing to the watchfulness of the Arundell family, it is kept in perfect repair. [5]
Let me first speak of the unpublished letters. These were lent me by Mr. John Payne (40 letters), Mr. W. F. Kirby (50 letters), Major St. George Burton, Mrs. E. J. Burton, Mrs. Agg, Mr. Mostyn Pryce, Dr. Tuckey, Mr. D. MacRitchie, and Mr. A. G. Ellis. Many of the letters reveal Burton in quite a new light. His patriotism and his courage were known of all men, but the womanly tenderness of his nature and his intense love for his friends will come to many as a surprise. His distress, for example, on hearing of the death of Drake, [6] is particularly affecting.
Of the friends of Sir Richard Burton who have been interviewed I must mention first of all Mr. John Payne. But for Mr. Payne's generous assistance, this work I must frankly admit, could not have been written. He, and he alone, held the keys to whole chambers of mystery. Mr. Payne was at first extremely reluctant to give me the material required. Indeed, in his first letter of reply to my request for information (7th August 1904) he declined positively either to enter the lists against Burton, with whom, he said, he had been on terms of intimate friendship, or to discuss the matter at all. "As for what," he said, "it pleases the public to think (save the mark!) of the relative merits of my own and Burton's translations, I have long ceased to care a straw." But this led me to write even more pressingly. I assured Mr. Payne that the public had been unjust to him simply because nobody had hitherto set himself the great task of comparing the two translations, and because the true history of the case had never been laid before them. I assured him that I yielded to nobody in admiration of Sir Richard Burton—that is, on account of what he (Sir Richard) did do, not on account of what he did not do; and I gave it as my opinion that Mr. Payne owed it both to the public and to himself to lay bare the whole story. After several letters and interviews I at last induced him to give way; and I think the public will thank me for my persistency.
My revelations, which form an astonishing story, will no doubt come as a complete surprise to almost everybody. I can imagine them, indeed, dropping like a bombshell into some circles; but they are founded, not only upon conversations with Mr. Payne, but upon Burton's own letters to Mr. Payne, all of which have been in my hands, and careful study of the two translations. The public, however, cannot possibly be more surprised than I myself was when I compared the two translations page by page, I could scarcely believe my own eyes; and only one conclusion was possible. Burton, indeed, has taken from Payne at least three-quarters of the entire work. He has transferred many hundreds of sentences and clauses bodily. Sometimes we come upon a whole page with only a word or two altered. [7] In short, amazing to say, the public have given Burton credit for a gift which he did not possess [8]—that of being a great translator. If the public are sorry, we are deeply sorry, too, but we cannot help it. Burton's exalted position, however, as ethnologist and anthropologist, is unassailable. He was the greatest linguist and traveller that England ever produced. And four thrones are surely enough for any man. I must mention that Mr. Payne gave me an absolute free hand—nay, more than that, having placed all the documents before me, he said—and this he repeated again and again—"Wherever there is any doubt, give Burton the benefit of it," and I have done so.
In dealing with the fight [9] over The Arabian Nights I have endeavoured to write in such a way as to give offence to nobody, and for that reason have made a liberal use of asterisks. I am the more desirous of saying this because no one is better aware than myself of the services that some of Burton's most bitter opponents—those ten or twelve men whom he contemptuously termed Laneites—have rendered to literature and knowledge. In short, I regard the battle as fought and won. I am merely writing history. No man at the present day would dream of mentioning Lane in the same breath with Payne and Burton. In restoring to Mr. Payne his own, I have had no desire to detract from Burton. Indeed, it is impossible to take from a man that which he never possessed. Burton was a very great man, Mr. Payne is a very great man, but they differ as two stars differ in glory. Burton is the magnificent man of action and the anthropologist, Mr. Payne the brilliant poet and prose writer. Mr. Payne did not go to Mecca or Tanganyika, Burton did not translate The Arabian Nights, [10] or write The Rime of Redemption and Vigil and Vision. He did, however, produce the annotations of The Arabian Nights, and a remarkable enough and distinct work they form.
I recall with great pleasure an evening spent with Mr. Watts-Dunton at The Pines, Putney. The conversation ran chiefly on the Gipsies, [11] upon whom Mr. Watts-Dunton is one of our best authorities, and the various translations of The Arabian Nights. Both he and Mr. A. C. Swinburne have testified to Burton's personal charm and his marvellous powers. "He was a much valued and loved friend," wrote Mr. Swinburne to me [12], "and I have of him none but the most delightful recollections." Mr. Swinburne has kindly allowed me to give in full his magnificent poem on "The Death of Richard Burton." Dr. Grenfell Baker, whom I interviewed in London, had much to tell me respecting Sir Richard's last three years; and he has since very kindly helped me by letter.
The great object of this book is to tell the story of Burton's life, to delineate as vividly as possible his remarkable character—his magnetic personality, and to defend him alike from enemy and friend. In writing it my difficulties have been two. First, Burton himself was woefully inaccurate as an autobiographer, and we must also add regretfully that we have occasionally found him colouring history in order to suit his own ends. [13] He would have put his life to the touch rather than misrepresent if he thought any man would suffer thereby; but he seems to have assumed that it did not matter about keeping strictly to the truth if nobody was likely to be injured. Secondly, Lady Burton, with haughty indifference to the opinions of everyone else, always exhibited occurrences in the light in which she herself desired to see them. This fact and the extreme haste with which her book was written are sufficient to account for most of its shortcomings. She relied entirely upon her own imperfect recollections. Church registers and all such documents were ignored. She begins with the misstatement that Burton was born at Elstree, she makes scarcely any reference to his most intimate friends and even spells their names wrongly. [14] Her remarks on the Kasidah are stultified by the most cursory glance at that poem; while the whole of her account of the translating of The Arabian Nights is at variance with Burton's own letters and conversations. I am assured by several who knew Burton intimately that the untrustworthiness of the latter part of Lady Burton's "Life" of her husband is owing mainly to her over-anxiety to shield him from his enemies. But I think she mistook the situation. I do not believe Burton had any enemies to speak of at the time of his death.
If Lady Burton's treatment of her husband's unfinished works cannot be defended, on the other hand I shall show that the loss as regards The Scented Garden was chiefly a pecuniary one, and therefore almost entirely her own. The publication of The Scented Garden would not—it could not—have added to Burton's fame. However, the matter will be fully discussed in its proper place.
It has generally been supposed that two other difficulties must confront any conscientious biographer of Burton—the first being Burton's choice of subjects, and the second the friction between Lady Burton and the Stisteds. But as regards the first, surely we are justified in assuming that Burton's studies were pursued purely for historical and scientific purposes. He himself insisted in season and out of season that his outlook was solely that of the student, and my researches for the purposes of this work have thoroughly convinced me that, however much we may deprecate some of these studies, Burton himself was sincere enough in his pursuit of them. His nature, strange as it may seem to some ears, was a cold one [15]; and at the time he was buried in the most forbidding of his studies he was an old man racked with infirmities. Yet he toiled from morning to night, year in year out, more like a navvy than an English gentleman, with an income of £700 a year, and 10,000 "jingling, tingling, golden, minted quid," as R. L. Stevenson would have said, in his pocket. In his hunger for the fame of an author, he forgot to feed his body, and had to be constantly reminded of its needs by his medical attendant and others. And then he would wolf down his food, in order to get back quickly to his absorbing work. The study had become a monomania with him.
I do not think there is a more pathetic story in the history of literature than that which I have to tell of the last few weeks of Burton's life. You are to see the old man, always ailing, sometimes in acute pain—working twenty-five hours a day, as it were—in order to get completed a work by which he supposed he was to live for ever. In the same room sits the wife who dearly loves him, and whom he dearly loves and trusts. A few days pass. He is gone. She burns, page by page, the work at which he had toiled so long and so patiently. And here comes the pathos of it—she was, in the circumstances, justified in so doing. As regards Lady Burton and the Stisteds, it was natural, perhaps, that between a staunch Protestant family such as the Stisteds, and an uncompromising Catholic like Lady Burton there should have been friction; but both Lady Burton and Miss Stisted are dead. Each made, during Lady Burton's lifetime, an honest attempt to think well of the other; each wrote to the other many sweet, sincere, and womanly letters; but success did not follow. Death, however, is a very loving mother. She gently hushes her little ones to sleep; and, as they drop off, the red spot on the cheek gradually fades away, and even the tears on the pillow soon dry.
Although Miss Stisted's book has been a help to me I cannot endorse her opinion that Burton's recall from Damascus was the result of Lady Burton's indiscretions. Her books give some very interesting reminiscences of Sir Richard's childhood and early manhood, [16] but practically it finishes with the Damascus episode. Her innocent remarks on The Scented Garden must have made the anthropological sides of Ashbee, Arbuthnot, and Burton's other old friends shake with uncontrollable laughter. Unfortunately, she was as careless as Lady Burton. Thus on page 48 she relates a story about Burton's attempt to carry off a nun; but readers of Burton's book on Goa will find that it had no connection with Burton whatever. It was a story someone had told him.
In these pages Burton will be seen on his travels, among his friends, among his books, fighting, writing, quarrelling, exploring, joking, flying like a squib from place to place—a 19th century Lord Peterborough, though with the world instead of a mere continent for theatre. Even late in life, when his infirmities prevented larger circuits, he careered about Europe in a Walpurgic style that makes the mind giddy to dwell upon.
Of Burton's original works I have given brief summaries; but as a writer he shines only in isolated passages. We go to him not for style but for facts. Many of his books throw welcome light on historical portions of the Bible. [17]
Of those of his works which are erotic in the true sense of the word I have given a sufficient account, and one with which I am convinced even the most captious will not find fault. [18] When necessity has obliged me to touch upon the subject to which Sir Richard devoted his last lustrum, I have been as brief as possible, and have written in a way that only scholars could understand. In short I have kept steadily in view the fact that this work is one which will lie on drawing-room tables and be within the reach of everyone. I have nowhere mentioned the subject by name, but I do not see how I could possible have avoided all allusion to it. I have dwelt on Burton's bravery, his tenderness, his probity, his marvellous industry, his encyclopaedic learning—but the picture would not have been a true one had I entirely over-passed the monomania of his last days. Hamlet must be shown, if not at his maddest, at any rate mad, or he would not be Hamlet at all.
As regards Burton's letters, I have ruthlessly struck out every sentence that might give offence. [19] While I have not hesitated to expose Sir Richard's faults, I have endeavoured to avoid laying too much stress upon them. I have tried, indeed, to get an idea of the mountain not only by climbing its sides, but also by viewing it from a distance. I trust that there will be found nothing in this book to hurt the feelings of any living person or indeed of any body of persons. I have certainly tried my utmost to avoid causing pain, and if the reader will kindly bear in mind that it is as much a Christian duty to avoid taking offence as to avoid giving offence, we shall amble along pleasantly together to the very last page. Out of consideration for Catholics I have suppressed a number of passages; and if I have allowed Sir Richard in one or two instances to make a lunge at their church, I trust they will notice that I have permitted him the same licence with regard to the Church of England and Exeter Hall. Finally, my impartiality is proved by my allowing him to gird at the poet Cowper.
Wherever possible, that is to say, when I could do it without ambiguity I have also out of courtesy used the term Catholic instead of Roman Catholic; and in order to meet what I believe to be the wishes of Lady Burton's executors, I have omitted all mention of certain events that occurred after Sir Richard's death.
The various works of Mr. W. H. Wilkins have been of great help to me, and I cannot avoid paying a passing tribute to the excellent opening passages [20] of the Preface of his edition of Lady Burton's Life of her husband.
The illustrations in this book are of exceptional interest. They include the Burton family portraits, the originals of which are in the possession of Mr. Mostyn Pryce and Mrs. Agg. During the lifetime of Sir Richard and Lady Burton they were the property of Lady and Miss Stisted; but, owing to her difference with these ladies, Lady Burton was not able to use them in the life of her husband; and Miss Stisted's own scheme did not include illustrations. So they are now reproduced for the first time. The most noticeable are the quaint picture of Burton, his brother and sister as children, and the oil painting of Burton and Lady Stisted made by Jacquand about 1851. Of great interest, too, is the series of photographs taken at Trieste by Dr. Grenfell Baker; while the portraits of Burton's friends, Mr. F. F. Arbuthnot, Mr. John Payne, Major St. George Burton, Dr. Baker, Mr. W. F. Kirby, Mr. A. G. Ellis, Professor J. F. Blumhardt, and others, will no doubt be appreciated by the public.
The writing of this book has been a thorough pleasure to me, not only on account of the infinite charm of the subject, but also because everyone whom I have approached has treated me with studied kindness. The representatives of Sir Richard Burton, of Lady Burton (through Mr. W. H. Wilkins) and of Miss Stisted have not only helped and permitted me to use the unpublished letters, [21] but have generously given me a free hand. I am deeply indebted to them, and I can only trust that these pages will prove that their confidence in my judgment has not been misplaced.
To everyone who has assisted me I tender my sincere thanks, and I assure them that I shall never forget their abundant kindness.
Finally, in writing this work every possible care has been taken to ensure accuracy [22]; but that absolute perfection has been attained is improbable. It is hoped, however,—to borrow the quaint expression of the Persian poet Jami—"that the noble disposition of the readers will induce them to pass over defects." [23]
My grateful thanks are due to the following ladies and gentlemen for various services.
Arbuthnot, Mrs. F. F., 43 South Street, Park Lane, London.
Ashbee, Mr. C. G., Woolstapler Hall, Chipping Cambden,
Gloucestershire.
Agg, Mrs. Hewletts, Cheltenham.
Baddeley, Mrs., Brighton.
Baker, Dr. Grenfell, 25, Southwick Street, Hyde Park, W.
Birch, Mrs. G. M., Lympstone Grange, South Devon.
Blumhardt, Prof. James F., British Museum.
Burton, Mrs. E. J., 31, Wilbury Road, Brighton.
Burton, Major St. George, The Black Watch.
Burton, Mr. Frederick, Brighton.
Cautley, Mr. P. P., 4, Via della Zonta, Trieste.
Clayton, Mr. Arthur, South View, Ropley, Hants.
Carrington, Mr. Charles, 13, Faubourg Montmartre, Paris.
Chatto, Mr. Andrew, Hillside, Elstree.
Codrington, Dr., Royal Asiatic Society, Albemarle Street.
Committee, The, of the Central Library, Camberwell.
Eales, Rev. A. R. T., The Rectory, Elstree, Herts.
Ellis, Mr. A. G., British Museum.
Editors, The, of the following newspapers: The Times, The Daily
Telegraph, The Standard, The Daily News, The Morning Post,
The Daily Chronicle, The Daily Mail, The Athenaeum, The Saturday
Review, The Academy, for inserting letters for me at different
times. These letters put me in touch with several of Burton's
old friends.
Gardiner, Mr. C. H., 4, Montpelier Crescent, Brighton.
George, Mr. William H., 2, Highfield Terrace, Bognor.
Hector, Mr. E., Bookseller, 103, John Bright Street, Birmingham.
Hutchinson & Co., Messrs, for the loan of the portrait of Khamoor.
Jones, Mr. Herbert, The Library, High Street, Kensington.
Josling, Mr. A., 36, Lyndhurst Grove, Camberwell.
Kirby, Mr. W. F., "Hilden," Sutton Court Road, Chiswick, London.
Letchford, Miss Daisy (now Madame Nicastro), Mezellina 178, Naples.
McCarthy, The Very Rev. P. J. Canon, Ilkeston, Derbyshire.
Mendelssohn, Mr. S., 21, Kensington Court Gardens, London, W.
Murray, Mr. T. Douglas, Pyt Cottage, Tisbury, Wilts.
MacRitchie, Mr. David, 4, Archibald Place, Edinburgh.
Newcombe, Mr. C. F., 16, Champion Park, Denmark Hill, London, S. E.
Nicastro, Madame.
Payne, Mr. John.
Pelham, Dr., President of Trinity College, Oxford.
Pryce, Mr. E. S. Mostyn, Gunley Hall, Chirbury, Shropshire.
Rankin-Lloyd, Mrs., Wilne House, Pembroke.
Royal Asiatic Society (for permission to examine the Arbuthnot and
Rehatsek manuscripts).
Roe, Rev. Henry, 12, Barnoon Terrace, St. Ives, Cornwall.
Sams, Rev. G. F., The Rectory, Emberton, Bucks.
Segrave, Mr. H., Seaview, Lyme Regis, Dorset.
Snowsill, Mr. W. G., Camberwell Central Library.
Spencer, Mr. W. T., Bookseller, 27, New Oxford Street, London, W. C.
Steingass, Mrs., 36, Lyndhurst Grove, Camberwell.
Tussaud, Mr. John, of "Madame Tussaud's."
Tedder, Mr., The Athenaeum.
Tuckey, Dr. Charles Lloyd, 88, Park Street, Grosvenor Square,
London.
Van Zeller, Mrs. (Lady Burton's sister).
Wilkins, Mr. W. H., 3, Queen Street, Mayfair, London, W.
Wood, Mr. W. Martin, Underwood, Oatlands Avenue, Weybridge.
Wyllie, Mr. Francis R. S., 6, Montpellier Villas, Brighton.
My wife, too, upon whom devolved the heavy task of transcribing,
must also be awarded her meed of praise.
The following is a fairly complete list of the various Books and Magazine Articles that have been laid under contribution.
Arbuthnot, F. F., "Persian Portraits." 1887
"The Mysteries of Chronology."
"Life of Balzac (in Manuscript)."
"Baily's Monthly Magazine," April 1883.
Baddeley, St. Clair (See Richards, A. B.)
Burton, Lady. "Life of Sir Richard Burton," 2 vols. 1893.
Her Works. 5 vols.
Burton, Sir Richard. His Works. 60 vols.
"Edinburgh Review," July 1886. No. 335.
Hitchman, F., "Richard R. Burton," 2 vols. 1887.
Kama Shastra Society's Publications.
Magazine Articles by or relating to Burton. Too numerous
to mention.
Payne, Mr. John, The Book of "The Thousand Nights and One Night,"
9 vols., 1882-4, and "Omar Kheyyam."
"Perfumed Garden, The." Published in 1904 by Mr. Carrington,
of Paris.
Its Preface contains letters from several of the leading Arabists
of the day, including M. Fagnan and Professor Hartwig Derenbourg,
Membre de l'Institut.
Richards (A. B.), Wilson (A.), and Baddeley (St. C.), "Sketch of the
Career of Richard F. Burton," 1886.
Rehatsek (Edward), Translations.
Roe, Rev. Henry, "West African Scenes," "Fernando Po Mission."
Stisted, Miss Georgiana, "Reminiscences of Sir Richard Burton"—
"Temple Bar," July, 1891. Vol. 92.
"The True Life of Sir Richard Burton," 1896.
"Saturday Review," "Ultima Thule," 1876, Jan. 15 (p. 82).
"Zanzibar," 1872, February 17th (p. 222).
Wilkins, W. H., "The Romance of Isabel Lady Burton," 2 vols. 1897.
Also the various works by Sir Richard Burton that have been
edited by Mr. Wilkins.
Wilson, A. (See Richards, A. B.)
Thomas Wright.
Chapter I. 19th March 1821-October 1840
Childhood and Youth
1. Torquay and Elstree.
Sir Richard Burton, the famous traveller, linguist, and anthropologist—"the Arabian Knight"—"the last of the demi-gods"—has been very generally regarded as the most picturesque figure of his time, and one of the most heroic and illustrious men that "this blessed plot... this England," this mother of heroes every produced.
The Burtons, a Westmoreland family [24] who had settled in Ireland, included among their members several men of eminence, not only in the army, which had always powerfully attracted them, but also in the navy and the church. [25] For long there was a baronetcy in the family, but it fell into abeyance about 1712, and all attempts of the later Burtons to substantiate their claim to it proved ineffectual. [26]
Burton supposed himself to be descended from Louis XIV. La Belle Montmorency, a beauty of the French court, had, it seems, a son, of which she rather believed Louis to be the father. In any circumstances she called the baby Louis Le Jeune, put him in a basket of flowers and carried him to Ireland, where he became known as Louis Drelincourt Young. Louis Young's grand-daughter married the Rev. Edward Burton, Richard Burton's grandfather. Thus it is possible that a runnel of the blood of "le grand monarque" tripped through Burton's veins. But Burton is a Romany name, and as Richard Burton had certain gipsy characteristics, some persons have credited him with gipsy lineage. Certainly no man could have been more given to wandering. Lastly, through his maternal grandmother, he was descended from the famous Scotch marauder, Rob Roy.
Burton's parents were Lieutenant-Colonel Joseph Netterville Burton, a tall, handsome man with sallow skin, dark hair, and coal-black eyes, and Martha Beckwith, the accomplished but plain daughter of Richard and Sarah Baker, of Barham House (now "Hillside" [27]), Elstree, Hertfordshire.
Richard Baker was an opulent country gentleman, and the most important personage in the parish. Judging from the size of his pew at church, "No. 19," he must also have been a man of eminent piety, for it contained sixteen sittings. At all events he kept the parish in admirable order, and, as churchwarden, discountenanced unreasonable sleeping in church. Thanks to his patronage the choir made marked progress, and eventually there was no louder in the county. In 1813, we find him overseer with one George Olney. He took a perfunctory [28] interest in the village school (where, by the by, Arthur Orton, the Tichborne claimant, received his elaborate education), and was for a time "director." He led the breezy life of a country gentleman. With his fat acres, his thumping balance at the bank, his cellar of crusted wine, and his horse that never refused a gate, this world seemed to him a nether paradise. He required, he said, only one more boon to make his happiness complete—namely, a grandson with unmistakably red hair. A shrewd man of business, Mr. Baker tied up every farthing of his daughter's fortune, £30,000; and this was well, for Burton's father, a rather Quixotic gentleman, had but a child's notion of the use of money. The Burtons resided at Torquay, and Colonel Burton busied himself chiefly in making chemical experiments, of which he was remarkably fond; but the other members of the household, who generally went about holding their noses, appear not to have sympathised with his studies and researches. He was very superstitious—nothing, for instance, could induce him to reveal his birthday; and he fretted continually because he was not permitted to invest his wife's money and make a second fortune; which no doubt he would very soon have done—for somebody else.
Richard Francis Burton was born at Torquay [29] on 19th March 1821; and to the intemperate joy of the family his hair was a fierce and fiery red. The news flew madly to Elstree. Old Mr. Baker could scarcely contain himself, and vowed then and there to leave the whole of his fortune to his considerate grandson. The baby, of course, was promptly called Richard after Mr. Baker, with Francis as an afterthought; and a little later the Burtons went to reside at Barham House with the grandparents. Richard was baptised in the parish church at Elstree, 2nd September 1821. In the entry his father's abode is called "Bareham Wood," [30] the name being spelt various ways. Our illustration of the old church is taken from an engraving made to commemorate the burial of William Weare [31] murdered by the notorious John Thurtell; an event that occurred in 1823, when Burton was two years old.
There was another link between the Burtons and the Bakers, for Joseph Netterville's youngest brother, Francis, military surgeon in the 99th regiment, married Sarah Baker, Mr. Richard Baker's eldest daughter. Dr. Burton [32] who was in St. Helena at the time of Napoleon's death lives in history as the man who "took a bust of the dead emperor." [33]
2. Tours and Elstree.
Being subject to asthma, Colonel Burton now left England and hired a chateau called Beausejour situated on an eminence near Tours, where there was an English colony. For several years the family fluctuated between Tours and Elstree, and we hear of a great yellow chariot which from time to time rolled into daylight. Richard's hair gradually turned from its fiery and obtrusive red to jet black, but the violent temper of which the former colour is supposed to be indicative, and of which he had already many times given proofs, signalised him to the end of life. In 1823 Mrs. Burton gave birth to a daughter, Maria Katharine Elisa, who became the wife of General Sir Henry Stisted; and on 3rd July 1824 to a son, Edward Joseph Netterville, both of whom were baptized at Elstree. [34] While at Tours the children were under the care of their Hertfordshire nurse, Mrs. Ling, a good, but obstinately English soul who had been induced to cross the Channel only after strenuous opposition.
3. Death of Richard Baker, 16th September 1824.
Richard Burton always preserved some faint recollections of his grandfather. "The first thing I remember," he says, "was being brought down after dinner at Barham House to eat white currants, seated upon the knee of a tall man with yellow hair and blue eyes." This would be in the summer of 1824. Mr. Baker, as we have seen, had intended to leave the whole of his property—worth about half a million—to his red-haired grandson; and an old will, made in 1812, was to be cancelled. But Burton's mother had a half brother—Richard Baker, junior—too whom she was extravagantly attached, and, in order that this brother should not lose a fortune, she did everything in her power to prevent Mr. Baker from carrying out his purpose. Three years passed away, but at last Mr. Baker resolved to be thwarted no longer, so he drove to his lawyer's. It was the 16th of September 1824. He reached the door and leapt nimbly from his carriage; but his foot had scarcely touched the ground before he fell dead of heart disease. So the old will had to stand, and the property, instead of going to Burton, was divided among the children of Mr. Baker, Burton's mother taking merely her share. But for this extraordinary good hap Richard Burton might have led the life of an undistinguished country gentleman; ingloriously breaking his dogs, training his horses and attending to the breed of stock. The planting of a quincunx or the presentation of a pump to the parish might have proved his solitary title to fame. Mr. Baker was buried at Elstree church, where may be seen a tablet to him with the following inscription:
"Sacred to the memory of Richard Baker, Esq., late of Barham
House in this parish, who departed this life on the 16th September 1824, aged 62 years." [35]
Soon after the death of her husband, Mrs. Baker must have left Elstree, [36] for from 1827 to 1839, Barham House was occupied by Viscount Northland. The Burtons continued to reside at Tours, and all went well until cholera broke out. Old Mrs. Baker, hearing the news, and accounting prevention better than cure, at once hurried across the channel; nor did she breathe freely until she had plugged every nose at Beausejour with the best Borneo camphor.
The apprehensive old lady, indeed, hovered round her grandchildren all day like some guardian angel, resolutely determined that no conceivable means should be spared to save them from the dreaded epidemic; and it was not until she had seen them safely tucked in their snowy, lavendered beds that her anxieties of the day really ceased. One night, however, when she went, as was her custom, to look at the sleeping children before retiring herself, she found, to her horror, that they were not there. The whole household was roused, and there was an agonising hue and cry; but, by and by, the culprits were seen slinking softly in at the principal door. It seems that they had climbed down from their room and had gone the round with the death carts and torches, to help collect corpses; and enquiry revealed that they had worked considerably harder than the paid men. When the cholera scare passed off Mrs. Baker took to learning French, and with such success that in less than six months she was able to speak several words, though she could never get hold of the correct pronunciation. Despite, however, her knowledge of the language, the good lady did not take kindly to France, and she often looked wistfully northwards, quoting as she did so her favourite Cowper:
"England with all thy faults I love thee still."
She and Mrs. Ling, the old nurse, who pined for English beef and beer, made some attempts to console each other, but with inappreciable success, and finally the fellow-sufferers, their faces now beaming with smiles, returned together to their England. And not even Campbell's sailor lad was gladder to see again the "dear cliffs of Dover."
Our charmingly quaint picture of Richard, his sister and brother, in wondrous French costumes, is from an oil painting [37] which has not before been copied. Richard was first taught by a lame Irishman named Clough, who kept a school at Tours; and by and by, chiefly for the children's sake, Colonel Burton gave up Beausejour and took a house in the Rue De L'Archeveche, the best street in the town. The little Burtons next attended the academy of a Mr. John Gilchrist, who grounded them in Latin and Greek. A kind-hearted man, Mr. Gilchrist often gave his pupils little treats. Once, for instance, he took them to see a woman guillotined. Richard and Edward were, to use Richard's expression, "perfect devilets." Nor was the sister an angelet. The boys lied, fought, beat their maids, generally after running at their petticoats and upsetting them, smashed windows, stole apple puffs; and their escapades and Richard's ungovernable temper were the talk of the neighourhood. Their father was at this time given to boar hunting in the neighbouring forest, but as he generally damaged himself against the trees and returned home on a stretcher, he ultimately abandoned himself again to the equally useful but less perilous pursuit of chemistry. If Colonel Burton's blowpipes and retorts and his conduct in private usually kept Mrs. Burton on tenterhooks, she was no less uneasy on his account when they went into society. He was so apt to call things by their right names. Thus on one occasion when the conversation ran upon a certain lady who was known to be unfaithful to her husband, he inexpressibly shocked a sensitive company by referring to her as "an adulteress." In this trait, as in many others, his famous son closely resembled him.
A youthful Stoic, Burton, in times of suffering, invariably took infinite pains to conceal his feelings. Thus all one day he was in frightful agony with the toothache, but nobody knew anything about it until next morning when his cheek was swollen to the size of a peewit's egg. He tried, too, to smother every affectionate instinct; but when under strong emotion was not always successful. One day, throwing stones, he cut his sister's forehead. Forgetting all his noble resolutions he flew to her, flung his arms round her, kissed her again and again, and then burst into a fit of crying. Mrs. Burton's way of dressing her children had the charm of simplicity. She used to buy a piece of yellow nankin and make up three suits as nearly as possible alike, except for size. We looked, said Burton, "like three sticks of barley sugar," and the little French boys who called after them in the streets thought so too, until Richard had well punched all their heads, when their opinions underwent a sudden change.
Another household incident that fixed itself in Burton's mind was the loss of their "elegant and chivalrous French chef," who had rebelled when ordered to boil a gigot. "Comment, madame," he replied to Mrs. Burton, "un—gigot!—cuit a l'eau, jamais! Neverre!" And rather than spoil, as he conceived it, a good leg of mutton he quitted her service. [38] Like most boys, Burton was fond of pets, and often spent hours trying to revive some bird or small beast that had met with misfortune, a bias that affords a curious illustration of the permanence of character. The boy of nine once succeeded in resuscitating a favourite bullfinch which had nearly drowned itself in a great water jug—and we shall find the man of sixty-nine, on the very last day of his life, trying to revive a half-drowned robin.
4. At School, Richmond, 1829.
In 1829 the Burtons returned to England and took a house in Maids of Honour Row, Richmond, while Richard and Edward were sent to a preparatory school at Richmond Green—a handsome building with a paddock which enclosed some fine old elms—kept by a "burly savage," named the Rev. Charles Delafosse. Although the fees were high, the school was badly conducted, and the boys were both ill-taught and ill-fed. Richard employed himself out of school hours fighting with the other boys, and had at one time thirty-two affairs of honour to settle. "On the first occasion," he says, "I received a blow in the eye, which I thought most unfair, and having got my opponent down I proceeded to hammer his head against the ground, using his ears by way of handles. My indignation knew no bounds when I was pulled off by the bystanders, and told to let my enemy stand up again. 'Stand up!' I cried, 'After all the trouble I've had to get the fellow down.'" [39]
Of the various countries he knew, Burton hated England most. Would he ever, he asked see again his "Dear France." And then Fate, who revels in irony, must needs set him to learn as a school task, of all the poems in English, Goldsmith's Traveller! So the wretched boy, cursing England in his heart, scowling and taking it out of Goldsmith by daubing his pages with ink, sat mumbling:
"Such is the patriot's boast, where'er we roam
His first, best country ever is at home." [40]
By and by, to Burton's extravagant joy—and he always intemperately loved change—measles broke out in the school, the pupils were dispersed, and Colonel Burton, tired of Richmond, resolved to make again for the continent. As tutor for his boys he hired an ox-like man "with a head the shape of a pear, smaller end uppermost"—the Rev. H. R. Du Pre afterwards rector of Shellingford; and Maria was put in charge of a peony-faced lady named Miss Ruxton. The boys hurrahed vociferously when they left what they called wretched little England; but subsequently Richard held that his having been educated abroad was an incalculable loss to him. He said the more English boys are, "even to the cut of their hair," the better their chances in life. Moreover, that it is a real advantage to belong to some parish. "It is a great thing when you have won a battle, or explored Central Africa, to be welcomed home by some little corner of the great world, which takes a pride in your exploits, because they reflect honour on itself." [41] An English education might have brought Burton more wealth, but for the wild and adventurous life before him no possible training could have been better than the varied and desultory one he had. Nor could there have been a more suitable preparation for the great linguist and anthropologist. From babyhood he mixed with men of many nations.
5. The Continent Again.
At first the family settled at Blois, where Colonel and Mrs. Burton gave themselves over to the excitement of dressing three or four times a day; and, as there was nothing whatever the matter with them, passed many hours in feeling each other's pulses, looking at each other's tongues, and doctoring each other. Richard and Edward devoted themselves to fending and swimming. If the three children were wild in England they were double wild at Blois. Pear-headed Mr. Du Pre stuck tenaciously to his work, but Miss Ruxton gave up in despair and returned to England. At a dancing party the boys learnt what it was to fall in love. Richard adored an extremely tall young woman named Miss Donovan, "whose face was truly celestial—being so far up" but she was unkind, and did not encourage him.
After a year at Blois, Colonel and Mrs. Burton, who had at last succeeded in persuading themselves that they were really invalids, resolved to go in search of a more genial climate. Out came the cumbersome old yellow chariot again, and in this and a chaise drawn by an ugly beast called Dobbin, the family, with Colonel Burton's blowpipes, retorts and other "notions," as his son put it, proceeded by easy stages to Marseilles, whence chariot, chaise, horse and family were shipped to Leghorn, and a few days later they found themselves at Pisa. The boys became proficient in Italian and drawing, but it was not until middle life that Richard's writing developed into that gossamer hand which so long distinguished it. Both had a talent for music, but when "a thing like Paganini, length without breadth" was introduced, and they were ordered to learn the violin, Richard rebelled, flew into a towering rage and broke his instrument on his master's head. Edward, however, threw his whole soul into the work and became one of the finest amateur violinists of his day. Edward, indeed, was the Greek of the family, standing for music and song as well as for muscle. He had the finely chiselled profile and the straight nose that characterises the faces on Attic coins. Richard, though without the Roman features, was more of the ancient Roman type of character: severe, doggedly brave, utilitarian; and he was of considerably larger mould than his brother. In July 1832, the family stayed at Siena and later at Perugia, where they visited the tomb of Pietro Aretino. At Florence, the boys, having induced their sister to lend them her pocket money, laid it out in a case of pistols; while their mother went in daily terror lest they should kill each other. The worst they did, however, was to put a bullet through a very good hat which belonged to Mr. Du Pre. When their mother begged them not to read Lord Chesterfield's Letters to a Son, concerning the morality of which she had doubts, they dutifully complied and surrendered themselves piously, and without a murmur, to the chaste pages of Paul de Kock. They did not, however, neglect the art treasures of Florence; and at Rome, their next stopping-place, they sauntered about with Baedeker's predecessor, "Mrs. Starke," and peered into earthly churches and flower-illumined ruins. Later the family journeyed to Naples, where the boys continued their studies under Mr. Du Pre. As a clergyman, this gentleman steadily inculcated in his pupils the beautiful principles of the Christian religion, and took a sincere and lively interest in their favourite pastime of cock-fighting.
Colonel Burton continued his chemical studies, and in an evil hour for the family, purchased a copy of the quaint text book by S. Parkes: "A Chemical Catechism... with copious notes... to which are added a Vocabulary and a Chapter of Amusing Experiments." [42] And very amusing they were when Colonel Burton made them. Having studied the book closely, including the "poetry" with which it is studded, he manufactured, at vast expense, a few cakes of a nasty-looking and evil-smelling substance, which, he said, was soap, and ought to be put on the market. Mrs. Burton intimated that he might put it on the market or anywhere else as long as he did not make any more. He next, by the aid of the same manual, prepared a mixture which he called citric acid, though any other name would have suited it equally well; and of this, as neither he nor anybody else had any use for it, he daily produced large quantities. From Naples the family moved to Sorrento, where S'or Riccardo and S'or Edwardo, as the Italians called them, surrendered themselves to the natural and legendary influences of the neighbourhood and to reading. The promontory on which Sorrento stands is barren enough, but southward rise pleasant cliffs viridescent with samphire, and beyond them purple hills dotted with white spots of houses. At no great distance, though hidden from view, stood the classic Paestum, with its temple to Neptune; and nothing was easier than to imagine, on his native sea as it were, the shell-borne ocean-god and old Triton blowing his wreathed horn. Capri, the retreat of Tiberius, was of easy access. Eastward swept a land of myrtle and lemon orchards. While the elder Burton was immersed in the melodious Parkes, who sang about "Oxygen, abandoning the mass," and changing "into gas," his sons played the parts of Anacreon and Ovid, they crowned their heads with garlands and drank wine like Anacreon, not omitting the libation, and called to mind the Ovid of well-nigh two thousand years previous, and his roses of Paestum. From poetry they turned once more to pistols, again brought their mother's heart to her mouth, and became generally ungovernable. A visit to a house of poor reputation having been discovered, their father and Mr. Du Pre set upon them with horsewhips, whereupon the graceless but agile youths ran to a neighbouring house and swarmed to the top of a stack of chimneys, whence partly by word and partly by gesticulation they arranged terms of peace.
In 1836, the Burtons left for Pau in the South of France; and while there Richard lost his heart to the daughter of a French baron. Unfortunately, however, she had to go away to be married; and Richard who loved her to desperation, wept bitterly, partly because he was to lose her and partly because she didn't weep too. Edward and the young lady's sister, who also understood each other, fared no better, for Colonel Burton having got tired of Pau, the whole family had to return to Italy. At Pisa "S'or Riccardo" and "S'or Edwardo" again "cocked their hats and loved the ladies," Riccardo's choice being a slim, soft, dark beauty named Caterina, Edwardo's her sister Antonia. Proposals of marriage were made and accepted, but adieux had soon to follow, for Colonel Burton now moved to Lucca. All four lovers gave way to tears, and Richard was so wrung with grief that he did not become engaged again for over a fortnight. At Lucca the precious pair ruffled it with a number of dissolute medical students, who taught them several quite original wickednesses. They went, however, with their parents, into more wholesome society; and were introduced to Louis Desanges, the battle painter, Miss Helen Croly, daughter of the author of Salathiel, and Miss Virginia Gabriel (daughter of General, generally called Archangel Gabriel) the lady who afterwards attained fame as a musical composer [43] and became, as we have recently discovered, one of the friends of Walter Pater. Says Burton "she showed her savoir faire at the earliest age. At a ball given to the Prince, all appeared in their finest dresses, and richest jewellery. Miss Virginia was in white, with a single necklace of pink coral." They danced till daybreak, when Miss Virginia "was like a rose among faded dahlias and sunflowers."
Here, as everywhere, there was more pistol practice, and the boys plumed themselves on having discovered a new vice—that of opium-eating, while their father made the house unendurable by the preparation of sulphuretted hydrogen and other highly-scented compounds. It was recognised, however, that these chemical experiments had at least the advantage of keeping Colonel Burton employed, and consequently of allowing everybody a little breathing time at each stopping-place. In the spring of 1840, Colonel Burton, Mr. Du Pre and the lads set out for Schinznach, in Switzerland, to drink the waters; and then the family returned to England in order that Richard and Edward might have a university education. Their father, although not quite certain as to their future, thought they were most adapted for holy orders. Their deportment was perfect, the ladies admired them, and their worst enemies, it seems, had never accused them of being "unorthodox in their views." Indeed, Mrs. Burton already pictured them mitred and croziered. For a few weeks the budding bishops stayed with "Grandmama Baker," who with "Aunt Sarah" and "Aunt Georgiana," and Aunt Sarah's daughters, Sarah and Elisa, was summering at Hampstead; and filled up the time, which hung heavy on their hands, with gambling, drinking and love-making.
Chapter II. October 1840-April 1842, Oxford
6. Trinity College, October 1840.
Edward was then placed under a clergyman at Cambridge—The Rev. Mr. Havergal, whose name, to that gentleman's indignation, the brothers turned into "a peculiar form of ridicule." [44] Richard was to go to Trinity College, Oxford. Neither, as we have seen, had been suitably prepared for a University career. Richard, who could speak fluently French, Italian, and modern Greek, did not know the Apostles' Creed, and what was even more unusual in a prospective clergyman, had never heard of the Thirty-nine Articles. He was struck with the architecture of the colleges, and much surprised at the meanness of the houses that surrounded them. He heretically calls the Isis 'a mere moat,' the Cherwell 'a ditch.' The brilliant dare-devil from Italy despised alike the raw, limitary, reputable, priggish undergraduates and the dull, snuffling, smug-looking, fussy dons. The torpor of academic dulness, indeed, was as irksome to Burton at Oxford as it had been to FitzGerald and Tennyson at Cambridge. After a little coaching from Dr. Ogle and Dr. William Alexander Greenhill [45], he in October 1840, entered Trinity, where he has installed in "a couple of frowsy dog-holes" overlooking the garden of old Dr. Jenkins, the Master of Balliol.
"My reception at College," says Burton, "was not pleasant. I had grown a splendid moustache, which was the envy of all the boys abroad, and which all the advice of Drs. Ogle and Greenhill failed to make me remove. I declined to be shaved until formal orders were issued by the authorities of the college. For I had already formed strong ideas upon the Shaven Age of England, when her history, with some brilliant exceptions, such as Marlborough, Wellington and Nelson, was at its meanest." An undergraduate who laughed at him he challenged to fight a duel; and when he was reminded that Oxford "men" like to visit freshmen's rooms and play practical jokes, he stirred his fire, heated his poker red hot, and waited impatiently for callers. "The college teaching for which one was obliged to pay," says Burton, "was of the most worthless description. Two hours a day were regularly wasted, and those who read for honours were obliged to choose and pay a private coach."
Another grievance was the constant bell ringing, there being so many churches and so many services both on week days and Sundays. Later, however, he discovered that it is possible to study, even at Oxford, if you plug your ears with cotton-wool soaked in glycerine. He spent his first months, not in studying, but in rowing, fencing, shooting the college rooks, and breaking the rules generally. Many of his pranks were at the expense of Dr. Jenkins, for whose sturdy common sense, however, he had sincere respect; and long after, in his Vikram and the Vampire, in which he satirises the tutors and gerund-grinders of Oxford, he paid him a compliment. [46]
Although he could not speak highly of the dons and undergraduates, he was forced to admit that in one respect the University out-distanced all other seats of learning. It produced a breed of bull-terriers of renowned pedigree which for their "beautiful build" were a joy to think about and a delirium to contemplate; and of one of these pugnacious brutes he soon became the proud possessor. That he got drunk himself and made his fellow collegians drunk he mentions quite casually, just as he mentions his other preparations for holy orders. If he walked out with his bull-terrier, it was generally to Bagley Wood, where a pretty, dizened gipsy girl named Selina told fortunes; and henceforward he took a keen interest in Selina's race.
He spent most of his time, however, in the fencing saloons of an Italian named Angelo and a Scotchman named Maclaren; and it was at Maclaren's he first met Alfred Bates Richards, who became a life friend. Richards, an undergraduate of Exeter, was a man of splendid physique. A giant in height and strength, he defeated all antagonists at boxing, but Burton mastered him with the foil and the broad-sword. Richards, who, like Burton, became a voluminous author [47] wrote long after, "I am sure, though Burton was brilliant, rather wild, and very popular, none of us foresaw his future greatness."
Another Oxford friend of Burton's was Tom Hughes, author of Tom Brown's Schooldays; the man who, in Burton's phrase, "taught boys not to be ashamed of being called good," [48] and he always revered the memory of his tutor, the Rev. Thomas Short. [49] Burton naturally made enemies as well as friends, but the most bitter was that imaginary person, Mrs. Grundy. This lady, whom he always pictured as an exceedingly stout and square-looking body with capacious skirts, and a look of austere piety, had, he tells us, "just begun to reign" when he was at Oxford, although forty years had elapsed since she first made her bow [50], and set everybody asking, "What will Mrs. Grundy say?" Mrs. Grundy had a great deal to say against Richard Burton, and, life through, he took a peculiar delight in affronting her. The good soul disapproved of Burton's "foreign ways" and his "expressed dislike to school and college life," she disapproved of much that he did in his prime, and when he came to translate The Arabian Nights she set up, and not without justification, a scream that is heard even to this day and in the remotest corners of the kingdom.
If Richard was miserable at Oxford, Edward was equally so at Cambridge. After the polish and politeness of Italy, where they had been "such tremendous dandies and ladies' men," the "boorishness and shoppiness," of Oxford and Cambridge were well-nigh unendurable. Seizing an early opportunity, Richard ran over to Cambridge to visit his brother. "What is the matter, Edward," enquired Richard. "Why so downcast?" "Oh, Dick," moaned Edward, "I have fallen among epiciers. [51]"
7. Expelled, April 1842.
The dull life at Oxford was varied by the occasional visit of a mesmeric lecturer; and one youth caused peals of canorous laughter by walking round in a pretended mesmeric sleep and kissing the pretty daughters of the dons.
The only preacher Burton would listen to was Newman, then Vicar of St. Mary's; of Pusey's interminable and prosy harangues he could not bear even to think. Although unable to bend himself to the drudgery of Oxford, Burton was already forming vast ambitions. He longed to excel as a linguist, and particularly in Oriental languages. Hence he began to teach himself Arabic; and got a little assistance from the Spanish scholar Don Pascual de Gayangos. When he asked the Regius Professor of Arabic to teach him, he was rebuffed with the information that it was the duty of a professor to teach a class, not an individual. He spent the vacation with his Grandmother Baker in Great Cumberland Place, and he and his brother amused themselves about town with other roisterers, chiefly in gambling. Returned to Oxford he applied sedulously to the acquisition of foreign languages. He says, "I got a simple grammar and vocabulary, marked out the forms and words which I knew were absolutely necessary, and learnt them by heart.... I never worked more than a quarter of an hour at a time, for after that the brain lost its freshness. After learning some three hundred words, easily done in a week, I stumbled through some easy book-work and underlined every word that I wished to recollect.... Having finished my volume, I then carefully worked up the grammar minutiae, and I then chose some other book whose subject most interested me. The neck of the language was now broken, and progress was rapid. If I came across a new sound, like the Arabic Ghayn, I trained my tongue to it by repeating it so many thousand times a day. When I read, I invariably read out loud, so that the ear might aid memory. I was delighted with the most difficult characters, Chinese and Cuneiform, because I felt that they impressed themselves more strongly upon the eye than the eternal Roman letters." [52] Such remarks from the man who became the first linguist of his day are well worth remembering. For pronouncing Latin words the "Roman way" he was ridiculed, but he lived long enough to see this pronunciation adopted in all our schools. The long vacation of 1841 was spent at Wiesbaden with his father and mother. Here again the chief delights of Richard and his brother were gambling and fencing; and when tired of Wiesbaden they wandered about the country, visiting among other places Heidelberg and Mannheim. Once more Richard importuned his father to let him leave Oxford and enter the army, but Colonel Burton, who still considered his son peculiarly fitted for the church, was not to be moved. Upon his return to England, however, Burton resolved to take the matter into his own hands. He laid his plans, and presently—in April 1842—an opportunity offered.
The Oxford races of that year were being looked forward to with exceptional interest because of the anticipated presence of a noted steeplechaser named Oliver, but at the last moment the college authorities forbade the undergraduates to attend them.
Burton, however, and some other lawless spirits resolved to go all the same, and a tandem conveyed them from the rear of Worcester College to the race meeting. Next morning the culprits were brought before the college dignitaries; but the dons having lectured Burton, he began lecturing them—concluding with the observation that young men ought not to be treated like children. As a consequence, while the other offenders were merely rusticated, Burton was expelled. [53] He made a ceremonious bow, and retired "stung with a sense of injustice," though where the injustice comes in, it is difficult to see. His departure from Oxford was characteristic. He and Anderson of Oriel, one of the other offenders, hired a tandem in which they placed their luggage, and then with "a cantering leader and a high-trotting shaft horse" they rode through the High Street, and so on to London, Burton artistically performing upon a yard of tin trumpet, waving adieux to his friends and kissing his hands to the shop girls. About the same time Edward, also for insubordination, had to leave Cambridge. Thus Burton got his own way, but he long afterwards told his sister, Lady Stisted, that beneath all his bravado there lay a deep sense of regret that such a course had been necessary.
Chapter III. April 1842-20th February 1847, Sind
8. To Bombay, 18th June 1842.
On his arrival in London, Burton, in order to have an hour or two of peace, coolly told his people that he had been given an extra vacation, "as a reward for winning a double first." Then occurred a quite un-looked-for sequel. His father insisted on giving a dinner in honour of the success, and Burton, unwillingly enough, became the hero of the moment. At table, however, a remark from one of the guests revealed the precise truth—with the result of an unpleasant scene; but eventually it was deemed advisable to let Burton have his own way and exchange the surplice for the sword. The Indian Service having been selected, a commission was purchased for £500, and Burton presently found himself Ensign to the 18th Regiment, Bombay Native Infantry. Delirious with joy, he applied himself vigorously to Hindustani under a dirty, smoky Scotch linguist, named Duncan Forbes. While thus employed he made the acquaintance of two persons who just them enjoyed a remarkable reputation, namely John Varley [54], the water colour painter and occultist, and the Rev. Robert Montgomery. [55] An artist of undoubted genius, Varley usually got fair prices for his pictures, but the expenses of a numerous family kept him miserably poor. Then he took to "judicial astrology," and eventually made it a kind of second profession. Curious to say, some of his predictions came true, and thanks to this freak of fate he obtained more fame from his horoscopes than from his canvasses. He "prognosticated," says Burton, "that I was to become a great astrologer." Straightway Burton buried himself in astrological and cabalistic books [56], studied the uncanny arts, and became learned in "dark spells and devilish enginery," but his own prophecies generally proved to be of the Moseilima type; that is to say, the opposite invariably happened—a fatality that pursued him to the end of life. The Rev. Robert Montgomery, with whom also he became acquainted, was the fashionable preacher and author whom Macaulay cudgelled so pitilessly in the Edinburgh Review. Burton's aunts, Sarah and Georgiana, [57] who went with the crowd to his chapel, ranked the author of "Satan, a Poem," rather above Shakespeare, and probably few men have received higher encomiums or a greater number of wool-work slippers.
Having been sworn in at the East India House, Burton went down to Greenwich, whence on 18th June, 1842, after being "duly wept over," he, in company with his beautifully built bull-terrier of renowned pedigree, set sail for Bombay. He divided his time during the voyage, which lasted four months, between studying Hindustani and taking part in the quarrels of the crew. This was the year of the murder of Sir William Macnaughten by the Afghans and the disastrous retreat of the British from Cabul; consequently the first request of the voyagers on reaching Bombay (28th October 1842) was for news about Afghanistan. They learnt that the prestige of the British arms had been restored by Pollack, and that the campaign was ended.
To Burton, who had counted on being sent to the front, this was a burning disappointment. He found Bombay marvellously picturesque, with its crowds of people from all parts of the world, but before many days had passed he fell ill and had to be transferred to the Sanitarium, where he made the acquaintance of an old Parsee priest who assisted him in his Hindustani. Even in these early days we find him collecting material of the kind that was to be utilised in his Arabian Nights. He was struck, for example, with the fine hedges of henna whose powerful and distinctive odour loaded the atmosphere; and with the immense numbers of ravenous kites and grey-headed crows that swooped down on dead and even dying animals.
9. Baroda. The Bubu.
After six weeks' rest, having received orders to join his regiment, which was then stationed at Baroda, he engaged some Goanese servants and made the voyage thither in a small vessel called a pattymar. It took them four days to march from the Tankaria-Bunder mudbank, where they landed, to Baroda; and Burton thus graphically describes the scenery through which they passed. "The ground, rich black earth... was covered with vivid, leek-like, verdigris green. The little villages, with their leafy huts, were surrounded and protected by hedge milk bush, the colour of emeralds. A light veil, as of Damascene silver, hung over each settlement, and the magnificent trees were tipped by peacocks screaming their good-night to the son." The sharp bark of the monkey mingled with the bray of the conch. Arrived at Baroda, he lodged himself in a bungalow, and spent his time alternately there with his books and on the drill ground. He threw himself into his studies with an ardour scarcely credible—devoting twelve hours a day to Hindustani, and outwearying two munshis.
At that time it was quite the custom for the officers, married as well as single, to form irregular unions with the Hindu women. Every individual had his Bubu; consequently half-caste children were not uncommon; but Burton was of opinion that this manner of life had advantages as well as disadvantages. It connected, he says, "the white stranger with the country and its people, gave him an interest in their manners and customs, and taught him thoroughly well their language." Like the rest, Burton had his Bubu. Still, he was no voluptuary. Towering ambition, enthusiasm, and passion for hard work trampled down all meaner instincts. Languages, not amours, were his aspiration, and his mind ran on grammar books rather than ghazels; though he confesses to having given whole days and nights to the tender pages of Euclid. Indeed, he was of a cold nature, and Plutarch's remark about Alexander applies equally to him: "For though otherwise he was very hot and hasty, yet was he hardly moved with lust or pleasure of the body." When the officers were not on the drill ground or philandering with their dusky loves, they amused themselves shooting the black buck, tigers, and the countless birds with which the neighbourhood abounded. The dances of the aphish-looking Nautch girls, dressed though they were in magnificent brocades, gave Burton disgust rather than pleasure. The Gaikwar, whose state processions were gorgeous to a wonder, occasionally inaugurated spectacles like those of the old Roman arena, and we hear of fights between various wild animals. "Cocking" was universal, and Burton, who as a lad had patronised this cruel sport, himself kept a fighter—"Bhujang"—of which he speaks affectionately, as one might of an only child. The account of the great fight between Bhujang and the fancy of a certain Mr. Ahmed Khan, which took place one evening "after prayers," may be read by those who have a taste for such matters in Burton's book Sind Revisited. [58] When Bhujang died, Burton gave it almost Christian burial near his bungalow, and the facetious enquired whether the little mound was not "a baby's grave."
His hero was the eagle-faced little veteran and despot, Sir Charles Napier, generally known from his Jewish look as "Fagin," and from his irascibility as "The Devil's Brother," and after the war with Sind, the chief event of which was the battle of Meeanee (February 21st), where Sir Charles and Major Outram defeated the Ameer, his admiration grew almost to worship; though he did not actually see his hero till some months later. According to Punch the news of the battle was transmitted to headquarters in one word: "Peccavi." A quarrel then broke out between the great English leaders, and Western India was divided into the two opposing camps of Outramists and Napierists, Burton, of course, siding with the latter. In April, Burton returned to Bombay to present himself for examination in Hindustani, and having passed with honour [59] he returned to Baroda, where he experienced all the inconveniences attendant on the south-west monsoon. The rain fell in cataracts. Night and day he lay or sat in a wet skin; the air was alive with ants and other winged horrors, which settled on both food and drink, while the dust storms were so dense that candles had to be burned in mid-day. However he applied himself vigorously to Gujarati [60], the language of the country, and also took lessons in Sanskrit.
"I soon," he says, "became as well acquainted as a stranger can with the practice of Hinduism. I carefully read up Ward, Moor, and the publications of the Asiatic Society... and eventually my Hindu teacher officially allowed me to wear the Brahminical thread." He learnt some of the Hindu text books by heart, including the Tota-kahani [61], which gave him a taste for "parrot books," [62] on which he became an authority; while the study of the Baital-Pachisi led to his writing Vikram and the Vampire. [63] All this application caused his fellow officers to call him "The White Nigger."
Although, in after years, Burton often made bitter attacks on Christianity, and wrote most scathingly against the Roman Catholic priesthood, and the cenobitic life of the monks, yet at times he had certain sympathies with Roman Catholicism. Thus at Baroda, instead of attending the services of the garrison chaplain, he sat under the pleasant Goanese priest who preached to the camp servants; but he did not call himself a Catholic. In August he visited Bombay to be examined in Gujarati; and having passed with distinction, he once more returned to Baroda—just in time to join in the farewell revels of his regiment, which was ordered to Sind.
10. Karachi. Love of Disguise.
On board the Semiramis, in which the voyage was performed, he made the acquaintance of Captain Scott, nephew of the novelist—a handsome man "with yellow hair and beard," and friendship followed. Both were fond of ancient history and romance, and Burton, who could speak Italian fluently and had knowledge of the canalization of the Po Valley, was able to render Scott, whose business was the surveyal of Sind, the precise assistance he just then required. Burton also formed a friendship with Dr. John Steinhauser, afterwards surgeon at Aden. Then, too, it was at Karachi that he first saw his hero, Sir Charles Napier. Though his ferocious temper repelled some, and his Rabelaisisms and kindred witticisms others, Sir Charles won the admiration and esteem of almost all who knew him. It was from him, to some extent, that Burton acquired the taste, afterwards so extraordinarily developed for erotic, esoteric and other curious knowledge. Napier intensely hated the East India Company, as the champions of his detested rival, Major Outram, and customarily spoke of them contemptuously as the "Twenty-four kings of Leadenhall Street," while Burton on his part felt little respect for the effete and maundering body whose uniform he wore and whose pay he drew.
Karachi [64], then not much better than a big village, was surrounded by walls which were perforated with "nostril holes," for pouring boiling water through in times of siege. There were narrow lanes, but no streets—the only open place being a miserable bazaar; while owing to the absence of sewers the stench was at times unendurable. Near the town was a great shallow artificial pond which abounded in huge sleepy crocodiles, sacred animals which were tended by a holy fakir, and one of Burton's amusements was to worry these creatures with his bull terrier. Tired of that pastime, he would muzzle a crocodile by means of a fowl fastened to a hook at the end of a rope, and then jump on to its back and take a zig-zag ride. [65] The feat of his friend, Lieutenant Beresford, of the 86th, however, was more daring even than that. Here and there in the pond were islets of rank grass, and one day noticing that the crocodiles and islets made a line across the pond, he took a run and hopped from one crocodile's back on to another or an islet until he reached the opposite side, though many a pair of huge jaws snapped angrily as he passed.
Burton presently found himself gazetted as Captain Scott's assistant; and having learnt the use of the theodolite and the spirit level, he went on December 10th (1844) with a surveying party to Hyderbad [66] and the Guni River. The work was trying, but he varied it with hawking; and collected material for a work which he published eight years later with the title of Falconry in the Valley of the Indus. He then made the acquaintance of three natives, all of whom assisted him in his linguistic studies, Mirza Ali Akhbar [67], Mirza Daud, and Mirza Mohammed Musayn. Helped by the last he opened covertly at Karachi several shops with the object, however, not of making profit, but of obtaining intimate knowledge of the people and their secret customs. Then he put on long hair and a venerable beard, stained his limbs with henna, and called himself Abdullah of Bushire, a half-Arab. In this disguise, with spear in hand and pistols in holsters, he travelled the country with a little pack of nick-knacks. In order to display his stock he boldly entered private houses, for he found that if the master wanted to eject him, the mistress would be sure to oppose such a measure.
All his life he loved to disguise himself. We shall see him later as a Greek doctor, a Pathan Hakim, and an Arab shaykh. His shops had plenty of customers, for he was in the habit of giving the ladies, especially if they were pretty, "the heaviest possible weight for their money," though sometimes he would charge too much in order to induce them to chaffer with him. He learnt most, however, from the garrulity of a decayed beauty named Khanum Jan, who in her springtide had married a handsome tailor. Her husband having lost the graces of his person, she generally alluded to him affectionately as "that old hyena." This couple proved a Golconda for information. Burton had not long studied these and other persons before coming to the conclusion that the Eastern mind is always in extremes, that it ignores what is meant by the "golden mean," and that it delights to range in flights limited only by the ne plus ultra of Nature herself. He picked up miscellaneous information about magic, white and black, Yoga [68], local manners and customs such as circumcision, both female and male, and other subjects, all of which he utilised when he came to write his Notes and Terminal Essay to The Arabian Nights, particularly the articles on Al Islam and woman. Then, too, when at Bombay and other large towns he used to ransack the bazaars for rare books and manuscripts, whether ancient or contemporaneous. Still, the most valuable portion of his knowledge was acquired orally.
11. A Dangerous Mission, 1845.
About this time it was reported to Sir Charles Napier that Karachi, though a town of only 2,000 souls, supported no fewer than three houses which were devoted to a particular and unspeakable vice [69] which is said to be common in the East. Sir Charles, whose custom it was to worm out the truth respecting anything and everything, at once looked round for someone willing to make enquiries and to report upon the subject. Burton being then the only British officer who could speak Sindi, the choice naturally fell upon him, and he undertook the task, only, however, on the express condition that his report should not be forwarded to the Bombay Government, from whom supporters of Napier's policy "could expect scant favour, mercy, or justice." Accompanied by his Munshi, Mirza Mohammed Hosayn Shiraz, and disguised as a merchant, Burton passed many evenings in the town, made the required visits, and obtained the fullest details, which were duly dispatched to Government House. But in 1847, when Napier quitted Sind "he left in his office Burton's unfortunate official." "This," says Burton, "found its way with sundry other reports to Bombay, and produced the expected result. A friend in the secretariat informed me that my summary dismissal had been formally proposed by one of Sir Charles Napier's successors, but this excess of outraged modesty was not allowed." [70] A little later, however, Burton had to suffer very severely for this unfortunate occurrence. Of course he heard regularly from home. His father was still immersed in blow-pipes and retorts, his mother still mildly protesting. His sister, who had won to herself for her loveliness the name of "the Moss Rose," was married to General Sir Henry Stisted [71], his brother Edward was practising as an army doctor; his Grandmother Baker was dead. [72]
12. The Persian Beauty.
During one of his rambles he formed the acquaintance of a beautiful olive, oval-faced Persian girl of high descent. We are told that her "eyes were narcissi, her cheeks sweet basil," her personal charms together with her siren voice and sweet disposition caused him to fall in love with her; but he had scarcely learnt that his passion was reciprocated before she died. We are told also that for many years he could never think of her without pain; and that when, some time after, he narrated the story to his sister he revealed considerable emotion. Miss Stisted thought she could see references to this episode in Burton's poem The Kasidah, portions of which were written some three years later: "Mine eyes, my brain, my heart are sad—sad is the very core of me." This may be so, but the birth of a litter of pups, presented to him by his beloved bull terrier, seems to have taken the edge off his grief; and his tribute to one of these pups, which received the name of Bachhun, is really affecting.
The "Acting Commissioner" of the time was General Jacob of the Sind Horse, who wore a helmet of silver and a sabre-tache studded with diamonds. This, however, was not from pride or love of display, but because he held it policy in those who have to deal with Hindus not to neglect show and splendour. "In the eyes of Orientals," he used to remark, and Burton endorsed the saying, "no man is great unless he is also superbly dressed." As Jacob stuttered, one of his correspondents thought his name was J. J. J. J. J. Jacob, and terribly offended the testy General by writing it so. A brave and self-confident, but rancorous old man, Jacob by his senseless regulations brought the Indian army to the verge of ruin. This peccadillo was passed over, but a more serious offence, his inability to play whist, was remembered against him by his brother officers right to the day of his death. [73]
13. A Simian Dictionary.
When the Sikh war broke out Burton resigned his post under Scott in order to take part in the campaign in the Punjab, but peace being proclaimed a few weeks later, after the battle of Sobraon, Burton had no opportunities of distinguishing himself. So he returned to his studies, and now became ambitious to understand not only the people but also the monkeys of India. Consequently he collected some forty of them, made them live and eat after the manner of humans; and studies them as they mowed and gibbered. He would then talk to them and pronounce the sounds they made, until at last they could conduct quite a conversation together. Burton never divulged this talk, which, of course, may have been of a confidential nature, but he compiled a Simian Dictionary, and thus to some extent anticipated the work of Mr. R. L. Garner. Unfortunately the dictionary was some years later destroyed by fire.
14. Duality.
We shall often notice in Burton's life what Burton himself called his dual nature. In the tale of Janshah in The Arabian Nights we read of a race of split men who separated longitudinally, each half hopping about contentedly on its own account, and reuniting with its fellow at pleasure. If Burton in a pre-existent state—and he half believed in the Pre-existence of Souls—belonged to this race, and one of his halves became accidentally united to one of the halves of somebody else, the condition of affairs would be explicable. In any circumstances, he was always insisting on his duality. For example—a kind-hearted man, who detested cruelty to animals, nevertheless he delighted, as we have seen, in the sport of cocking; an ambitious man, who wore himself out with his studies yet he neutralised all his efforts to rise by giving way to an ungovernable temper. He would say just what he thought, and no man could have exhibited less tact. Thus he managed to give offence, and quite unnecessarily, to his superior officer, Colonel Henry Corsellis, and they were henceforth at handgrips.
Among his favourite books was Jami's Beharistan. The only pity is that he did not take the advice proffered in the Third Garden:
"If Alexander's realm you want, to work adroitly go, Make friends more friendly still, and make a friend of every foe."
Other instances of opposing qualities will be noticed as this work proceeds. Late in life, when he took to glasses, Burton used to say "My duality is proved by my eyes alone. My right eye requires a No. 50 convex lens, my left a No. 14." His assiduous application to his studies now brought about an illness, and, having returned to Bombay, he obtained two years' leave of absence to the salubrious Neilgherries.
Chapter IV. 20th February 1847-1849. Under the Spell of Camoens
Bibliography:
1. Grammar of the Jataki Dialect, 1849. 2. Remarks on Dr. Dorn's Chrestomathy of the Afghan Tongue, 1849. 3. Reports on Sind addressed to the Bombay Government. 4. Grammar of the Mooltanee Language.
15. Goa and Camoens.
He left Goa on 20th February 1847, taking as usual a pattymar, his mind vibrant with thoughts of his great hero, the "Portingall" Camoens, with whose noble epic all Western India, from Narsinga and Diu to Calicut is intimately associated. Passages from Camoens were frequently in his mouth, and in bitterest moments, in the times of profoundest defection, he could always find relief in the pages of him whom he reverently calls "my master." Later in life he could see a parallel between the thorny and chequered career of Camoens and his own. Each spent his early manhood on the West Coast of India [74], each did his country an incalculable service: Camoens by enriching Portugal with The Lusiads, Burton by his travels and by presenting to England vast stores of Oriental lore. Each received insult and ill-treatment, Camoens by imprisonment at Goa, Burton by the recall from Damascus. There was also a temperamental likeness between the two men. The passion for travel, the love of poetry and adventure, the daring, the patriotism of Camoens all find their counterpart in his most painstaking English translator. Arrived at Panjim, Burton obtained lodgings and then set out by moonlight in a canoe for old Goa. The ruins of churches and monasteries fascinated him, but he grieved to find the once populous and opulent capital of Portuguese India absolutely a city of the dead. The historicity of the tale of Julnar the Sea Born and her son King Badr [75] seemed established, Queen Lab and her forbidding escort might have appeared at any moment. On all sides were bowing walls and tenantless houses. Poisonous plants covered the site of the Viceregal Palace, and monster bats hung by their heels at the corners of tombs. Thoughts of Camoens continued to impinge on his mind, and in imagination he saw his hero dungeoned and laid in iron writing his Lusiads. A visit to the tomb of St. Francis Xavier also deeply moved him. To pathos succeeded comedy. There was in Panjim an institution called the Caza da Misericordia, where young ladies, for the most part orphans, remained until they received suitable offers of marriage The description of this place piqued Burton's curiosity, and hearing that it was not unusual for persons to propose themselves as suitors with a view to inspecting the curiosities of the establishment, he and some companions repaired to the Caza. Having seen the chapel and the other sights he mentioned that he wanted a wife. A very inquisitive duenna cross-examined him, and then he was allowed to interview one of the young ladies through a grating, while several persons, who refused to understand that they were not wanted, stood listening. Burton at once perceived that it would be an exhausting ordeal to make love in such circumstances, but he resolved to try, and a dialogue commenced as follows:
"Should you like to be married, senorita?"
"Yes, very much, senor."
"And why, if you would satisfy my curiosity?"
"I don't know."
The rest of the conversation proved equally wooden and unsatisfactory, and quotations from poets were also wasted.
"The maid, unused to flowers of eloquence,
Smiled at the words, but could not guess their sense."
Burton then informed the duenna that he thought he could get on better if he were allowed to go on the other side of the grating, and be left alone with the demure senorita. But at that the old lady suddenly became majestic. She informed him that before he could be admitted to so marked a privilege he would have to address an official letter to the mesa or board explaining his intentions, and requesting the desired permission. So Burton politely tendered his thanks, "scraped the ground thrice," departed with gravity, and in ten minutes forgot all about the belle behind the grille. It was while at Panhim, that, dissatisfied with the versions of Camoens by Strangford [76], Mickle and others, Burton commenced a translation of his own, but it did not reach the press for thirty-three years. [77]
We next find him at Panany, whence he proceeded to Ootacamund, the sanitarium on the Neilgherries, where he devoted himself to the acquisition of Telugu, Toda, Persian and Arabic, though often interrupted by attacks of ophthalmia. While he was thus engaged, Sir Charles Napier returned to England (1847) [78] and Sind was placed under the Bombay Government "at that time the very sink of iniquity." [79]
In September Burton visited Calicut—the city above all others associated with Camoens, and here he had the pleasure of studying on the spot the scenes connected with the momentous landing of Da Gama as described in the seventh and most famous book of the Lusiads. In imagination, like Da Gama and his brave "Portingalls," he greeted the Moor Monzaida, interviewed the Zamorim, and circumvented the sinister designs of the sordid Catual; while his followers trafficked for strange webs and odoriferous gums. On his return to Bombay, reached on October 15th, Burton offered himself for examination in Persian, and gaining the first place, was presented by the Court of Directors with a thousand rupees. In the meantime his brother Edward, now more Greek-looking than ever, had risen to be Surgeon-Major, and had proceeded to Ceylon, where he was quartered with his regiment, the 37th.
16. "Would you a Sufi be?"
Upon his return to Sind, Burton at first applied himself sedulously to Sindi, and then, having conceived the idea of visiting Mecca, studied Moslem divinity, learnt much of the Koran by heart and made himself a "proficient at prayer." It would be unjust to regard this as mere acting. Truth to say, he was gradually becoming disillusioned. He was finding out in youth, or rather in early manhood, what it took Koheleth a lifetime to discover, namely, that "all is vanity." This being the state of his mind it is not surprising that he drifted into Sufism. He fasted, complied with the rules and performed all the exercises conscientiously. The idea of the height which he strove to attain, and the steps by which he mounted towards it, may be fathered from the Sufic poet Jami. Health, says Jami, is the best relish. A worshipper will never realise the pure love of the Lord unless he despises the whole world. Dalliance with women is a kind of mental derangement. Days are like pages in the book of life. You must record upon them only the best acts and memories.
"Would you a Sufi be, you must
Subdue your passions; banish lust
And anger; be of none afraid,
A hundred wounds take undismayed." [80]
In time, by dint of plain living, high thinking, and stifling generally the impulses of his nature, Burton became a Master Sufi, and all his life he sympathised with, and to some extent practised Sufism. Being prevented by the weakness of his eyes from continuing his survey work, he made a number of reports of the country and its people, which eventually drifted into print. Then came the stirring news that another campaign was imminent in Mooltan, his heart leaped with joy, and he begged to be allowed to accompany the force as interpreter. As he had passed examinations in six native languages and had studied others nobody was better qualified for the post or seemed to be more likely to get it.
17. Letter to Sarah Burton, 14th Nov. 1848.
It was while his fate thus hung in the balance that he wrote to his cousin Sarah [81] daughter of Dr. Francis Burton, who had just lost her mother. [82] His letter, which is headed Karachi, 14th November 1848, runs as follows:—"My dear cousin, I lose no time in replying to your note which conveyed to me the mournful tidings of our mutual loss. The letter took me quite by surprise. I was aware of my poor aunt's health having suffered, but never imagined that it was her last illness. You may be certain that I join with you in lamenting the event. Your mother had always been one of my best relations and kindest friends; indeed she was the only one with whom I kept up a constant correspondence during the last six years. I have every reason to regret her loss; and you, of course, much more. Your kind letter contained much matter of a consolatory nature; it was a melancholy satisfaction to hear that my excellent aunt's death-bed was such a peaceful one—a fit conclusion to so good and useful a life as hers was. You, too, must derive no small happiness from the reflection that both you and your sister [83] have always been dutiful daughters, and as such have contributed so much towards your departed mother's felicity in this life. In my father's last letter from Italy he alludes to the sad event, but wishes me not to mention it to my mother, adding that he has fears for her mind if it be abruptly alluded to.
"At the distance of some 1,500 [84] miles all we can do is resign ourselves to calamities, and I confess to you that judging from the number of losses that our family has sustained during the last six years I fear that when able to return home I shall find no place capable of bearing that name. I hope, however, dear cousin, that you or your sister will occasionally send me a line, informing me of your plans and movements, as I shall never leave to take the greatest interest in your proceedings. You may be certain that I shall never neglect to answer your letters and shall always look forward to them with the greatest pleasure. Stisted [85] is not yet out: his regiment is at Belgaum [86], but I shall do my best to see him as soon as possible. Edward [87] is still in Ceylon and the war [88] has ceased there. I keep this letter open for ten or twelve days longer, as that time will decide my fate. A furious affair has broken out in Mooltan and the Punjaub and I have applied to the General commanding to go up with him on his personal staff. A few days more will decide the business—and I am not a little anxious about it, for though still suffering a little from my old complaint—ophthalmia—yet these opportunities are too far between to be lost."
Unfortunately for Burton, his official respecting his investigations at Karachi in 1845 was produced against him [89], and he was passed over [90] in favour of a man who knew but one language besides English. His theory that the most strenuous exertions lead to the most conspicuous successes now thoroughly broke down, and the scarlet and gold of his life, which had already become dulled, gave place to the "blackness of darkness." It was in the midst of this gloom and dejection that he wrote the postscript which he had promised to his cousin Sarah. The date is 25th November, 1848. He says, "I am not going up to the siege of Mooltan, as the General with whom I had expected to be sent is recalled. Pray be kind enough to send on the enclosed to my father. I was afraid to direct it to him in Italy as it contains papers of some importance. You are welcome to the perusal, if you think it worth the trouble. I have also put in a short note for Aunt Georgiana. Kindly give my best love to your sister, and believe me, my dear cousin, your most affectionate R. Burton."
Chagrin and anger, combined with his old trouble, ophthalmia, had by this time sapped Burton's strength, a serious illness followed, and the world lost all interest for him.
18. Allahdad.
He returned to Bombay a complete wreck, with shrunken, tottering frame, sunken eyes, and a voice that had lost its sonority. "It is written," said his friends, "that your days are numbered, take our advice and go home to die." They carried him to his ship, "The Elisa," and as there seemed little hope of his reaching England, he at once wrote a farewell letter to his mother. With him as servant, however, he had brought away a morose but attentive and good-hearted native named Allahdad, and thanks in part to Allahdad's good nursing, and in part to the bland and health-giving breezes of the ocean, he gradually regained his former health, strength, and vitality. At the time he regarded these seven years spent in Sind as simply seven years wasted, and certainly his rewards were incommensurate with his exertions. Still, it was in Sind that the future became written on his forehead; in Sind that he began to collect that mass of amazing material which made possible his edition of The Arabian Nights.
Chapter V. 1849 to 3rd April, 1853, Chiefly Boulogne
Bibliography:
5. Goa and the Blue Mountains, 1851. 6. Scinde; or the Unhappy Valley, 2 vols., 1851. 7. Sindh, and the Races that Inhabit the Valley of the Indus, 1851. 8. Falconry in the Valley of the Indus, 1852. 9. Commencement with Dr. Steinhauser of The Arabian Nights, 1852. 10. A complete System of Bayonet Exercise, 1853.
19. A Motto from Ariosto.
When "The Elisa" approached Plymouth, with its "turfy hills, wooded parks and pretty seats," Allahdad opened his eyes in wonderment. "What manner of men must you English be," he said, "to leave such a paradise and travel to such a pandemonium as ours without compulsion?" On arriving in London, Burton called on his Aunt Georgiana, [91] flirted with his pretty cousins Sarah and Elisa, attended to business of various kinds, and then, in company with Allahdad, set out for Italy to see his father and mother, who were still wandering aimlessly about Europe, and inhaling now the breath of vineyard and garden and now the odours of the laboratory. He found them, his sister, and her two little daughters, Georgiana and Maria (Minnie) at Pisa, and the meeting was a very happy one. Burton's deep affection for his parents, his sister and his brother, is forced upon our notice at every turn; and later he came to regard his nieces just as tenderly. Quoting Coleridge, he used to say:
"To be beloved is all I need,
And whom I love I love indeed." [92]
If Burton was thus drawn to those nearest of kin to him, so also his warm heart welled with affection for his friends, and for those who did him kindnesses. "If you value a man or his work," he said, "don't conceal your feelings." The warmth of his affection for his friends Drake, Arbuthnot, and others, will be noticed as this book proceeds. On one occasion, after a spontaneous outburst of appreciation, he said in palliation of his enthusiasm, "Pardon me, but this is an asthenic age—and true-hearted men are rare." Presently we find him revisiting some of his old haunts. In his youth he had explored Italy almost from end to end; but the literary associations of the various towns were their principal charm. To him, Verona stood for Catullus, Brindisi for Virgil, Sorrento for Tasso, Florence for "the all Etruscan three," [93] Dante, Petrarch, and Boccaccio, Reggio and Ferrara for Ariosto. It was from Ariosto, perhaps through Camoens, who adopted it, that he took his life motto, "Honour, not honours"—
"'Tis honour, lovely lady, that calls me to the field,
And not a painted eagle upon a painted shield." [94]
All the Burton servants obtained some knowledge of Italian, even Allahdad being soon able to swear fluently in it, and his aptitude, joined to a quarrelsome temper and an illogical prejudice against all Italians, caused innumerable broils.
By and by the family returned to England and Miss Stisted thus describes the progress: "One of the earliest pictures in my memory is of a travelling carriage crossing snow-covered Alps. A carriage containing my mother and uncle, sister and self, and English maid, and a romantic but surly Asiatic named Allahdad. Richard Burton, handsome, tall and broad-shouldered, was oftener outside the carriage than in it, as the noise made by his two small nieces rendered pedestrian exercise, even in the snow, an agreeable and almost necessary variety." Now and then he gave them bits of snow to taste, which they hoped might be sugar. [95] On reaching England he sent Allahdad back to Bombay.
Much of the year 1850 was spent at Leamington and Dover, and in 1851, Burton, accompanied by his brother Edward, crossed to Boulogne, where he prepared for publication his books, Goa, Scinde, Falconry in the Valley of the Indus, and Bayonet Exercise. Love of a sort mingled with literature, for he continued various flirtations, but without any thought of marriage; for he was still only a lieutenant in the service of John Company, and his prospects were not rosy. We said "love of a sort," and advisedly, for we cannot bring ourselves to believe that Burton was ever frenziedly in love with any woman. He was, to use his own expression, no "hot amortist." Of his views on polygamy, to which he had distinct leanings, we shall speak later. He said he required two, and only two qualities in a woman, namely beauty and affection. It was the Eastern idea. The Hindu Angelina might be vacuous, vain, papilionaceous, silly, or even a mere doll, but if her hair hung down "like the tail of a Tartary cow," [96] if her eyes were "like the stones of unripe mangoes," and her nose resembled the beak of a parrot, the Hindu Edwin was more than satisfied. Dr. Johnson's "unidead girl" would have done as well as the blue-stocking Tawaddud. [97]
20. Isabel Arundell & "My Dear Louisa." 1851.
It was during Burton's stay at Boulogne that he saw the handsome girl who ten years later became his wife—Isabel, daughter of Mr. Henry Raymond Arundell. She was the eldest of a very large family. Just twenty, fair, "with yards of golden hair," dark blue eyes and a queenly manner, Isabel Arundell everywhere attracted attention. No portrait, it was said, ever did justice to her virginal beauty. "When she was in any company you could look at no one else," the charm of her manner exceeded even the graces of her person, but her education was defective, and she was amusingly superstitious. She could be heard saying at every turn: "This is a good omen; that a bad one; oh, shocking! the spoons are crossed;
By the pricking of my thumbs
Something wicked this way comes."
Though not themselves wealthy, the Arundells were of noble lineage, and had rich and influential relations who prided themselves on being "old English Catholics." Among Miss Arundell's ancestors was Henry, 6th Lord Arundell of Wardour; her grandfather and the 9th Lord were brothers; and her mother was sister to Lord Gerard.
Isabel Arundell and Burton could have conducted their first conversation just as well had they been deaf and dumb. Strolling on the ramparts he noticed a bevy of handsome girls, one of whom, owing to her exceptional looks, particularly fired him, and having managed to attract her attention, he chalked on a wall, "May I speak to you," and left the piece of chalk at the end of the sentence. She took it up and wrote under it, "No, mother will be angry."
She had, however, long pictured to herself an ideal husband, and on seeing Burton, she exclaimed under her breath: "That is the man!" She describes him as "five feet eleven inches in height, very broad, thin and muscular, with very dark hair, black, clearly defined, sagacious eyebrows, a brown, weather-beaten complexion, straight Arab features, a determined-looking mouth and chin, nearly covered by an enormous moustache; two large, black, flashing eyes, with long lashes," and a "fierce, proud, melancholy expression." [98] In the words of one of his friends, he had the eye of an angel, the jaw of a devil. Also staying at Boulogne was a young lady for whom Burton entertained a sincere affection, and whom he would probably have married but for the poorness of his outlook. "My dear Louisa," [99] as he called her, was a relative of Miss Arundell, and hearing what had occurred, she did Burton and Miss Arundell the kindness of formally introducing them to each other, Miss Arundell never tried to attract Burton's attention—we have her word for that—but wherever he went she went too; and she never lost an opportunity of accidentally crossing his path. She considered sacred a sash which she wore when dancing with him, and she remembered him specially in her prayers. Henceforward, one devouring desire occupied her mind. She wished—and praiseworthily—to be Burton's wife. To him, on the other hand, she was but an ephemeral fancy—one of the hundred and fifty women—his fair cousins in England and the softer and darker beauties of France and Italy—to whom he had said tender nothings. Later, when Miss Arundell saw him flirting with another girl, a certain "Louise" [100] (not to be confused with "my dear Louisa"), she bridled up, coloured to her brow-locks, called "Louise" "fast" and Louise's mother "vulgar." Naturally they would be. [101] With "myosotis eyes," peachy cheeks and auburn hair, rolling over ivory shoulders [102], "Louise" was progressing admirably, when, unfortunately for her, there came in view a fleshy, vinous matron of elephantine proportions, whom she addressed as "mother." The sight of this caricature of the "Thing Divine," to use Burton's expression, and the thought that to this the "Thing Divine" would some day come, instantly quenched his fires, and when the mother tried to bring him to a decision, by inquiring his intentions regarding her daughter, he horrified her by replying: "Strictly dishonourable, madam." "Englishmen," he reflected, "who are restricted to one wife, cannot be too careful." Miss Arundell was also jealous of "My dear Louisa," though unwarrantably, for that lady presently became Mrs. Segrave; but she and Burton long preserved for each other a reminiscitory attachment, and we shall get several more glimpses of her as this book proceeds. [103]
Isabel Arundell was herself somewhat cheered by the prophecy of a gipsy of her acquaintance—one Hagar Burton—who with couched eyes and solemn voice not only prognosticated darkly her whole career, but persistently declared that the romance would end in marriage; still, she fretted a good deal, and at last, as persons in love sometimes do, became seriously indisposed. Without loss of time her parents called in a skilful physician, who, with his experienced eye, saw at once that it was indigestion, and prescribed accordingly. Residing at Boulogne in 1851, was a French painter named Francois Jacquand, who had obtained distinction by his pictures of monks, and "a large historical tableau representing the death chamber of the Duc d'Orleans." In an oil painting which he made of Burton and his sister, and which is here reproduced for the first time, Burton appears as a pallid young military man, heavily moustached, with large brown eyes [104]; and his worn and somewhat melancholy face is a striking contrast to the bright and cheerful looks of his comely sister. Our portraits of the Misses Stisted are also from paintings by Jacquand. Burton's habit of concealing his ailments which we noticed as a feature of his boyhood was as conspicuous in later life. "On one occasion," says Miss Stisted, "when seized with inflammation of the bladder, a fact he tried to keep to himself, he continued to joke and laugh as much as usual, and went on with his reading and writing as if little were the matter. At last the agony became too atrocious, and he remarked in a fit of absence 'If I don't get better before night, I shall be an angel.' Questions followed, consternation reigned around, and the doctor was instantly summoned."
21. Forster FitzGerald Arbuthnot 1853.
When Burton first became acquainted with Forster FitzGerald Arbuthnot is uncertain; but by 1853, they were on terms of intimacy. Burton was then 32, Arbuthnot 20. Of this enormously important fact in Burton's life—his friendship with Arbuthnot—no previous writer has said a single word, except Lady Burton, and she dismisses the matter with a few careless sentences, though admitting that Arbuthnot was her husband's most intimate friend. Of the strength of the bond that united the two men, and the admiration felt by Arbuthnot for Burton, she had little idea. F. F. Arbuthnot, born in 1833, was second son of Sir Robert Keith Arbuthnot and Anne, daughter of Field-Marshal Sir John Forster FitzGerald, G.C.B. Educated at Haileybury, he entered in 1852 the Bombay Civil Service, and rose subsequently to the important position of "collector." A man of a quiet and amiable disposition, Arbuthnot never said an unkind word either to or about anyone. The sweetness and serenity of his manner were commented upon by all his friends; but like so many of your quiet men, he had a determination—a steady heroism, which made everything give way. Oppose Burton, and you would instantly receive a blow aimed straight from the shoulder, oppose Arbuthnot and you would be pushed quietly and amiably aside—but pushed aside nevertheless. A great idea had early possessed him. He wanted to see as much attention paid to the literatures of India, Persia and Arabia as to those of ancient Greece and Rome. All the famous books of the East, he said, should be translated into English—even the erotic, and he insisted that if proper precautions were taken so that none but scholars could obtain them, no possible harm could ensue. [105]
"England," he wrote long after (1887), "has greater interests in the East than any other country in Europe, and ought to lead the way in keeping the world informed on all subjects connected with Oriental literature. Surely the time has not arrived for her to take a back seat on that coach, and to let other nations do a work which she ought to do herself." [106] The expression "on that coach," by the by, was eminently characteristic of a man who plumed himself on being a Jehu of Jehus. Hundreds of invaluable manuscripts written by poets and sages, he said, require to be translated into English, and the need of the day is an Oriental Translation Fund. A man of means, Arbuthnot was sometime later to apply his money to the cause he had at heart; and year in, year out, we shall find him and Burton striking at the self-same anvil. Though there was a considerable difference in their ages, and though thousands of miles often separated them, their minds were ever united, and they went down the stream of life together like two brothers.
Chapter VI. 3rd April 1853 to 29th October 1854, Pilgrimage to Mecca
Bibliography:
11. The Kasidah (commenced). 12. El Islam (commenced).
22. The Man Wants to Wander.
Much of his time at Boulogne Burton devoted to fencing; and to his instructor, M. Constantin, he paid glowing tributes. He thoroughly mastered the art, defeated all antagonists, whether English or French, earned his "brevet de pointe for the excellence of his swordsmanship, and became a Maitre d' Armes." As horseman, swordsman, and marksman, no soldier of his day surpassed him, and very few equalled him. But of fencing, flirting and book-writing, he soon got heartily tired. Like his putative ancestors, the gipsies, he could never be happy long in one place. He says, "The thoroughbred wanderer's idiosyncrasy, I presume to be a composition of what phrenologists call inhabitiveness and locality equally and largely developed. After a long and toilsome march, weary of the way, he drops into the nearest place of rest to become the most domestic of men. For a while he smokes the pipe of permanence with an infinite zest, he delights in various siestas during the day, relishing withal a long sleep at night; he enjoys dining at a fixed dinner hour, and wonders at the demoralisation of the mind which cannot find means of excitement in chit-chat or small talk, in a novel or a newspaper. But soon the passive fit has passed away; again a paroxysm on ennui coming on by slow degrees, viator loses appetite, he walks bout his room all night, he yawns at conversations, and a book acts upon his as a narcotic. The man wants to wander, and he must do so, or he shall die." [107]
23. Haji Wali, 1853.
As we have seen, Burton, even before he had left Sind, had burned to visit Mecca. Four years had since elapsed, and his eyes still turned towards "Allah's holy house." Having obtained another twelve months' furlough, in order that he "might pursue his Arabic studies in lands where the language is best learned," he formed the bold plan of crossing Arabia from Mecca to the Persian Gulf. Ultimately, however, he decided, in emulation of Burckhardt, the great traveler, to visit Medina and Mecca in the disguise of a pilgrim, a feat that only the most temerarious of men would have dared even to dream of. He made every conceivable preparation, learning among other usefulnesses how to forge horse shoes and to shoe a horse. To his parents and Lady Stisted and her daughters, who were then residing at Bath, he paid several visits, but when he last parted from them with his usual "Adieu, sans adieu," it did not occur to them that he was about to leave for good; for he could not—he never could—muster up sufficient courage to say a final "Good-bye." Shortly after his departure his mother found a letter addressed to her and in his handwriting. It contained, besides an outline of his dangerous plans, the instruction that, in case he should be killed, his "small stock of valuables" was to be divided between her and his sister.
Once more Burton had the keen pleasure of putting on disguise. Richard F. Burton ceased to be, and a muscular and powerful Mirza Abdullah, of Bushire, took his place. "I have always wished to see," he explained to a friend, "what others have been content to hear of." He wore long hair and Oriental costume, and his face and limbs were stained with henna. Accompanied by Captain Henry Grindlay of the Bengal Cavalry, he left London for Southampton, 3rd April 1853, and thence took steamer for Egypt, without ever a thought of Isabel Arundell's blue eye or Rapunzel hair, and utterly unconscious of the sighs he had evoked. At Alexandria he was the guest of Mr. John Thurburn and his son-in-law, Mr. John Larking [108], at their residence "The Sycamores," but he slept in an outhouse in order the better to delude the servants. He read the Koran sedulously, howled his prayers with a local shaykh who imparted to him the niceties of the faith, purified himself, made an ostentatious display of piety, and gave out that he was a hakim or doctor preparing to be a dervish. As he had some knowledge of medicine, this role was an easy one, and his keen sense of humour made the experience enjoyable enough. On the steamer that carried him to Cairo, he fraternized with two of his fellow-passengers, a Hindu named Khudabakhsh and an Alexandrian merchant named Haji Wali. Haji Wali, whose connection with Burton lasted some thirty years [109], was a middle-aged man with a large round head closely shaven, a bull neck, a thin red beard, handsome features which beamed with benevolence, and a reputation for wiliness and cupidity. Upon their arrival at Boulak, the port of Cairo. Khudabakhsh, who lived there, invited Burton to stay with him. Hindu-like, Khudabakhsh wanted his guest to sit, talk, smoke, and sip sherbet all day. But this Burton could not endure. Nothing, as he says, suits the English less than perpetual society, "an utter want of solitude, when one cannot retire into one self an instant without being asked some puerile questions by a companion, or look into a book without a servant peering over one's shoulder." At last, losing all patience, he left his host and went to a khan, where he once more met Haji Wali. They smoked together the forbidden weed hashish, and grew confidential. Following Haji Wali's advice, Burton, having changed his dress, now posed as an Afghan doctor, and by giving his patients plenty for their money and by prescribing rough measures which acted beneficially upon their imaginations, he gained a coveted reputation. He always commenced his prescriptions piously with: "In the name of Allah, the compassionate, the merciful, and blessings and peace be upon our Lord the Apostle"; and Haji Wali vaunted him as "the very phoenix of physicians." According to his wont, he never lost an opportunity of learning the ways and customs of the various people among whom he was thrown, or of foisting himself on any company in which he thought he could increase his knowledge. His whole life indeed was a preparation for "The Arabian Nights." Thus at Cairo he had the good fortune to cure some Abyssinian slave-girls of various complaints, including the "price-lowering habit of snoring," and in return he made the slave dealer take him about the town and unfold the mysteries of his craft. He also visited the resting-place of his hero, Burckhardt; [110] indeed, in whatever town he sojourned, he sought out the places associated with the illustrious dead. It was now the Ramazan, and he observed it by fasting, reading the Koran, and saying countless prayers with his face turned devoutly to the Kiblah. [111] He heartily rejoiced, however, with the multitude when the dreary month was over, and he describes [112] amusingly the scenes on the first day following it: "Most people," he says, "were in fresh suits of finery; and so strong is personal vanity in the breast of Orientals... that from Cairo to Calcutta it would be difficult to find a sad heart under a handsome coat. The men swaggered, the women minced their steps, rolled their eyes, and were eternally arranging, and coquetting with their head-veils." In the house of a friend he saw an Armenian wedding. For servant he now took a cowardly and thievish lad named Nur, and, subsequently, he made the acquaintance of a Meccan youth, Mohammed, who was to become his companion throughout the pilgrimage. Mohammed was 18, chocolate brown, short, obese, hypocritical, cowardly, astute, selfish and affectionate. Burton not only purchased the ordinary pilgrim garb, but he also took the precaution to attach to his person "a star sapphire," the sight of which inspired his companions with "an almost reverential awe," and even led them to ascribe to him thaumaturgic power. [113] His further preparations for the sacred pilgrimage reads rather like a page out of Charles Lever, for the rollicking Irishman was as much in evidence as the holy devotee. They culminated in a drinking bout with an Albanian captain, whom he left, so to speak, under the table; and this having got noised abroad, Burton, with his reputation for sanctity forfeited, found it expedient to set off at once for Mecca. He sent the boy Nur on to Suez with his baggage and followed him soon after on a camel through a "haggard land infested with wild beasts and wilder men." At Suez he made the acquaintance of some Medina and Mecca folk, who were to be his fellow-travellers; including "Sa'ad the Demon," a negro who had two boxes of handsome apparel for his three Medina wives and was resolved to "travel free;" and Shaykh Hamid, a "lank Arab foul with sweat," who never said his prayers because of the trouble of taking clean clothes out of his box. "All these persons," says Burton, "lost no time in opening the question of a loan. It was a lesson in Oriental metaphysics to see their condition. They had a twelve days' voyage and a four days' journey before them; boxes to carry, custom houses to face, and stomachs to fill; yet the whole party could scarcely, I believe, muster two dollars of ready money. Their boxes were full of valuables, arms, clothes, pipes, slippers, sweetmeats, and other 'notions,' but nothing short of starvation would have induced them to pledge the smallest article." [114] Foreseeing the advantage of their company, Burton sagaciously lent each of them a little money at high interest, not for the sake of profit, but with a view to becoming a Hatim Tai, [115] by a "never mind" on settling day. This piece of policy made "the Father of Moustaches," as they called him, a person of importance among them. During the delay before starting, he employed himself first in doctoring, and then in flirting with a party of Egyptian women the most seductive of whom was one Fattumah, [116] a plump lady of thirty "fond of flattery and possessing, like all her people, a voluble tongue." The refrain of every conversation was "Marry me, O Fattumah! O daughter! O female pilgrim." To which the lady would reply coquettishly, "with a toss of the head and a flirting manipulation of her head veil," "I am mated, O young man." Sometimes he imitated her Egyptian accent and deprecated her country women, causing her to get angry and bid him begone. Then, instead of "marry me, O Fattumah," he would say, "O old woman and decrepit, fit only to carry wood to market." This would bring a torrent of angry words, but when they met again all was forgotten and the flirtations of the day before were repeated.
24. The Pilgrim Ship, 6th July 1853.
Burton and his party now embarked on the sambuk which was to take them to Yambu, the port of Medina. As ninety-seven pilgrims were crowded on a vessel constructed to carry only sixty, most extraordinary scenes occurred. Thanks to the exertions of Sa'ad the Demon, Burton and his friends secured places on the poop, the most eligible part of the vessel. They would not be very comfortable anywhere, Sa'ad explained, but "Allah makes all things easy." Sa'ad himself, who was blessed with a doggedness that always succeeds, managed to get his passage free by declaring himself an able seaman. Disturbances soon commenced. The chief offenders were some Maghrabis, "fine looking animals from the deserts about Tripoli," the leader of whom, one Maula Ali, "a burly savage," struck Burton as ridiculously like his old Richmond schoolmaster, the Rev. Charles Delafosse. These gentry tried to force their way on to the poop, but Sa'ad distributed among his party a number of ash staves six feet long, and thick as a man's wrist. "He shouted to us," says Burton, "'Defend yourself if you don't wish to be the meat of the Maghrabis!' and to the enemy 'Dogs and sons of dogs! now shall you see what the children of the Arab are.' 'I am Omar of Daghistan!' 'I am Abdullah the son of Joseph!' 'I am Sa'ad the Demon! [117]' we exclaimed." And, Burton, with his turbulent blood well stirred, found himself in the seventh heaven. "To do our enemies justice," he continues, "they showed no sign of flinching; they swarmed towards the poop like angry hornets, and encouraged each other with cries of 'Allaho Akbar!' But we had a vantage ground about four feet above them, and their short daggers could do nothing against our terrible quarter staves. Presently a thought struck me. A large earthen jar full of drinking water, in its heavy frame of wood stood upon the edge of the poop. Seeing an opportunity, I crept up to the jar and rolled it down upon the swarm of assailants. Its fall caused a shriller shriek to rise above the ordinary din, for heads, limbs and bodies were sorely bruised by the weight, scratched by the broken potsherds, and wetted by the sudden discharge. [118] The Maghrabis then slunk off towards the end of the vessel, and presently solicited peace."
The beauties of the sunrise baffled description. The vessel sailed over a violet sea, and under a sky dappled with agate-coloured clouds. At noon the heat was terrible and all colour melted away, "with the canescence from above." The passengers were sympathetic with one another, notwithstanding their recent factiousness, and were especially kind to a poor little brown baby, which they handed round and nursed by turns, but the heat, the filth, and the stench of the ship defied description. At Mahar, one of the places where they landed, Burton injured his foot with a poisonous thorn, which made him lame for the rest of the pilgrimage. Presently the welcome profile of Radhwa came in view, the mountain of which the unfortunate Antar [119] sang so plaintively:
"Did Radhwa strive to support my woes,
Radhwa itself would be crushed by the weight,"
and on July 17th, after twelve days of purgatory, Burton sprang on shore at Yambu.
25. Medina.
He now dressed himself as an Arab, that is to say, he covered his head with a red kerchief bordered with yellow, his body with a cotton shirt and a camel's hair cloak, while a red sash, a spear and a dagger completed the outfit. Then, having hired some camels, he joined a caravan, consisting of several hundred men and beasts, which was bound for Medina; but his injured foot still incommoded him. Determined, however, to allow nobody to exceed him in piety, he thrice a day or oftener pounded the sand with his forehead like a true Mussulman.
While passing through one of the mountain gorges the pilgrims were attacked by a number of predatory Bedouin, led by a ferocious chief named Saad, who fired upon them from the rocks with deadly effect, but, at last, after a journey of 130 miles, they reached Medina, with the great sun-scorched Mount Ohod towering behind it—the holy city where, according to repute, the coffin of Mohammed swung between heaven and earth. [120] Medina consisted of three parts, a walled town, a large suburb, with ruinous defences, and a fort. Minarets shot up above the numerous flat roofs, and above all flashed the pride of the city, the green dome that covered the tomb of Mohammed. Burton became the guest of the dilatory and dirty Shaykh Hamid. The children of the household, he says, ran about in a half nude state, but he never once set eyes upon the face of woman, "unless the African slave girls be allowed the title. Even these at first attempted to draw their ragged veils over their sable charms." Having dressed themselves in white, Burton and Hamid sallied out for the Prophet's Tomb, Burton riding on a donkey because of his lameness. He found the approach to the Mosque choked up by ignoble buildings, and declares that as a whole it had neither beauty nor dignity. Upon entering, he was also disillusioned, for its interior was both mean and tawdry. After various prayers they visited first the "Hujrah," where they saw the tombs of Mohammed, Abu Bakr, Omar and Fatimah; and afterwards El Rauzah, the Garden situated between the Hujrah and the Prophet's Pulpit, both very celebrated spots. Of the latter, Mohammed said: "Between my house and my pulpit is a garden of the gardens of paradise." [121] After more prayers they wandered round to the other sights, including the fine Gate of Salvation, the five minarets, and the three celebrated pillars, called respectively, Al-Mukhallak, the Pillar of Ayishah, and the Pillar of Repentance. They then made their way to the Mosque of Kuba, some two miles out of the town, and witnessed the entry into Medina of the great caravan from Damascus, numbering 7,000 souls—grandees in gorgeous litters of green and gold, huge white Syrian dromedaries, richly caparisoned horses and mules, devout Hajis, sherbet sellers, water carriers, and a multitude of camels, sheep and goats. [122] Lastly Burton and his friends pilgrimaged to the holy Mount Ohod with its graves of "the martyrs;" and to the celebrated Al-Bakia, or Saints' Cemetery, where lie ten thousand of the Prophet's companions. On entering the latter they repeated the usual salutation: "Peace be upon ye, O People of Al-Bakia," and then sought out the principal tombs—namely those of the Caliph Othman, [123] "Our Lady Halimah," [124] the Infant Ibrahim, [125] and about fourteen of Mohammed's wives. [126] The cemetery swarmed with clamorous beggars, who squatted with dirty cotton napkins spread on the ground before them for the reception of coins. Some of the women promised to recite Fatihahs for the donors, and the most audacious seized the visitors by their skirts. Burton laid out three dollars in this way, but though the recipients promised loudly to supplicate Allah in behalf of his lame foot, it did not perceptibly benefit. Burton's companions hinted that he might do worse than settle in Medina. "Why not," said one, "open a shop somewhere near the Prophet's Mosque? There thou wilt eat bread by thy skill, and thy soul will have the blessing of being on holy ground." Burton, however, wanted to be going forward.
26. Mecca.
On 31st August, after praying "a two-bow prayer," he bade adieu to Shaykh Hamid, and with Nur and the boy Mohammed, joined the caravan bound for Mecca, the route taken being the celebrated road through the arid Nejd made by Zubaydah, wife of Harun al Rashid. The events of the journey were not remarkable, though Mohammed very nearly killed himself by feeding too liberally on clarified butter and dates mashed with flour. Sometimes Burton cheered the way and delighted his companions by singing the song of Maysunah, the Arab girl who longed to get back from the Caliph's palace to the black tents of her tribe. Everybody got into good humour when he began:
"Oh take these purple robes away,
Give back my cloak of camel's hair,"
and they laughed till they fell on their backs when he came to the line where the desert beauty calls her Royal husband a "fatted ass." In truth, they needed something to cheer them, for the sky was burnished brass, and their goats died like flies. Simoon and sand-pillar threw down the camels, and loathsome vultures ready for either beast or man hovered above or squabbled around them. To crown their discomforts they were again attached by the Bedouin, whom they dispersed only after a stubborn fight and with the loss of several dromedaries. After passing the classic Wady Laymun, sung by the Arab poet Labid [127] in lines suggestive of Goldsmith's Deserted Village, they very piously shaved their heads and donned the conventional attire, namely two new cotton cloths with narrow red stripes and fringes; and when the Holy City came in view, the whole caravan raised the cry, "Mecca! Mecca! the Sanctuary! O the Sanctuary! Labbayk! Labbayk!" [128] the voices being not infrequently broken by sobs.
On entering the gates, Burton and Nur crossed the famous hill Safa and took up their abode with the lad Mohammed. Early next morning they rose, bathed, and made their way with the crowd to the Prophet's Mosque in order to worship at the huge bier-like erection called the Kaaba, and the adjacent semi-circular Hatim's wall. The famous Kaaba, which is in the middle of the great court-yard, looked at a distance like an enormous cube, covered with a black curtain, but its plan is really trapeziform. "There at last it lay," cries Burton, "the bourn of my long and weary pilgrimage, realising the plans and hopes of many and many a year,"—the Kaaba, the place of answered prayer, above which in the heaven of heavens Allah himself sits and draws his pen through people's sins. "The mirage of fancy invested the huge catafalque and its gloomy pall with peculiar charms." Of all the worshippers who clung weeping to the curtain, [129] or who pressed their beating hearts to the sacred black stone built into the Kaaba, none, thought Burton, felt for the moment a deeper emotion than he. But he had to confess the humbling truth that while theirs was the high feeling of religious enthusiasm, his was but the ecstasy of gratified pride. Bare-headed and footed and in company with Mohammed, he first proceeded to the holy well, Zem-Zem, said to be the same that was shown by God to Hagar. [130] They found the water extremely unpleasant to the taste, and Burton noticed that nobody drank it without making a wry face. It was impossible at first to get near the Black Stone owing to the crush of pilgrims. However, they occupied the time in various prayers, blessed the Prophet, and kissed the finger tips of the right hand. They then made the seven Ashwat or circuits, and from time to time raised their hands to their ears, and exclaimed, "In the name of Allah and Allah is omnipotent!" The circuits finished, and it was deemed advisable to kiss the Black Stone. For some minutes Burton stood looking in despair at the swarming crowd of Bedouin and other pilgrims that besieged it. But Mohammed was equal to the occasion. Noticing that most of those near the Stone were Persians, against whom the Arabs have an antipathy, he interpolated his prayers with insults directed against them—one of the mildest being "O hog and brother of a hoggess." This having small effect he collected half-a-dozen stalwart Meccans, "with whose assistance," says Burton, "by sheer strength, we wedged our way into the thin and light-legged crowd. ...After reaching the stone, despite popular indignation testified by impatient shouts, we monopolised the use of it for at least ten minutes. While kissing it and rubbing hands and forehead upon it, I narrowly observed it, and came away persuaded that it was an aerolite." Burton and his friends next shouldered and fought their way to the part of the Kaaba called Al Multazem, at which they asked for themselves all that their souls most desired. Arrived again at the well Zem-Zem, Burton had to take another nauseous draught and was deluged with two skinfuls of the water dashed over his head. This causes sins to fall from the spirit like dust. He also said the customary prayers at the Makam Ibrahim or Praying Place of Abraham [131] and other shrines. At last, thoroughly worn out, with scorched feet and a burning head, he worked his way out of the Mosque, but he was supremely happy for he had now seen:
"Safa, Zem-Zem, Hatim's wall,
And holy Kaaba's night-black pall." [132]
The next day he journeyed to the sacred Mount of Arafat, familiar to readers of The Arabian Nights from the touching story of Abu Hasan and Abu Ja'afar the Leper and [133] he estimated that he was but one of 50,000 pilgrims. The mountain was alive with people, and the huge camp at its foot had booths, huts and bazaars stocked with all manner of Eastern delicacies, and crowded with purchasers. Instead, however, of listening to the sermons, Burton got flirting with a Meccan girl with citrine skin and liquescent eyes.
On the third day, mounted on an ass, he made for Muna and took part in the ceremony called Stoning the Devil. He was, however, but one of a multitude, and, in order to get to the stoned pillar a good deal of shouldering and fighting was necessary. Both Burton and the boy Mohammed, however, gained their end, and like the rest of the people, vigorously pelted the devil, saying as they did so, "In the name of Allah—Allah is Almighty." To get out of the crowd was as difficult as it had been to get in. Mohammed received a blow in the face which brought the blood from his nose, and Burton was knocked down; but by "the judicious use of the knife" he gradually worked his way into the open again, and piously went once more to have his head shaved and his nails cut, repeating prayers incessantly. Soon after his return to Mecca, Mohammed ran up to him in intense excitement. "Rise, Effendi," he cried, "dress and follow me; the Kaaba is open." The pair then made their way thither with alacrity, and, replies to the officials in charge being satisfactory, Mohammed was authoritatively ordered to conduct Burton round the building. They entered. It was a perilous moment; and when Burton looked at the windowless walls and at the officials at the door, and thought of the serried mass of excited fanatics outside, he felt like a trapped rat. However safe a Christian might have been at Mecca, nothing could have preserved him from the ready knives of the faithful if detected in the Kaaba. The very idea was pollution to a Moslem. "Nothing," says Burton, "is more simple than the interior of this sacred building. The pavement is composed of slabs of fine and various coloured marbles. The upper part of the walls, together with the ceiling, are covered with handsome red damask, flowered over with gold. The flat roof is upheld by three cross beams, supported in the centre by three columns. Between the columns ran bars of metal supporting many lamps said to be of gold." The total expense was eight dollars, and when they got away, the boy Mohammed said, "Wallah, Effendi! thou has escaped well! some men have left their skins behind."
The fifty-five other wonders of the city having been visited, Burton sent on Nur with his heavy boxed to Jeddah, the port of Mecca, and he himself followed soon after with Mohammed. At Jeddah he saw its one sight, the tomb of Eve, and then bade adieu to Mohammed, who returned to Mecca. Having boarded the "Dwarka," an English ship, he descended to his cabin and after a while emerged with all his colouring washed off and in the dress of an English gentleman. Mirza Abdullah of Bushire, "Father of Moustaches," was once more Richard Francis Burton. This extraordinary exploit made Burton's name a household word throughout the world, and turned it into a synonym for daring; while his book, the Pigrimage to Al-Madinah and Meccah, which appeared the following year, was read everywhere with wonder and delight. Had he been worldly-wise he would have proceeded straight to England, where, the lion of the hour, he might have obtained a reward more substantial than mere praise. But he did not show himself until the commotion caused by his exploit had been half-forgotten, and we shall find him making a similar mistake some years later, after his return from Tanganyika. [134]
It seems that Burton was known in the army as "Ruffian Dick"—not by way of disparagement, but because of this demonic ferocity as a fighter, and because he had "fought in single combat more enemies than perhaps any other man of his time." One evening soon after his return from Mecca, a party of officers, including a friend of Burton's named Hawkins, were lounging outside Shepherd's Hotel at Cairo. As they sat talking and smoking, there passed repeatedly in front of them, an Arab, in his loose flowing robes, with head proudly erect, and the peculiar swinging stride of those sons of the desert. As he strode backwards and forwards he drew nearer and nearer to the little knot of officers, till at last, as he swept by, the flying folds of his burnous brushed against one of the officers. "D—— that nigger's impudence!" said the officer; "if he does that again, I'll kick him." To his surprise the dignified Arab suddenly halted, wheeled round, and exclaimed, "Well, d—— it, Hawkins, that's a fine way to welcome a fellow after two year's absence." "It's Ruffian Dick!" cried the astonished officer. [135]
Perhaps to this period must be assigned the bastinado incident. Burton used to tell the tale [136] as follows: "Once, in Egypt, another man and I were out duck shooting, and we got separated. When I next came in sight of the other man some Turkish soldiers had tied him up and were preparing to administer the bastinado. As I hurried to his assistance he said something to the Turks which I could not catch, and pointed to me. Instantly they untied him and pouncing upon me, tried to put me in his place, while my companion took to his heels. As they were six to one, they succeeded, and I had the very unpleasant experience of being bastinadoed. The first dozen or two strokes I didn't mind much, but at about the ninetieth the pain was too excruciating for description. When they had finished with me I naturally enquired what it was all for. It seems that my companion when firing at a duck had accidentally shot an Egyptian woman, the wife of one of the soldiers. Upon my appearance he had called out in Turkish to the soldiers: 'It was not I who fired the shot, it was that other fellow,' pointing to me. The blackguard has taken good care to keep out of my way ever since."
27. Burton's Delight in Shocking.
The story of Burton's adventures having spread abroad, people now took the trouble to invent many incidents that were untrue. They circulated, for example, a grisly tale of a murder which he was understood to have committed on a man who had penetrated his disguise, [137] and, the tale continuing to roll, the murder became eventually two murders. Unfortunately, Burton was cursed with a very foolish habit, and one that later did him considerable harm. Like Lord Byron, he delighted to shock. His sister had often reproved him for it after his return from India, but without effecting a change. Kindly listeners hardly knew how to take him, while the malicious made mischief. One day, in England, when, in the presence of his sister and a lady friend, he had thought fit to enlarge on a number of purely fictitious misdeeds, he was put to some shame. His sister having in vain tried by signs to stop him, the friend at last cut him short with: "Am I to admire you, Mr. Burton?" And he accepted the reproof. Still, he never broke himself of this dangerous habit; indeed, when the murder report spread abroad he seems to have been rather gratified than not; and he certainly took no trouble to refute the calumny.
On another occasion he boasted of his supposed descent from Louis XIV. "I should have thought," exclaimed a listener, "that you who have such good Irish blood in your veins would be glad to forget your descent from a dishonourable union."
"Oh, no," replied Burton vehemently, "I would rather be the bastard of a king than the son of an honest man."
Though this was at the time simply intended to shock, nevertheless it illustrated in a sense his real views. He used to insist that the offspring of illicit or unholy unions were in no way to be pitied if they inherited, as if often the case, the culture or splendid physique of the father and the comeliness of the mother; and instanced King Solomon, Falconbridge, in whose "large composition," could be read tokens of King Richard, [138] and the list of notables from Homer to "Pedro's son," as catalogued by Camoens [139] who said:
"The meed of valour Bastards aye have claimed
By arts or arms, or haply both conjoined."
The real persons to be pitied, he said, were the mentally or physically weak, whatever their parentage.
28. El Islam.
Burton now commenced to write a work to be called El Islam, or the History of Mohammedanism; which, however, he never finished. It opens with an account of the rise of Christianity, his attitude to which resembled that of Renan. [140] Of Christ he says: "He had given an impetus to the progress of mankind by systematizing a religion of the highest moral loveliness, showing what an imperfect race can and may become." He then dilates on St. Paul, who with a daring hand "rent asunder the ties connecting Christianity with Judaism." "He offered to the great family of man a Church with a Diety at its head and a religion peculiarly of principles. He left the moral code of Christianity untouched in its loveliness. After the death of St. Paul," continues Burton, "Christianity sank into a species of idolatry. The acme of stupidity was attained by the Stylites, who conceived that mankind had no nobler end than to live and die upon the capital of a column. When things were at their worst Mohammed first appeared upon the stage of life." The work was published in its unfinished state after Burton's death.
With The Kasidah we shall deal in a later chapter, for though Burton wrote a few couplets at this time, the poem did not take its present shape till after the appearance of FitzGerald's adaptation of The Rubaiyat Oman Khayyam.
Having spent a few weeks in Egypt, Burton returned to Bombay, travelling in his Arab dress. Among those on board was an English gentleman, Mr. James Grant Lumsden, senior member of the Council, Bombay, who being struck by Burton's appearance, said to a friend, "What a clever, intellectual face that Arab has!" Burton, overhearing the remark, made some humorous comment in English, and thus commenced a pleasant friendship.
Chapter VII. 29th October 1854—9th February, 1855 To Harar
Bibliography: 13. Pilgrimage to Al-Madimah and Meccah. 3 vols. 1855-1856.
29. At Aden. The Arabian Nights. Oct. 1854.
It was while staying at Bombay as Mr. Lumsden's guest that Burton, already cloyed with civilization, conceived the idea of journeying, via Zeila in Somaliland, to the forbidden and therefore almost unknown city of Harar, and thence to Zanzibar. His application to the Bombay Government for permission and assistance having been received favourably, he at once set out for Aden, where he stayed with his "old and dear friend," Dr. John Steinhauser, who had been appointed civil surgeon there. Steinhauser, a stolid man, whose face might have been carved out of wood, was, like Burton, an enthusiastic student of The Arabian Nights, and their conversation naturally drifted into this subject. Both came to the conclusion that while the name of this wondrous repertory of Moslem folk-lore was familiar to almost every English child, no general reader could form any idea of its treasures. Moreover, that the door would not open to any but Arabists. But even at the present day, and notwithstanding the editions of Payne and Burton, there are still persons who imagine that The Arabian Nights is simply a book for the nursery. Familiar only with some inferior rendering, they are absolutely ignorant of the wealth of wisdom, humour, pathos and poetry to be found in its pages. [141] Writing in 1856, Burton says: "The most familiar book in England, next to the Bible, it is one of the least known, the reason being that about one-fifth is utterly unfit for translation, and the most sanguine Orientalist would not dare to render more than three-quarters of the remainder, [142] consequently the reader loses the contrast—the very essence of the book—between its brilliancy and dulness, its moral putrefaction and such pearls as:
'Cast the seed of good works on the least fit soil;
Good is never wasted, however it may be laid out.'
And in a page or two after such divine sentiment, the ladies of Baghdad sit in the porter's lay, and indulge in a facetiousness which would have killed Pietro Aretino before his time." [143] When the work entitled A Thousand Nights and a Night was commenced, no man knows. There were Eastern collections with that title four centuries ago, laboured by the bronzed fingers of Arab scribes; but the framework and some of the tales must have existed prior even to the Moslem conquest. It has been noticed that there are resemblances between the story of Shahryar and that of Ahasuerus as recorded in Esther. In both narratives the King is offended with his Queen and chooses a new wife daily. Shahryar has recourse to the scimitar, Ahasuerus consigns wife after wife to the seclusion of his harem. Shahryar finds a model consort in Shahrazad, Ahasuerus in Esther. Each queen saves a multitude from death, each king lies awake half the night listening to stories. [144] While many of the stories in The Arabian Nights are ancient, some, as internal evidence proves, are comparatively recent. Thus those of Kamar-al-Zaman II. and Ma'aruf the Cobbler belong to the 16th century; and no manuscript appears to be older than 1548. The most important editions are the Calcutta, the Boulac [145] and the Breslau, all of which differ both in text and the order of the stories. The Nights were first introduced into Europe by Antoine Galland, whose French translation appeared between 1704 and 1717. Of the Nights proper, Galland presented the public with about a quarter, and he added ten tales [146] from other Eastern manuscripts. An anonymous English edition appeared within a few years. The edition published in 1811 by Jonathan Scott is Galland with omissions and additions, the new tales being from the Wortley Montague MS. now in the Bodleian. In 1838, Henry Torrens began a translation direct from the Arabic, of which, however, he completed only one volume, and in 1838-40 appeared the translation direct from the Arabic, of which, however, he completed only one volume, and in 1838-40 appeared the translation of Edward William Lane, [147] made direct from the Boulac edition. This work, which contains about one third of the entire Arabian Nights, was a great step forward, but unfortunately, Lane, who afterwards became an excellent Arabic scholar, was but a poor writer, and having no gift of verse, he rendered the poetical portions, that is to say, some ten thousand lines "in the baldest and most prosaic of English." [148]
So Burton and Steinhauser said to themselves, As the public have never had more than one-third of the Nights, and that translated indifferently, we will see what we can do. "We agreed," says Burton, "to collaborate and produce a full, complete, unvarnished, uncastrated, copy of the great original, my friend taking the prose and I the metrical part; and we corresponded upon the subject for years." [149] They told each other that, having completed their task, they would look out for a retreat as a preparation for senility, some country cottage, perhaps, in the South of France, where, remote from books, papers, pens, ink and telegrams, they could spend their nights in bed and their days in hammocks. Beyond planning the translation, however, nothing was done. Steinhauser died fourteen years later (1866), and whatever notes he made were dispersed, while Burton, even as late as 1883, had done nothing beyond making a syllabus of the Boulac edition. [150] Still, the scheme was never for very long absent from his thoughts, and during his wanderings in Somaliland, the Tanganyika country and elsewhere, he often delighted the natives by reciting or reading some of the tales. The history of Burton's translation of The Arabian Nights is, as we shall subsequently show, curiously analogous to that of The Kasidah.
30. From Zeila to Harar, 27th November 1854 to 2nd January 1855.
Burton now found that, as regards the projected expedition, his plans would have to be modified, and he finally decided to confine his explorations to "the great parched horn" of Somaliland. His plan was now to visit Harar via Zeila, and then make for Berbera, in order to join Lieutenant Speke, Herne and Stroyan, who had been authorised to assist him and had arranged to await him there. The presence at Berbera of Speke and his companions, would, it was supposed, "produce a friendly feeling on the part of Somali," and facilitate Burton's egress from Harar, should he ever, as was by no means certain, enter alive that dangerous and avoided city. Sir James Outram, then Political Resident at Aden, called the expedition a tempting of Providence, and tried hard to stop it, but in vain. Burton left Aden for Zeila on October 29th, taking with him a managing man called "The Hammal," a long, lean Aden policeman, nicknamed "Long Gulad" and a suave but rascally Moslem priest dubbed "The End of Time." [151] They landed on October 31st, and found Zeila a town of white-washed houses and minaretted mosques, surrounded by a low brown wall with round towers. Burton, who called himself a Moslem merchant, spent three weeks buying camels and mules and interviewing guides, while he kept up his reputation for piety with the customary devotions. According to his wont, he carefully studied the customs of the people. "One of the peculiar charms," he says, of the Somali girls, is "a soft, low and plaintive voice," and he notices that "in muscular strength and endurance the women of the Somal are far superior to their lords." The country teems with poets, who praise the persons of the belles very much in the style of Canticles, declaring prettily, for example, that their legs are as straight as the "Libi Tree," and that their hips swell out "like boiled rice." The marriage ceremonies, he tells us, are conducted with feasting, music and flogging. On first entering the nuptial hut the bridegroom draws forth his horsewhip and inflicts chastisement upon his bride, with the view of taming any lurking propensity to shrewishness. As it is no uncommon event to take four wives at once, this horsewhipping is naturally rather exhausting for the husband. Burton considered polygamy to be indispensable in countries like Somaliland, "where children are the principal wealth;" but he saw less necessity for it "among highly civilised races where the sexes are nearly equal, and where reproduction becomes a minor duty." However, he would have been glad to see polygamy allowed even in England, "if only to get rid of all the old maids," a class that he regarded with unbounded pity. He longed "to see these poor, cankered, angular ladies transformed into cheerful, amiable wives with something really to live for." "Man," it was a favourite saying with him, "is by nature polygamic, whereas woman, as a rule, is monogamic, and polyandrous only when tired of her lover. The man loves the woman, but the love of the woman is for the love of the man." He also agreed with the 18th century Rev. Martin Madan, author of Thelyphthora, a treatise on female ruin, who insisted that polygamy would go far to remove one of the great reproaches of the streets of London and other large cities. "Except in books," says Burton, "seduction in Mohammedan countries is almost unknown, adultery difficult." That polygamy, however, is no panacea, the following remarks will show. "Both sexes," he says, speaking of the Somali, "are temperate from necessity." Drunkenness is unknown. Still, the place is not Arcady. "After much wandering," he continues, "we are almost tempted to believe that morality is a matter of geography; [152] that nations and races have, like individuals, a pet vice; and that by restraining one, you only exasperate another. As a general rule Somali women prefer flirtations with strangers, following the well-known Arabian proverb, 'The new comer filleth the eye.'" Burton was thoroughly at home in Zeila "with the melodious chant of the muezzin" and the loudly intoned "Amin" and "Allaho Akbar" daily ringing in his ear. He often went into the Mosque, and with a sword and a rosary before him, read the "cow chapter" [153] in a loud twanging voice. Indeed, he had played the role of devout Mohammedan so long, that he had almost become one. The people of Zeila tried to persuade him to abandon his project. "If," said they, "you escape the desert hordes it will only be to fall by the hands of the truculent Amir of Harar." Nothing, however, could dash Burton's confidence in his star, and like Dante, he applied to Fear no epithets but "vile" and "base."
One Raghi, a petty Eesa chief, having been procured as protector of the party, and other arrangements having been made, Burton on November 27th (1854) set out for his destination by a circuitous route. Raghi rode in front. Next, leading camels, walked two enormously fat Somali women; while by the side of the camels rode Burton's three attendants, the Hammal, Long Gulad, and "The End of Time," "their frizzled wigs radiant with grease," and their robes splendidly white with borders dazzlingly red. Burton brought up the rear on a fine white mule with a gold fringed Arab pad and wrapper-cloth, a double-barrelled gun across his lap, and in this manner the little caravan pursued its sinuous course over the desert. At halting places he told his company tales from The Arabian Nights; they laughed immoderately at the adventures of the little Hunchback; tears filled their eyes as they listened to the sad fate of Azizah; [154] and the two fat Somali women were promptly dubbed Shahrazad and Dunyazad. Dunyazad had been as far as Aden and was coquettish. Her little black eyes never met Burton's, and frequently with affected confusion she turned her sable cheek the clean contrary way. Attendant on the women was a Zeila lad, who, being one-eyed, was pitilessly called "The Kalandar." At their first halting place, Burton astonished the natives by shooting a vulture on the wing. "Lo!" cried the women, "he bringeth down the birds from heaven." On their way through an ochreish Goban, or maritime plain, they passed huge hills made by white ants, Gallas graves planted with aloe, [155] and saw in the distance troops of gazelles. They were now in the Isa country, "Traitorous as an Isa" being a Zeila proverb. Though the people were robbers and murderers, Burton, by tact, got on excellently with them, and they good-naturedly offered him wives. At every settlement the whole population flocked to see him, the female portion loudly expressing their admiration for him. "Come girls," they cried one to another, "come and look at this white stranger." According to Raghi, the fair face of a French lady who had recently landed at Berbera, "made every man hate his wife, and every wife hate herself." Once they were attacked by Bedouin, who, however, on hearing the report of Burton's revolver, declared that they were only in fun. Others who tried to stop them were shown the star sapphire, and threatened with "sorcery, death, wild beasts," and other unpleasantnesses. At a place called Aububah, Raghi relinquished the charge of the caravan to some men of the Gudabirsi tribe, who led the way to the village of Wilensi, where they were the guests of the household of a powerful chief called Jirad Adan. Here Burton left Shahrazad, Dunyazad and the Kalandar, and proceeded to Sagharrah, where he met and formed a friendship with Jirad Adan. For several days he was prostrated by fever, and some Harar men who looked in tried to obtain him as a prisoner. The Jirad acted honourably, but he declined to escort Burton to Harar. "No one," he said, "is safe in the Amir's clutches, and I would as soon walk into a crocodile's mouth as set foot in the city." "Nothing then remained," says Burton, "but payer d'audace, [156] and, throwing all forethought to the dogs, to rely upon what has made many a small man great, the good star. I addressed my companions in a set speech, advising a mount without delay." [157] The End of Time, having shown the white feather, was left behind, but the rest courageously consented to accompany their leader. "At 10 a.m. on the 2nd January," says Burton, "all the villagers assembled, and recited the Fatihah, consoling us with the information that we were dead men." The little company, carrying their lives in their hands, then set forward, and presently came in sight of Harar, "a dark speck upon a tawny sheet of stubble." Arrived at the gate of the town, they accosted the warder, sent their salaams to the Amir, and requested the honour of audience.
31. At Harar.
They were conducted to the palace, a long, single-storied, windowless barn of rough stone and reddish clay. Says Burton: "I walked into a vast hall between two long rows of Galla spearmen, between whose lines I had to pass. They were large, half-naked savages, standing like statues with fierce, movable eyes, each one holding, with its butt end on the ground, a huge spear, with a head the size of a shovel. I purposely sauntered down them coolly with a swagger, with my eyes fixed upon their dangerous-looking faces. I had a six-shooter concealed in my waist-belt, and determined, at the first show of excitement, to run up to the Amir, and put it to his head, if it were necessary, to save my own life." The Amir was an etiolated young man of twenty-four or twenty-five, plain and thin-bearded, with a yellow complexion, wrinkled brows and protruding eyes. He wore a flowing robe of crimson cloth, edged with snowy fur, and a narrow white turban tightly twisted round a tall, conical cap of red velvet. On being asked his errand, Burton replied politely in Arabic that he had come from Aden in order to bear the compliments of the governor, and to see the light of his highness's countenance. On the whole, the Amir was gracious, but for some days Burton and his party were in jeopardy, and when he reflected that he was under the roof of a bigoted and sanguinary prince, whose filthy dungeons resounded with the moans of heavily ironed, half-starved prisoners; among a people who detested foreigners; he, the only European who had ever passed over their inhospitable threshold, naturally felt uncomfortable. The Amir, it seems, had four principal wives, and an army of 200 men armed chiefly with daggers. Burton describes the streets of Harar as dirty narrow lanes heaped with garbage, and the houses as situated at the bottom of courtyards, closed by gates of holcus stalks. The town was proud of its learning and sanctity, and venerated the memory of several very holy and verminous saints. Neither sex possessed personal attractions, and the head-dresses of the women seen from behind resembled a pawnbroker's sign, except that they were blue instead of gilt. The people lived chiefly on holcus, and a narcotic called "jat," made by pounding the tender twigs of a tree of the same name. "It produced in them," says Burton, "a manner of dreamy enjoyment, which exaggerated by time and distance, may have given rise to that splendid myth the Lotos and the Lotophagi. [158] Their chief commodity was coffee, their favourite drink an aphrodisiac made of honey dissolved in hot water, and strained and fermented with the bark of a tree called kudidah." Although unmolested, Burton had no wish to remain long at Harar, and when on 13th January he and his party took their departure it was with a distinct feeling of relief.
32. From Harar to Berbera. 13th Jan. 1855-5th Feb. 1855.
At Sagharrah they found again the pusillanimous "End of Time," and at Wilensi they were rejoined by Shahrazad, Dunyazad and the one-eyed Kalandar. Persons who met Burton and his friends enquired Irish-like if they were the party who had been put to death by the Amir of Harar. Everyone, indeed, was amazed to see them not only alive, but uninjured, and the Frank's temerity became the talk of the desert. Burton now put the two women, the Kalandar, the camels, and the baggage, under the care of a guide, and sent them to Zeila, while he himself and the men made straight for Berbera. The journey, which led them past Moga's tooth [159] and Gogaysa, was a terrible one, for the party suffered tortures from thirst, and at one time it seemed as though all must perish. By good fortune, however, they ultimately came upon some pools. Any fear that might have haunted them, lest the water should be poisonous, was soon dispelled, for it contained a vast number of tadpoles and insects, and was therefore considered quite harmless and suitable for drinking. For many hours they again plodded on beneath a brazen sky. Again thirst assailed them; and, like Ishmael in the desert of Zin, they were ready to cast themselves down and die. This time they were saved by a bird, a katta or sand grouse, which they saw making for some hills; and having followed it, they found, as they had anticipated, a spring of water, at which they frenziedly slaked their thirst. Many other difficulties and troubles confronted them in their subsequent march, but at last they heard (delightful sound!) the murmur of the distant sea. Every man was worn out, with the exception of the Hammal, who, to Burton's delight, not only talked, but sang and shouted. Finally they reached Berbera, where they found Speke, Herne and Stroyan, and on 5th February, Burton in company with the Hammal, Long Gulad, and The End of Time, set sail for Aden, calling on their way at Siyaro and Anterad, east of Berbera.
The first news Burton had on arriving there was of the death of his mother, which had occurred 18th December 1854, at the time he lay ill at Sagharrah. Always immersed in him, she used to say, when he left her, "It seems as if the sun itself has disappeared." He, on his part, often bore witness to the unselfishness and blamelessness of her life, generally adding, "It is very pleasant to be able to feel proud of one's parents."
33. The Fight at Berbera, 22nd April, 1855.
Unable to let well alone, Burton now wanted to make a new expedition, this time to the Nile, via Berbera and Harar, and on a larger and more imposing scale. On 7th April he was back again at Berbera, taking with him Speke, Stroyan, Herne and 42 assistants, and his first care was to establish an agency on the coast, so as to have the protection of the English gunboat, the "Mahi," which had brought them. Unfortunately, the Government drew off the gunboat, and this had scarcely been done before Burton and his party were attacked by 300 natives, who swarmed round them during the night, and tried to entrap and entangle them by throwing down the tents. A desperate hand-to-hand fight then ensued. Javelins hissed, war-clubs crashed. The forty-two coloured auxiliaries promptly took to their heels, leaving the four Englishmen to do as they could. Stroyan fell early in the fight. Burton, who had nothing but a sabre, fought like a demon; Speke, on his left near the entrance of the tent, did deadly execution with a pair of revolvers; Herne on his right emptied into the enemy a sixshooter, and then hammered it with the butt end. Burton, while sabreing his way towards the sea, was struck by a javelin, which pierced both cheeks, and struck out four of his teeth. Speke received eleven wounds, from which, however, he took no harm—a touching proof, comments Burton, of how difficult it is to kill a man in sound health. Eventually the survivors, stained with blood, and fearfully exhausted, but carrying, nevertheless, the corpse of poor Stroyan, managed to reach a friendly native craft, which straightway took them back to Aden. [160]
Chapter VIII. 9th February 1855-October 1856, The Crimea
Bibliography:
14. First Footsteps in East Africa, 1856.
34. The Crimea.
Owing to his wounds Burton had to return to England, and, on his first opportunity, he gave an account of his explorations before the Royal Geographical Society. Little, however, was now talked of except the Crimean War, which had commenced, it will be remembered in March 1854. The Allies landed in the Crimea in September, Inkermann was fought on the 5th of November, and then followed the tedious siege of Sebastopol. Burton had not long been home before he applied for and obtained leave to join the besieging army; and his brother Edward also went out as surgeon, about the same time. Emulous of the deeds of Napier and Outram, Burton now thought he saw a career of military glory awaiting him. Soon after his arrival at the seat of war he was appointed chief of the staff to General Beatson, and in his "gorgeous uniform blazing with gold" he set vigorously to work to re-organize and drill his contingent of Bashi-Bazouks. He had great difficulties with Beatson, a brave, but passionate and undiplomatic old warrior; but he succeeded marvellously with his men, and his hope of winning fame rose higher than ever. The war, however, was crawling to an end, and the troops he had drilled so patiently had little to do beside look on. At this conjuncture he thought he saw a road to success in the relief of Kars, which had been persistently besieged by the Russians. Elated at the prospect of taking part in a great military feat, he hurried to Constantinople, obtained an interview with the British Ambassador, Lord Stratford, and submitted a plan for approval. To his amazement, Lord Stratford broke into a towering passion, and called him "the most impudent man in the Bombay Army." Later Burton understood in what way he had transgressed. As the war was closing, it had been arranged by the Allies that Kars should be allowed to fall as a peace offering to Russia.
Burton now began to suffer from the untrue tales that were told about him, still he never troubled to disprove them. Some were circulated by a fellow officer of his—an unmitigated scoundrel whose life had been sullied by every species of vice; who not only invented calumniating stories but inserted particulars that gave them a verisimilitude. Two of this man's misdeeds may be mentioned. First he robbed the Post Office at Alexandria, and later he unblushingly unfolded to Lord Stanley of Alderley his plan of marrying an heiress and of divorcing her some months later with a view to keeping, under a Greek law, a large portion of her income. He seemed so certain of being able to do it that Lord Stanley consulted a lady friend, and the two together succeeded in frustrating the infamous design. This sordid and callous rascal tried hard to lead people to suppose that he and Burton were hand and glove in various kinds of devilry, and a favourite phrase in his mouth was "I and Burton are great scamps." Percy Smythe [161] then an official under Lord Stratford, commented on hearing the saying: "No, that won't do, —— is a real scamp, but Burton is only wild." One story put abroad apparently by the same scoundrel is still in circulation. We are told that Burton was once caught in a Turkish harem, and allowed to escape only after suffering the usual indescribable penalty. As this was the solitary story that really annoyed Burton, we think it our duty to say that conclusive documentary evidence exists proving that, whether or not he ever broke into a harem, he most certainly underwent no deprivation. Other slanders of an even more offensive nature got abroad. Pious English mothers loathed Burton's name, and even men of the world mentioned it apologetically. In time, it is true, he lived all this down, still he was never—he is not now—generally regarded as a saint worthy of canonization.
With the suspension of General Beatson—for the machinations of enemies ultimately accomplished the old hero's fall—Burton's connection with the Crimean army abruptly ceased. Having sent in his resignation, he returned to England and arrived here just in time to miss, to his disappointment, his brother Edward, who had again left for Ceylon. Edward's after career was sad enough to draw tears from adamant. During an elephant hunt a number of natives set upon him and beat him brutally about the head. Brain trouble ensued, and he returned home, but henceforth, though he attained a green old age, he lived a life of utter silence. Except on one solitary occasion he never after—and that is to say for forty years—uttered a single word. Always resembling a Greek statue, there was now added to him the characteristic of all statues, rigid and solemn silence. From a man he had become aching marble. To Burton, with his great, warm, affectionate heart, Edward's affliction was an unceasing grief. In all his letters he enquires tenderly after his "dear brother," and could truly say, with the enemy of his boyhood, Oliver Goldsmith:
"Where'er I roam, whatever realms to see,
My heart untravelled fondly turns to thee:
Still to my Brother turns." [162]
Arrived in England, General Beatson promptly instituted civil proceedings against his enemies; and Burton was in constant expectation of being subpoenaed. He thoroughly sympathized with Beatson, but he had no wish to be forced to remain in London, just as he had no wish at any time in his life to be mewed up anywhere. Consequently he disguised himself by wearing green spectacles and tying a pillow over his stomach to simulate corpulence. To one friend who met him, he made himself known. "Are you really Burton?" inquired his friend. "I shall be," replied Burton, "but just now I'm a Greek doctor." Burton's conscience, however, finally had the mastery. He did attend the trial and he corroborated the statements of his late chief. The verdict of the jury went against Beatson, but it was generally felt that the old war dog had fully vindicated his character.
35. Engaged to Isabel Arundell, August 1856.
In August, after a lapse of four years, Burton renewed acquaintance with Isabel Arundell, who one day met him, quite by accident, in the Botanical Gardens, and she kept meeting him there quite by accident every day for a fortnight. He had carried his life in his hand to Mecca and to Harar, he had kept at bay 200 Somalis, but like the man in Camoens, he finally fell by "a pair of eyes." [163] According to Lady Burton, [164] it was Burton who made the actual proposal; and it is just possible.
"You won't chalk up 'Mother will be angry' now I hope," said Burton.
"Perhaps not," replied Miss Arundell, "but she will be all the same."
Mrs. Arundell, indeed, like so many other English mothers, was violently prejudiced against Burton. When her daughter broached the subject she replied fiercely: "He is not an old English Catholic, or even a Catholic, he has neither money nor prospects." She might also have added that he was apt to respect mere men of intellect more than men of wealth and rank, an un-English trait which would be sure to militate against his advancement.
Miss Arundell bravely defended her lover, but without effect. A few days later she again met her old gipsy crone Hagar Burton, who repeated her sibylline declaration. As Miss Arundell never, by any chance, talked about anything or anybody except Burton, and as she paid liberally for consulting the Fates, this declaration necessarily points to peculiar acumen on the part of the gipsy.
At one of their meetings Miss Arundell put round Burton's neck a steel chain with a medal of the Virgin Mary and begged him to wear it all his life. Possessing a very accommodating temperament in matters that seemed to himself of no vital importance, he consented; so it joined the star-sapphire and other amulets, holy and unholy, which, for different purposes, he carried about the world.
That this medal had often acted as a preservative to Burton she was in after life thoroughly convinced.