"I am, as you may think, fearfully sad. I have been nowhere; I neither
visit, nor receive, nor go out. Men drink when they are sad, women fly
into company; but I must fight the battle with my own heart, learn to
live alone and work, and when I have conquered I will allow myself to
see something of my friends. I dreaded my empty home without children
or relatives; but I have braved the worst now. I am cleaning and tidying
his room, putting each thing down in its own place; but I won't make it
luxurious this time; I have learnt by experience."
Isabel passed the next three months at Trieste busily studying, writing,
and carrying out the numerous directions contained in her husband's
letters.
Early in April her doctor discovered that she had the germs of the
internal complaint of which she ultimately died. She had noticed all the
year that she had been getting weaker and weaker in the fencing-school,
until one day she turned faint, and the fencing-master said to her, "Why,
what's the matter with you? Your arms are getting quite limp in using
the broad-sword." She did not know what was the matter with her at the
time; but soon after she became so ill that she had to take to her bed,
and then her doctor discovered the nature of the malady. She did not go
to the fencing-school any more after that. In the Life of her husband,
speaking of the matter, Lady Burton says that her internal complaint
possibly resulted from her fall downstairs in Paris in 1879; but in
talking the matter over with her sister, Mrs.
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