The next day, though very ill,
she, with her sister Mrs. Fitzgerald, went down to Liverpool to meet her
husband's remains, which were arriving by sea. Lord and Lady Derby, who
had always been her kind friends, had arranged everything for her, and
the next morning Lady Burton went on board ship. She says, "I forgot
the people when I saw my beloved case, and I ran forward to kiss it."
It was taken to the train, and to Mortlake, where they arrived that
evening. The coffin was conveyed by torchlight to a temporary resting-
place in the crypt under the altar of the church, where it remained
until the tent was erected. The same evening Lady Burton returned to
London, and, her work being done, the reaction set in. She broke down
and took to her bed that night, where she remained for many weeks.
She says "I cannot describe the horror of the seventy-six days enhanced
by the fog, which, after sunlight and air, was like being buried alive.
The sense of desolation and loneliness and longing for him was cruel,
and it became
The custom of the day
And the haunting of the night.
My altered circumstances, and the looking into and facing my future,
had also to be borne."
In the meantime her friends, notably the Dowager Lady Stanley of
Alderley, the Royal Geographical and other Societies, had not been idle,
and her claims had been brought before the Queen, who was graciously
pleased to grant Lady Burton a pension of 150 pounds a year from the
Civil List.
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