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FROM SKETCH-BOOK AND DIARY

BY THE SAME AUTHOR

LETTERS FROM THE HOLY LAND

CONTAINING 16 FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
FROM PAINTINGS BY THE AUTHOR

"Charmingly natural and spontaneous travel impressions with sixteen
harmonious illustrations. The glow, spaciousness and atmosphere of these
Eastern scenes are preserved in a way that eloquently attests the
possibilities of the best colour process work."--_Outlook_.

"The letters in themselves afford their own justification; the sketches
are by Lady Butler, and when we have said that we have said all.
Combined, they make a book that is at once a delight to the eye and a
pleasure to handle. The  illustrations, marvellously well
reproduced, provide in a panoramic display faithful representations of
the Holy Land as it is seen to-day. They make a singularly attractive
collection, worthy of the distinguished artist who painted them."--_St.
James's Gazette_.

A. & C. BLACK, SOHO SQUARE LONDON

AGENTS

America       The Macmillan Company
                64 & 66 Fifth Avenue, New York

Australasia   The Oxford University Press
                205 Flinders Lane, Melbourne

Canada        The Macmillan Company of Canada, Ltd.
                27 Richmond Street West, Toronto

India         Macmillan & Company, Ltd.
                Macmillan Building, Bombay
                309 Bow Bazaar Street, Calcutta

[Illustration: THE HOUR OF PRAYER, A SOUVENIR OF WADY HALFA]




FROM SKETCH-BOOK
AND DIARY

BY

ELIZABETH BUTLER

WITH TWENTY-EIGHT ILLUSTRATIONS IN COLOUR
AND TWENTY-ONE SMALL SKETCHES IN THE TEXT
BY THE AUTHOR

[Illustration: colophon]

LONDON

ADAM AND CHARLES BLACK, SOHO SQUARE, W.

BURNS AND OATES, 28 ORCHARD STREET, W.
1909




Dedication

TO MY SISTER, ALICE MEYNELL


I have an idea of writing to you, most sympathetic Reader, of certain
days and nights of my travels that have impressed themselves with
peculiar force upon my memory, and that have mostly rolled by since you
and I set out, at the Parting of the Ways, from the paternal roof-tree,
within three months of each other.

First, I want to take you to the Wild West Land of Ireland, to a glen in
Kerry, where, so far, the tourist does not come, and then on to remote
Clew Bay, in the County Mayo.

After that, come with me up the Nile in the time that saw the close of
the Gordon Relief Expedition, when the sailing "Dahabieh," most
fascinating of house-boats, was still the vogue for those who were not
in a hurry, and when again the tourist (of that particular year) was
away seeking safer picnic grounds elsewhere.

Then to the Cape and the voyage thither, which may not sound alluring,
but where you may find something to smile at.

I claim your indulgence, wherever I ask you to accompany me, for my
painter's literary crudities; but nowhere do I need it more than in
Italy, for you have trodden that field with me almost foot by foot. The
veil to which I trust for softening those asperities elsewhere must fall
asunder there.

I have made my Diary, and in the case of the Egyptian chapters, my
letters to our mother, the mainsprings from which to draw these
reminiscences.

Bansha CASTLE, _July_ 1909.




CONTENTS


I. IN THE WEST OF IRELAND

CHAPTER I
                                                                    PAGE
GLANARAGH                                                              3

CHAPTER II

COUNTY MAYO IN 1905                                                   15


II. EGYPT

CHAPTER I

CAIRO                                                                 31

CHAPTER II

THE UPPER NILE                                                        55

CHAPTER III

ALEXANDRIA                                                            77


III. THE CAPE

CHAPTER I

TO THE CAPE                                                           91

CHAPTER II

AT ROSEBANK, CAPE COLONY                                             105


IV. ITALY

CHAPTER I

VINTAGE-TIME IN TUSCANY                                              123

CHAPTER II

Sienna, Perugia, and Vesuvius                                        143

CHAPTER III

ROME                                                                 160




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS


IN COLOUR

1. The Hour of Prayer, A Souvenir of Wady Halfa            _Frontispiece_


IRELAND

                                                             FACING PAGE

2. Our Escort into Glenaragh                                           1

3. "A Chapel-of-Ease," Co. Kerry                                       8

4. Croagh Patrick                                                     17

5. Clew Bay, Co. Mayo                                                 20

6. A Little Irish River                                               24


EGYPT

7. In a Cairo Bazaar                                                  33

8. The Camel Corps                                                    40

9. The English General's Syces                                        49

10. Registering Fellaheen for the Conscription                        56

11. "No Mooring To-night!"                                            59

12. The "Fostat" becalmed                                             62

13. At Philae                                                          67

14. A "Lament" in the Desert                                          70

15. Abu Simbel at Sunrise                                             76

16. Madame's "At Home" Day; Servants at the Gate                      81

17. Syndioor on the Lower Nile                                        88


THE CAPE

18. "In the Hollow of His Hand"                                       97

19. A Corner of our Garden at Rosebank                               104

20. The Inverted Crescent                                            113

21. The Cape "Flats"                                                 120


ITALY

22. Bringing in the Grapes                                           123

23. A Son of the Soil, Riviera di Levante                            126

24. Ploughing in Tuscany                                             145

25. The Bersaglieri at the Fountain, Perugia                         152

26. A Meeting on the Pincian: French and German
Seminarists                                                          161

27. A Lenten Sermon in the Colosseum                                 164

28. The Start for the Horse Race, Rome                               168

Also head and tail pieces in black and white on pp. 2, 3, 15, 27,
28, 30, 31, 54, 55, 76, 77, 88, 90, 91, 104, 105, 122, 123,
142, 143, and 160.

[Illustration: OUR ESCORT INTO GLENARAGH]




I

IN THE WEST OF IRELAND

[Illustration]

[Illustration]




CHAPTER I

GLENARAGH


My diary must introduce you to Glenaragh, where I saw a land whose
beauty was a revelation to me; a new delight unlike anything I had seen
in my experiences of the world's loveliness. To one familiarized from
childhood with Italy's peculiar charm, a sudden vision of the Wild West
of Ireland produces a sensation of freshness and surprise difficult
adequately to describe.

"--_June_ '77.--At Killarney we left the train and set off on one of the
most enchanting carriage journeys I have ever made, passing by the
lovely Lough Leane by a road hedged in on both sides with masses of the
richest May blossom. For some distance the scenery was wooded and soft,
almost too perfect in composition of wood, lake, river, and mountain;
but by degrees we left behind us those scenes of finished beauty, and
entered upon tracts of glorious bog-land which, in the advancing
evening, impressed me beyond even my heart's desire by their breadth of
colour and solemn tones. I was beginning to taste the salt of the Wilds.

"The scenery grew more rugged still, and against ranges of distant
mountains jutted out the strong grey and brown rocks, the stone cairns
and cabins of the Wild West land.

"To be a figure-painter and full of interest in mankind does not mean
that one cannot enjoy, from the depths of one's heart, such scenes as
these, where what human habitations there are, are so like the stone
heaps that lie over the face of the land that they are scarcely
distinguishable from them.