Page:The life and letters of Sir John Henniker Heaton bt. (IA lifelettersofsi00port).pdf/302

telegrams (which I hope you have received) with some details of your dear husband's illness; and, as it is quite uncertain when we may be able to leave, it is right that you should have some news as soon as possible. For some ten days before we left Carlsbad, on 2nd Sept., he took up his residence at my hotel in order to have the benefit of the services of my valet, and I naturally saw a great deal of him as we always had our evening meal together. He talked to me a great deal, and was constantly looking forward to seeing his "dear little wife," and so far as I could judge he was far better in general health on the eve of our departure than he had been during the whole of his stay at Carlsbad; he was naturally very much upset at England going to war, and very much excited when news of disasters kept pouring in. We left in a special train for the Swiss frontier on 2nd Sept. and he and I occupied a first-class coupé and he bore the journey to the frontier exceedingly well, although he was perhaps rather imprudent in the matter of diet, and I often congratulated him on his ability to eat the unpalatable provisions we had to consume; at the Swiss frontier we found a special train ready to bring us to Geneva, and before changing trains at 4 a.m. I took care to see that he was properly wrapped up, and he was most cheerful and said that he had got on a very warm undergarment that "his dear little wife" had specially provided for him. I put him in the Swiss train, and then had to leave him as I was very busy making arrangements with Cook's agent on various matters connected with a lot of indigent English people for whom I had funds, and I also had to send several telegrams connected with our possible departure from here to the British Minister at Berne and the British Ambassador at Paris. I also had to arrange with passengers in various parts of the train about guaranteeing the cost of special from Geneva to England, etc. etc., the consequence