As my dear mother stood on the threshold between
life and death at Mornex that sad spring, he was untiring in all
kindly offices of friendship. It was her old friend, Principal A. J.
Scott (then eminent, now forgotten), who sent him to call. He came to
see us daily when possible, sometimes bringing MSS. of Rossetti and
others to read aloud (and who could equal his reading?), and when she
was too ill for this, or himself absent, he would send not only books
and flowers to brighten the bare rooms of the hillside inn (then very
primitive), but his own best treasures of Turner and W. Hunt, drawings
and illuminated missals. It was an anxious solace; and though most
gratefully enjoyed, these treasures were never long retained.
[55] Villa Mansi, nearly opposite the old Ducal Palace. With its private
chapel, it formed three sides of a small place or court.
[56] He also at all times spared no pains to enforce that ideal on other
index-makers, who were not always grateful for his sound doctrine!
[57] He saw a good deal of the outbreak when taking small comforts to a
friend, the Commandent of the Military School, who was captured and
imprisioned by the insurgents.
