The epidemic of typhus that seemed softened down, broke out again, sweeping away whole villages. The death-list of my husband’s companions of arms swelled. I was present at the funeral service officiated over by General Goubski, a good friend of ours, and was very painfully impressed by it; all who stood by were dry-eyed, his servant only seemed somewhat afflicted. I returned home in a most depressed state of mind. As I entered my room I perceived on the flat roof of the house opposite my lodgings an unusual animation; there was a table in the middle surrounded by officers and soldiers; I was told that it was a public sale of all the articles that had belonged to an inhabitant of that house, a Cossack colonel who had just been carried away by the typhus. On the other side of the roof the clothes of the deceased officer were burnt on a wood-pile. At the sight of that my nerves utterly gave way, and I was seized more than ever with a strong desire to rejoin my husband. I was so awfully anxious knowing him to be in Erzeroum, where the disease was at its height, that I could endure the separation, the uncertainty, the suspense no longer. My pillow that night was all moistened with tears. I lay in the dark, save for the ghastly light of the smouldering fire on the opposite roof, with my pessimistic thoughts to keep me company; I turned my face to the wall and sobbed hot, miserable sobs until I fell into an uneasy slumber. The next morning my mind was made up and I despatched a telegram to my husband, telling him that, come what might, I would start for Erzeroum. It was all to no purpose again; Sergy showed himself the most inexorable of husbands and wrote to me that I must listen to reason and wait patiently until his return after the ratification of the armistice. But I was not in a humour to listen to reason. “Wait patiently,” I cried out with unusual heat in myself, “Patience be hanged! I’ll go crazy if I don’t go to Sergy; I cannot possibly sit still and wait!” An officer who had just arrived from Erzeroum came on purpose to try to dissuade me from undertaking such a long and dangerous journey. He told me that even for him it had been awfully fatiguing; the roads were so horrible that the committee of the Red-Cross could not find it possible to send even one Sister of Mercy to Erzeroum. These descriptions of the state of the roads were certainly not encouraging, but nothing could shake my determination, I felt heroic and was prepared to brave all dangers and risk anything for Sergy’s sake, and no human powers should prevent me from starting at the first opportunity.