[54] I cannot let the mention of this time of lonely sickness and trial pass without recording here my deep gratitude to our dear and honoured friend, John Ruskin. 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 Commandant of the Military School, who was captured and imprisoned by the insurgents. [58] After 1869 he discontinued sea-bathing. [59] This was Yule’s first geographical honour, but he had been elected into the Athenæum Club, under “Rule II.,” in January, 1867. [60] Garnier took a distinguished part in the Defence of Paris in 1870–71, after which he resumed his naval service in the East, where he was killed in action. His last letter to Yule contained the simple announcement “_J’ai pris Hanoï_” a modest terseness of statement worthy of the best naval traditions. [61] One year the present writer, at her mother’s desire, induced him to take walks of 10 to 12 miles with her, but interesting and lovely as the scenery was, he soon wearied for his writing-table (even bringing his work with him), and thus little permanent good was effected. And it was just the same afterwards in Scotland, where an old Highland gillie, describing his experience of the Yule brothers, said: “I was liking to take out Sir George, for _he_ takes the time to enjoy the hills, but (plaintively), the Kornel is no good, for he’s just as restless as a water-wagtail!” If there be any _mal de l’écritoire_ corresponding to _mal du pays_, Yule certainly had it. [62] The Russian Government in 1873 paid the same work the very practical compliment of circulating it largely amongst their officers in Central Asia.