The churches were kept lighted night and day for his benefit, and his nurse attributed his final recovery entirely to the intercession of Panagia Castriotissa, or "Our Lady of the Acropolis." At length, after long hovering between life and death, his robust constitution carried him through, and towards the end of September the doctor advised his being removed to Athens. He was carried thither in a litter and set down at Madame Masson's, where he was henceforth to live. Before this episode was fairly concluded or my father had progressed far in convalescence, a new cause of agitation arose. Notice was received that Baron Stackelberg was in the hands of pirates. He had been for a tour in Asia Minor, and was on his way back between Constantinople and Athens, when in crossing the Gulf of Volo he was taken. His case was even more deplorable than Bronstedt's, for he not only lost whatever he had with him, and saw his drawings torn to pieces in sheer malice before his very eyes, but the miscreants claimed an enormous ransom, amounting to about 3,000l., and sent a notice to his friends in Athens to the effect that the money must be forwarded promptly or portions of the prisoner would be sent as reminders. Meanwhile he had to live with the pirates, and his experiences were no laughing matter. The ruffians used to show him hideous instruments of torture to frighten him into paying a higher ransom. They made him sleep in the open air, which half killed him with fever; and as they had nowhere to keep him when they went on their marauding expeditions, he had to go with them. On one occasion he saw a vessel run aground to avoid capture, and the sailors clamber up the rocks to escape. An old man who could not follow fast enough was brought in to be sold as a slave. The rest got away, and one of the pirates, in his fury at being eluded, in order to slake his thirst for blood seized on a wretched goat that was grazing by him and cut its throat. Several weeks of this sort of company and exposure left poor Stackelberg more dead than alive. His rescue, which was managed with great diplomacy and a splendid disregard for his own safety by Baron Haller, was finally effected at a cost of about 500l. A Mr. Hughes, in company with Mr. Parker, whom he was "bearleading," arrived in Athens when my father was recovering; and about the last week of November, at their invitation, tempted by the opportunity of travelling with a Tartar and a buyulurdi--that is to say, in security and with as little discomfort as possible--he consented to join in a tour to Albania. I shall not give a detailed account of this voyage. It was over ground everyone has read about. It resulted in no discoveries and few adventures, and anyone who is curious about it will find it fully described in Hughes's book. General Davies, quartermaster-general to the British forces in the Mediterranean, was to form one of the party.