L- had pressed me to let him take my place; but
though I was very tired at the end of the first quarter of an hour,
and then every successive half hour, I would not give in. I nearly
paid dear for my obstinacy, however; for in the evening I had
alternate fits of shivering and burning.'
III.
The next extracts, and I am sorry to say the last, are from
Fleeming's letters of 1860, when he was back at Bona and
Spartivento and for the first time at the head of an expedition.
Unhappily these letters are not only the last, but the series is
quite imperfect; and this is the more to be lamented as he had now
begun to use a pen more skilfully, and in the following notes there
is at times a touch of real distinction in the manner.
'Cagliari: October 5, 1860.
'All Tuesday I spent examining what was on board the ELBA, and
trying to start the repairs of the Spartivento land line, which has
been entirely neglected, and no wonder, for no one has been paid
for three months, no, not even the poor guards who have to keep
themselves, their horses and their families, on their pay.
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