1906] The Tichborne Claimant 129 



at Buenos Aires, the announcement of his arrival having been made 

 beforehand with some parade in the local newspapers. The great 

 traveller, it was stated, had the project of making a new exploration of 

 Patagonia and the western Pampas and of ascending the highest sum- 

 mits of the Andes, including Aconcagua, then a virgin peak, and para- 

 graphs were from time to time printed as to the preparations being 

 made beforehand for so great an adventure. On his arrival, however, 

 it was soon abundantly clear that there was nothing very serious in the 

 plan. Burton, in spite of his naturally iron constitution, was no longer 

 in a physical condition for serious work, and though he talked about it 

 for a while to all who would listen, the expedition was gradually let 

 drop by him and ended by becoming a matter of joke among his friends. 

 I remember what I think was my first meeting with him, at Mrs. 

 Russell's house in the autumn of 1868, where we had both been asked 

 to dinner and with us the notorious Sir Roger Tichborne, in whose 

 company Burton had arrived and with whom he chiefly consorted dur- 

 ing his two months' stay at Buenos Aires. They were a strange, 

 disreputable couple. Burton was at that time at the lowest point I fancy 

 of his whole career, and in point of respectability at his very worst. 

 His consular life at Santos, without any interesting work to his hand 

 or proper vent for his energies, had thrown him into a habit of drink 

 he afterwards cured himself of and he seldom went to bed sober. 

 His dress and appearance were those suggesting a released convict, 

 rather than anything of more repute. He wore, habitually, a rusty 

 black coat with a crumpled black silk stock, his throat destitute of 

 collar, a costume which his muscular frame and immense chest made 

 singularly and incongruously hideous, above it a countenance the most 

 sinister I have ever seen, dark, cruel, treacherous, with eyes like a 

 wild beast's. He reminded me by turns of a black leopard, caged, but 

 unforgiving, and again with his close cut poll and iron frame of that 

 wonderful creation of Balzac's, the ex-gallerien Vautrin, hiding his grim 

 identity under an Abbe's cassock. Of the two companions Tichborne 

 was distinctly the less criminal in appearance. I came to know them 

 both well, especially Burton, his connection with the Consular service 

 bringing him to us at the Legation, and I have sat up many nights 

 with him talking of all things in Heaven and Earth, or rather listening 

 while he talked till he grew dangerous in his cups, and revolver in 

 hand would stagger home to bed. 



" On the first occasion, however, of our dinner at Mrs. Russell's 

 my curiosity was excited more towards Tichborne than towards him. 

 He had already laid claim to the Tichborne baronetcy and was com- 

 monly called by his title, and his business at Buenos Aires was to collect 

 evidence, proving his identity for the lawsuit he was about to bring 

 for the family estates. Burton at that time, it is worth recording, more 



