SOCIAL LIFE
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point, and the stream after crossing it fell into a precipice, at the bottom of which ran the river Loup. Mrs. MacLennan was walking first, and, owing to some strange accident, missed a stone or tripped, and fell heavily on her side, where she lay motionless in the water as though shot dead. I helped her to rise, but she was in great pain. It was difficult to set her on her feet, for the position was not one to stagger safely in, the precipice being much too near.
With great pluck, she went a few steps onward to see the fall, and then the long return walk had to be achieved. She was confined for a long time to bed, and far from fit to travel when she left us. The injury was followed by an internal complaint, of which, after much suffering at her own home, she died.
Few have been more thorough in their friendship to my wife and myself than Sir Rutherford and Lady Alcock and her daughter by a previous marriage, Miss Lowder, now Lady Pelly. I was well acquainted with much of Sir Rutherford's work in China and Japan before I had the pleasure of knowing him personally, because the Foreign Office used to forward those of his dispatches that were of geographical interest to the Royal Geographical Society, where, for want of a better person, they were generally referred to myself. Sir Rutherford's life was eventful ; first as an army surgeon in Spain under Sir De Lacy Evans, then Consul in China, then our first Minister in Japan, then Ambassador to China. Lady Alcock seconded him in charge of the well -being of his large staff, with a kindliness that was proverbial. On their return to England they became social favourites from the highest in rank to the
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