Page 89 - Life of Gertrude Bell

COURAGE AND DETERMINATION 75

Etna mostly hidden. But for all that it was a revelation of beauty
... and then the theatre, the perfect theatre, framing sea and town
and mountains through its broken arches, and itself the most
exquisite warm colours of brick and stone.’ And again: ‘One’s
eyes, one’s whole mind are brimmed full of beauty in that place —
the eternal Greek beauty set in an Italian landscape.’ At Santa
Flavia they were joined by a youthful Winston Churchill, six
years younger than Gertrude and as yet better known for his
part in the Omdurman battle and the Boer War, and his book
The River War, than for his politics. ‘He appeared at 9.30,’ she
wrote to her stepmother on Sunday February 9th, ‘and took us
sight-seeing.’ They went back to Mr Churchill’s villa, leaving a
card at the home of friends on the way and calling at the residence
of a priest of the Chapel Royal, where they saw a collection of
ancient Sicilian coins. As the journey progressed, Gertrude’s
father became weary with the discomfort of travelling on small
steamers and cramped trains, and the rheumatism which was
increasingly troublesome during the rest of his life became
extremely painful, though a local chemist supplied a liniment
which Gertrude rubbed into his limbs to good effect. They
returned to their starting point, Taormina, which they eventually
left ‘with a terrible tearing of the heartstrings’ for Naples via
Paestum or Pesto as it is now called, with its ‘fine and noble
columns, just right in height and diminution’, and the Temple of
Neptune.
The family party split up after a tour of Neapolitan sights,
Hugo and their father returning to England and Gertrude going
on alone to Asia Minor. On Saturday March 15 th she wrote to
Florence from Malcajik: ‘Dearest Mother, I am delighted to get
your satisfactory telegram about Maurice [her brother was just
home from the Boer War with a shoulder wound to show for his
service] ... I was welcomed here on last Wednesday with the
greatest warmth. On Thursday ... I went off early and spent the
day at Ephesus ... We travelled with a comic party, American
Catholic Bishop, a dear old thing, two American priests and a
young Englishman—what he was doing in that quarter I can’t
think. They are going to Syria so I shall probably meet them
again.’ She was accompanied for much of the time on her travels
along the west coast of Asiatic Turkey by the Van Heemstras and
Van Lenneps, wealthy and academically distinguished families of
Dutch origin. She spent several weeks with them, sampling the