Lady Victoria Campbell

NIGHEAN AN DIUC 297
The " Iona woman " who pleads fatigue will
probably meet with more sympathy from the readers
of this letter than she did from a mistress who always
felt that idleness and fatigue were both vices which
must be overcome.
No one, who does not know the dreary harbours
of Tobermory and Bunessan in Mull, the uncomfort-
able steamers, the grey winter wastes of rolling waters
which divide Mull from Tiree, can understand the
sinkings of heart (and we may add, of stomach) in
being again and again " carried past."
One of these victims appealed to Lady Victoria
from another point of view. After having been
" carried past " three times, she wrote from the main-
land, giving up the situation, saying it was clearly
not " the wull of God " that she should keep her
engagement.
The year 1899 was one of the last, when she was
fully fit to be " on the go." There were to be ten more
years of activity, but the pace had begun to tell.
The severe illnesses became more frequent, and the
recoveries from them were slower, each leaving her
on a lower plane.
Once, when alone with her brother Lord Archibald,
she said to him that her life would not be a long one.
She was looking particularly well at the time, and he
hoped there was no reason for the foreseeing remark.
He told her so, but her answer was quiet and decisive :
" I have worked too hard to be long-lived."
The diary of one year, with the days of actual
travelling and of occupation, is given as a specimen
of many similar ones.