During that time four deaths had occurred
among its inmates.
The first to happen was that of the old and highly valued servant
of whom I had occasion to speak when upon the subject of Mr. Hume's
spiritualistic experiences at my house. She had been for many years
a much trusted and beloved servant in the family of Mr. Garrow at
Torquay, and had accompanied them abroad. Her name was Elizabeth
Shinner. Her death was felt by all of us as that of a member of our
family, and she lies in the Protestant cemetery at Florence by the
side of her former master, and of the young mistress whom she had
loved as a child of her own.
The next to go was Mr. Garrow. His death was a very sudden and
unexpected one. He was a robust and apparently perfectly healthy man.
I was absent from home when he died. I had gone with a Cornishman, a
Mr. Trewhella, who was desirous of visiting Mr. Sloane's copper mine,
in the neighbourhood of Volterra, of which I have before spoken. We
had accomplished our visit, and were returning over the Apennine about
six o'clock in the morning in a little _bagherino_, as the country
cart-gigs are called, when we were hailed by a man in a similar
carriage meeting us, whom I recognised as the foreman of a carpenter
we employed. He had been sent to find me, and bring me home with all
speed, in consequence of the sudden illness of Mr. Garrow. As far as
I could learn from him there was little probability of finding my
father-in-law alive.
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