Lady Burton began her autobiography a fewmonths before she died, but in consequenceof rapidly failing health she made little progress withit. After her death, which occurred in the spring oflast year, it seemed good to her sister and executrix,Mrs. Fitzgerald, to entrust the unfinished manuscriptto me, together with sundry papers and letters, witha view to my compiling the biography. Mrs. Fitzgeraldwished me to undertake this work, as I had thegood fortune to be a friend of the late Lady Burton,and one with whom she frequently discussed literarymatters; we were, in fact, thinking of writing aromance together, but her illness prevented us.

The task of compiling this book has not been aneasy one, mainly for two reasons. In the first place,though Lady Burton published comparatively little,viiishe was a voluminous writer, and she left behindher such a mass of letters and manuscripts that thesorting of them alone was a formidable task. Thedifficulty has been to keep the book within limits.In the second place, Lady Burton has written theLife of her husband; and though in that book shestudiously avoided putting herself forward, and gaveto him all the honour and the glory, her life was soabsolutely bound up with his, that of necessity shecovered some of the ground which I have had to goover again, though not from the same point of view.So much has been written concerning Sir RichardBurton that it is not necessary for me to tell againthe story of his life here, and I have therefore beenable to write wholly of his wife, an equally congenialtask. Lady Burton was as remarkable as a womanas her husband was as a man. Her personality wasas picturesque, her individuality as unique, and,allowing for her sex, her life was as full and variedas his.

It has been my aim, wherever possible, throug

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