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Henry Yule was the youngest son of Major William Yule, by his first wife, Elizabeth Paterson, and was born at Inveresk, in Midlothian, on 1st May, 1820. He was named after an aunt who, like Miss Ferrier's immortal heroine, owned a man's name.

On his father's side he came of a hardy agricultural stock,[1] improved by a graft from that highly-cultured tree, Rose of Kilravock.[2] Through his mother, a somewhat prosaic person herself, he inherited strains from Huguenot and Highland ancestry. There were recognisable traces of all these elements in Henry Yule, and as was well said by one of his oldest friends: "He was one of those curious racial compounds one finds on the east side of Scotland, in whom the hard Teutonic grit is sweetened by the artistic spirit of the more genial Celt."[3] His father, an officer of the Bengal army (born 1764, died 1839), was a man of cultivated tastes and enlightened mind, a good Persian and Arabic scholar, and possessed of much miscellaneous Oriental learning. During the latter years of his career in India, he served successively as Assistant Resident at the (then independent) courts of Lucknow[4] and Delhi. In the latter office his chief was the noble Ouchterlony. William Yule, together with his younger brother Udny,[5] returned home in 1806. "A recollection of their voyage was that they hailed an outward bound ship, somewhere off the Cape, through the trumpet: 'What news?' Answer: 'The King's mad, and Humfrey's beat Mendoza' (two celebrated prize-fighters and often matched). 'Nothing more?' 'Yes, Bonapart_y_'s made his Mother King of Holland!'

"Before his retirement, William Yule was offered the Lieut.-Governorship of St. Helena. Two of the detailed privileges of the office were residence at Longwood (afterwards the house of Napoleon), and the use of a certain number of the Company's slaves. Major Yule, who was a strong supporter of the anti-slavery cause till its triumph in 1834, often recalled both of these offers with amusement."[6]

William Yule was a man of generous chivalrous nature, who took large views of life, apt to be unfairly stigmatised as Radical in the narrow Tory reaction that prevailed in Scotland during the early years of the 19th century.[7] Devoid of literary ambition, he wrote much for his private pleasure, and his knowledge and library (rich in Persian and Arabic MSS.) were always placed freely at the service of his friends and correspondents, some of whom, such as Major C. Stewart and Mr. William Erskine, were more given to publication than himself. He never travelled without a little 8vo MS. of Hafiz, which often lay under his pillow. Major Yule's only printed work was a lithographed edition of the Apothegms of 'Ali, the son of Abu Talib, in the Arabic, with an old Persian version and an English translation interpolated by himself. "This was privately issued in 1832, when the Duchesse d'Angoulême was living at Edinburgh, and the little work was inscribed to her, with whom an accident of neighbourhood and her kindness to the Major's youngest child had brought him into relations of goodwill."[8]

Henry Yule's childhood was mainly spent at Inveresk. He used to say that his earliest recollection was sitting with the little cousin, who long after became his wife, on the doorstep of her father's house in George Street, Edinburgh (now the Northern Club), listening to the performance of a passing piper. There was another episode which he recalled with humorous satisfaction. Fired by his father's tales of the jungle, Yule (then about six years old) proceeded to improvise an elephant pit in the back garden, only too successfully, for soon, with mingled terror and delight, he saw his uncle John[9] fall headlong into the snare. He lost his mother before he was eight, and almost his only remembrance of her was the circumstance of her having given him a little lantern to light him home on winter nights from his first school. On Sundays it was the Major's custom to lend his children, as a picture-book, a folio Arabic translation of the Four Gospels, printed at Rome in 1591, which contained excellent illustrations from Italian originals.[10] Of the pictures in this volume Yule seems never to have tired. The last page bore a MS. note in Latin to the effect that the volume had been read in the Chaldaean Desert by Georgius Strachanus, Milnensis, Scotus, who long remained unidentified, not to say mythical, in Yule's mind. But George Strachan never passed from his memory, and having ultimately run him to earth, Yule, sixty years later, published the results in an interesting article.[11]

Two or three years after his wife's death, Major Yule removed to Edinburgh, and established himself in Regent's Terrace, on the face of the Calton Hill.[12] This continued to be Yule's home until his father's death, shortly before he went to India. "Here he learned to love the wide scenes of sea and land spread out around that hill—a love he never lost, at home or far away. And long years after, with beautiful Sicilian hills before him and a lovely sea, he writes words of fond recollection of the bleak Fife hills, and the grey Firth of Forth."[13]

Yule now followed his elder brother, Robert, to the famous High School, and in the summer holidays the two made expeditions to the West Highlands, the Lakes of Cumberland, and elsewhere. Major Yule chose his boys to have every reasonable indulgence and advantage, and when the British Association, in 1834, held its first Edinburgh meeting, Henry received a member's ticket. So, too, when the passing of the Reform Bill was celebrated in the same year by a great banquet, at which Lord Grey and other prominent politicians were present, Henry was sent to the dinner, probably the youngest guest there.[14]

At this time the intention was that Henry should go to Cambridge (where his name was, indeed, entered), and after taking his degree study for the Bar. With this view he was, in 1833, sent to Waith, near Ripon, to be coached by the Rev. H. P. Hamilton, author of a well-known treatise, On Conic Sections, and afterwards Dean of Salisbury. At his tutor's hospitable rectory Yule met many notabilities of the day. One of them was Professor Sedgwick.

There was rumoured at this time the discovery of the first known (?) fossil monkey, but its tail was missing. "Depend upon it, Daniel O'Conell's got hold of it!" said 'Adam' briskly.[15] Yule was very happy with Mr. Hamilton and his kind wife, but on his tutor's removal to Cambridge other arrangements became necessary, and in 1835 he was transferred to the care of the Rev. James Challis, rector of Papworth St. Everard, a place which "had little to recommend it except a dulness which made reading almost a necessity."[16] Mr. Challis had at this time two other resident pupils, who both, in most diverse ways, attained distinction in the Church. These were John Mason Neale, the future eminent ecclesiologist and founder of the devoted Anglican Sisterhood of St. Margaret, and Harvey Goodwin, long afterwards the studious and large-minded Bishop of Carlisle. With the latter, Yule remained on terms of cordial friendship to the end of his life. Looking back through more than fifty years to these boyish days, Bishop Goodwin wrote that Yule then "showed much more liking for Greek plays and for German than for mathematics, though he had considerable geometrical ingenuity."[17] On one occasion, having solved a problem that puzzled Goodwin, Yule thus discriminated the attainments of the three pupils: "The difference between you and me is this: You like it and can't do it; I don't like it and can do it. Neale neither likes it nor can do it." Not bad criticism for a boy of fifteen.[18]

On Mr. Challis being appointed Plumerian Professor at Cambridge, in the spring of 1836, Yule had to leave him, owing to want of room at the Observatory, and he became for a time, a most dreary time, he said, a student at University College, London.

By this time Yule had made up his mind that not London and the Law, but India and the Army should be his choice, and accordingly in Feb. 1837 he joined the East India Company's Military College at Addiscombe. From Addiscombe he passed out, in December 1838, at the head of the cadets of his term (taking the prize sword[19]), and having been duly appointed to the Bengal Engineers, proceeded early in 1839 to the Headquarters of the Royal Engineers at Chatham, where, according to custom, he was enrolled as a "local and temporary Ensign." For such was then the invidious designation at Chatham of the young Engineer officers of the Indian army, who ranked as full lieutenants in their own Service, from the time of leaving Addiscombe.[20] Yule once audaciously tackled the formidable Pasley on this very grievance. The venerable Director, after a minute's pondering, replied: "Well, I don't remember what the reason was, but I have no doubt (staccato) it … was … a very … good reason."[21]

"When Yule appeared among us at Chatham in 1839," said his friend Collinson, "he at once took a prominent place in our little Society by his slightly advanced age [he was then 18–½], but more by his strong character. … His earlier education … gave him a better classical knowledge than most of us possessed; then he had the reserve and self-possession characteristic of his race; but though he took small part in the games and other recreations of our time, his knowledge, his native humour, and his good comradeship, and especially his strong sense of right and wrong, made him both admired and respected. … Yule was not a scientific engineer, though he had a good general knowledge of the different branches of his profession; his natural capacity lay rather in varied knowledge, combined with a strong understanding and an excellent memory, and also a peculiar power as a draughtsman, which proved of great value in after life. … Those were nearly the last days of the old régime, of the orthodox double sap and cylindrical pontoons, when Pasley's genius had been leading to new ideas, and when Lintorn Simmons' power, G. Leach's energy, W. Jervois' skill, and R. Tylden's talent were developing under the wise example of Henry Harness."[22]

In the Royal Engineer mess of those days (the present anteroom), the portrait of Henry Yule now faces that of his first chief, Sir Henry Harness. General Collinson said that the pictures appeared to eye each other as if the subjects were continuing one of those friendly disputes in which they so often engaged.[23]

It was in this room that Yule, Becher, Collinson, and other young R.E.'s, profiting by the temporary absence of the austere Colonel Pasley, acted some plays, including Pizarro. Yule bore the humble part of one of the Peruvian Mob in this performance, of which he has left a droll account.[24]

On the completion of his year at Chatham, Yule prepared to sail for India, but first went to take leave of his relative, General White. An accident prolonged his stay, and before he left he had proposed to and been refused by his cousin Annie. This occurrence, his first check, seems to have cast rather a gloom over his start for India. He went by the then newly-opened Overland Route, visiting Portugal, stopping at Gibraltar to see his cousin, Major (afterwards General) Patrick Yule, R.E.[25] He was under orders "to stop at Aden (then recently acquired), to report on the water supply, and to deliver a set of meteorological and magnetic instruments for starting an observatory there. The overland journey then really meant so; tramping across the desert to Suez with camels and Arabs, a proceeding not conducive to the preservation of delicate instruments; and on arriving at Aden he found that the intended observer was dead, the observatory not commenced, and the instruments all broken. There was thus nothing left for him but to go on at once" to Calcutta,[26] where he arrived at the end of 1840.

His first service lay in the then wild Khasia Hills, whither he was detached for the purpose of devising means for the transport of the local coal to the plains. In spite of the depressing character of the climate (Cherrapunjee boasts the highest rainfall on record), Yule thoroughly enjoyed himself, and always looked back with special pleasure on the time he spent here. He was unsuccessful in the object of his mission, the obstacles to cheap transport offered by the dense forests and mighty precipices proving insurmountable, but he gathered a wealth of interesting observations on the country and people, a very primitive Mongolian race, which he subsequently embodied in two excellent and most interesting papers (the first he ever published).[27]

In the following year, 1842, Yule was transferred to the irrigation canals of the north-west with head-quarters at Kurnaul. Here he had for chief Captain (afterwards General Sir William) Baker, who became his dearest and most steadfast friend. Early in 1843 Yule had his first experience of field service. The death without heir of the Khytul Rajah, followed by the refusal of his family to surrender the place to the native troops sent to receive it, obliged Government to send a larger force against it, and the canal officers were ordered to join this. Yule was detailed to serve under Captain Robert Napier (afterwards F.-M. Lord Napier of Magdala). Their immediate duty was to mark out the route for a night march of the troops, barring access to all side roads, and neither officer having then had any experience of war, they performed the duty "with all the elaborate care of novices." Suddenly there was an alarm, a light detected, and a night attack awaited, when the danger resolved itself into Clerk Sahib's khansamah with welcome hot coffee![28] Their hopes were disappointed, there was no fighting, and the Fort of Khytul was found deserted by the enemy. It "was a strange scene of confusion—all the paraphernalia and accumulation of odds and ends of a wealthy native family lying about and inviting loot. I remember one beautiful crutch-stick of ebony with two rams' heads in jade. I took it and sent it in to the political authority, intending to buy it when sold. There was a sale, but my stick never appeared. Somebody had a more developed taste in jade. … Amid the general rummage that was going on, an officer of British Infantry had been put over a part of the palace supposed to contain treasure, and they—officers and all—were helping themselves. Henry Lawrence was one of the politicals under George Clerk. When the news of this affair came to him I was present. It was in a white marble loggia in the palace, where was a white marble chair or throne on a basement. Lawrence was sitting on this throne in great excitement. He wore an Afghan choga, a sort of dressing-gown garment, and this, and his thin locks, and thin beard were streaming in the wind. He always dwells in my memory as a sort of pythoness on her tripod under the afflatus."[29]

During his Indian service, Yule had renewed and continued by letters his suit to Miss White, and persistency prevailing at last, he soon after the conclusion of the Khytul affair applied for leave to go home to be married. He sailed from Bombay in May, 1843, and in September of the same year was married, at Bath, to the gifted and large-hearted woman who, to the end, remained the strongest and happiest influence in his life.[30]

Yule sailed for India with his wife in November 1843. The next two years were employed chiefly in irrigation work, and do not call for special note. They were very happy years, except in the one circumstance that the climate having seriously affected his wife's health, and she having been brought to death's door, partly by illness, but still more by the drastic medical treatment of those days, she was imperatively ordered back to England by the doctors, who forbade her return to India.

Having seen her on board ship, Yule returned to duty on the canals. The close of that year, December, 1845, brought some variety to his work, as the outbreak of the first Sikh War called nearly all the canal officers into the field. "They went up to the front by long marches, passing through no stations, and quite unable to obtain any news of what had occurred, though on the 21st December the guns of Ferozshah were distinctly heard in their camp at Pehoa, at a distance of 115 miles south-east from the field, and some days later they came successively on the fields of Moodkee and of Ferozshah itself, with all the recent traces of battle. When the party of irrigation officers reached head-quarters, the arrangements for attacking the Sikh army in its entrenchments at Sobraon were beginning (though suspended till weeks later for the arrival of the tardy siege guns), and the opposed forces were lying in sight of each other."[31]

Yule's share in this campaign was limited to the sufficiently arduous task of bridging the Sutlej for the advance of the British army. It is characteristic of the man that for this reason he always abstained from wearing his medal for the Sutlej campaign.

His elder brother, Robert Yule, then in the 16th Lancers, took part in that magnificent charge of his regiment at the battle of Aliwal (Jan. 28, 1846) which the Great Duke is said to have pronounced unsurpassed in history. From particulars gleaned from his brother and others present in the action, Henry Yule prepared a spirited sketch of the episode, which was afterwards published as a coloured lithograph by M'Lean (Haymarket).

At the close of the war, Yule succeeded his friend Strachey as Executive Engineer of the northern division of the Ganges Canal, with his head-quarters at Roorkee, "the division which, being nearest the hills and crossed by intermittent torrents of great breadth and great volume when in flood, includes the most important and interesting engineering works."[32]

At Roorkee were the extensive engineering workshops connected with the canal. Yule soon became so accustomed to the din as to be undisturbed by the noise, but the unpunctuality and carelessness of the native workmen sorely tried his patience, of which Nature had endowed him with but a small reserve. Vexed with himself for letting temper so often get the better of him, Yule's conscientious mind devised a characteristic remedy. Each time that he lost his temper, he transferred a fine of two rupees (then about five shillings) from his right to his left pocket. When about to leave Roorkee, he devoted this accumulation of self-imposed fines to the erection of a sun-dial, to teach the natives the value of time. The late Sir James Caird, who told this legend of Roorkee as he heard it there in 1880, used to add, with a humorous twinkle of his kindly eyes, "It was a very handsome dial."[33]

From September, 1845, to March, 1847, Yule was much occupied intermittently, in addition to his professional work, by service on a Committee appointed by Government "to investigate the causes of the unhealthiness which has existed at Kurnal, and other portions of the country along the line of the Delhi Canal," and further, to report "whether an injurious effect on the health of the people of the Doab is, or is not, likely to be produced by the contemplated Ganges Canal."

"A very elaborate investigation was made by the Committee, directed principally to ascertaining what relation subsisted between certain physical conditions of the different districts, and the liability of their inhabitants to miasmatic fevers." The principal conclusion of the Committee was, "that in the extensive epidemic of 1843, when Kurnaul suffered so seriously … the greater part of the evils observed had not been the necessary and unavoidable results of canal irrigation, but were due to interference with the natural drainage of the country, to the saturation of stiff and retentive soils, and to natural disadvantages of site, enhanced by excess of moisture. As regarded the Ganges Canal, they were of opinion that, with due attention to drainage, improvement rather than injury to the general health might be expected to follow the introduction of canal irrigation."[34] In an unpublished note written about 1889, Yule records his ultimate opinion as follows: "At this day, and after the large experience afforded by the Ganges Canal, I feel sure that a verdict so favourable to the sanitary results of canal irrigation would not be given." Still the fact remains that the Ganges Canal has been the source of unspeakable blessings to an immense population.

The Second Sikh War saw Yule again with the army in the field, and on 13th Jan. 1849, he was present at the dismal 'Victory' of Chillianwallah, of which his most vivid recollection seemed to be the sudden apparition of Henry Lawrence, fresh from London, but still clad in the legendary Afghan cloak.

On the conclusion of the Punjab campaign, Yule, whose health had suffered, took furlough and went home to his wife. For the next three years they resided chiefly in Scotland, though paying occasional visits to the Continent, and about 1850 Yule bought a house in Edinburgh. There he wrote "The African Squadron vindicated" (a pamphlet which was afterwards re-published in French), translated Schiller's Kampf mit dem Drachen into English verse, delivered Lectures on Fortification at the, now long defunct, Scottish Naval and Military Academy, wrote on Tibet for his friend Blackwood's Magazine, attended the 1850 Edinburgh Meeting of the British Association, wrote his excellent lines, "On the Loss of the Birkenhead," and commenced his first serious study of Marco Polo (by whose wondrous tale, however, he had already been captivated as a boy in his father's library—in Marsden's edition probably). But the most noteworthy literary result of these happy years was that really fascinating volume, entitled Fortification for Officers of the Army and Students of Military History, a work that has remained unique of its kind. This was published by Blackwood in 1851, and seven years later received the honour of (unauthorised) translation into French. Yule also occupied himself a good deal at this time with the practice of photography, a pursuit to which he never after reverted.

In the spring of 1852, Yule made an interesting little semi-professional tour in company with a brother officer, his accomplished friend, Major R. B. Smith. Beginning with Kelso, "the only one of the Teviotdale Abbeys which I had not as yet seen," they made their way leisurely through the north of England, examining with impartial care abbeys and cathedrals, factories, brick-yards, foundries, timber-yards, docks, and railway works. On this occasion Yule, contrary to his custom, kept a journal, and a few excerpts may be given here, as affording some notion of his casual talk to those who did not know him.

At Berwick-on-Tweed he notes the old ramparts of the town: "These, erected in Elizabeth's time, are interesting as being, I believe, the only existing sample in England of the bastioned system of the 16th century. … The outline of the works seems perfect enough, though both earth and stone work are in great disrepair. The bastions are large with obtuse angles, square orillons, and double flanks originally casemated, and most of them crowned with cavaliers." On the way to Durham, "much amused by the discussions of two passengers, one a smooth-spoken, semi-clerical looking person; the other a brusque well-to-do attorney with a Northumbrian burr. Subject, among others, Protection. The Attorney all for 'cheap bread'—'You wouldn't rob the poor man of his loaf,' and so forth. 'You must go with the stgheam, sir, you must go with the stgheam.' 'I never did, Mr. Thompson, and I never will,' said the other in an oily manner, singularly inconsistent with the sentiment." At Durham they dined with a dignitary of the Church, and Yule was roasted by being placed with his back to an enormous fire. "Coals are cheap at Durham," he notes feelingly, adding, "The party we found as heavy as any Edinburgh one. Smith, indeed, evidently has had little experience of really stupid Edinburgh parties, for he had never met with anything approaching to this before." (Happy Smith!) But thanks to the kindness and hospitality of the astronomer, Mr. Chevalier, and his gifted daughter, they had a delightful visit to beautiful Durham, and came away full of admiration for the (then newly established) University, and its grand locale. They went on to stay with an uncle by marriage of Yule's, in Yorkshire. At dinner he was asked by his host to explain Foucault's pendulum experiment. "I endeavoured to explain it somewhat, I hope, to the satisfaction of his doubts, but not at all to that of Mr. G. M., who most resolutely declined to take in any elucidation, coming at last to the conclusion that he entirely differed with me as to what North meant, and that it was useless to argue until we could agree about that!" They went next to Leeds, to visit Kirkstall Abbey, "a mediaeval fossil, curiously embedded among the squalid brickwork and chimney stalks of a manufacturing suburb. Having established ourselves at the hotel, we went to deliver a letter to Mr. Hope, the official assignee, a very handsome, aristocratic-looking gentleman, who seemed as much out of place at Leeds as the Abbey." At Leeds they visited the flax mills of Messrs. Marshall, "a firm noted for the conscientious care they take of their workpeople. … We mounted on the roof of the building, which is covered with grass, and formerly was actually grazed by a few sheep, until the repeated inconvenience of their tumbling through the glass domes put a stop to this." They next visited some tile and brickworks on land belonging to a friend. "The owner of the tile works, a well-to-do burgher, and the apparent model of a West Riding Radical, received us in rather a dubious way: 'There are a many people has come and brought introductions, and looked at all my works, and then gone and set up for themselves close by. Now des you mean to say that you be really come all the way from Beng_u_l?' 'Yes, indeed we have, and we are going all the way back again, though we didn't exactly come from there to look at your brickworks.' 'Then you're not in the brick-making line, are you?' 'Why we've had a good deal to do with making bricks, and may have again; but we'll engage that if we set up for ourselves, it shall be ten thousand miles from you.' This seemed in some degree to set his mind at rest. … "

"A dismal day, with occasional showers, prevented our seeing Sheffield to advantage. On the whole, however, it is more cheerful and has more of a country-town look than Leeds—a place utterly without beauty of aspect. At Leeds you have vast barrack-like factories, with their usual suburbs of squalid rows of brick cottages, and everywhere the tall spiracles of the steam, which seems the pervading power of the place. Everything there is machinery—the machine is the intelligent agent, it would seem, the man its slave, standing by to tend it and pick up a broken thread now and then. At Sheffield … you might go through most of the streets without knowing anything of the kind was going on. And steam here, instead of being a ruler, is a drudge, turning a grindstone or rolling out a bar of steel, but all the accuracy and skill of hand is the Man's. And consequently there was, we thought, a healthier aspect about the men engaged. None of the Rodgers remain who founded the firm in my father's time. I saw some pairs of his scissors in the show-room still kept under the name of Persian scissors."[35]

From Sheffield Yule and his friend proceeded to Boston, "where there is the most exquisite church tower I have ever seen," and thence to Lincoln, Peterborough, and Ely, ending their tour at Cambridge, where Yule spent a few delightful days.

In the autumn the great Duke of Wellington died, and Yule witnessed the historic pageant of his funeral. His furlough was now nearly expired, and early in December he again embarked for India, leaving his wife and only child, of a few weeks old, behind him. Some verses dated "Christmas Day near the Equator," show how much he felt the separation.

Shortly after his return to Bengal, Yule received orders to proceed to Aracan, and to examine and report upon the passes between Aracan and Burma, as also to improve communications and select suitable sites for fortified posts to hold the same. These orders came to Yule quite unexpectedly late one Saturday evening, but he completed all preparations and started at daybreak on the following Monday, 24th Jan. 1853.

From Calcutta to Khyook Phyoo, Yule proceeded by steamer, and thence up the river in the Tickler gunboat to Krenggyuen. "Our course lay through a wilderness of wooded islands (50 to 200 feet high) and bays, sailing when we could, anchoring when neither wind nor tide served … slow progress up the river. More and more like the creeks and lagoons of the Niger or a Guiana river rather than anything I looked for in India. The densest tree jungle covers the shore down into the water. For miles no sign of human habitation, but now and then at rare intervals one sees a patch of hillside rudely cleared, with the bare stems of the burnt trees still standing. … Sometimes, too, a dark tunnel-like creek runs back beneath the thick vault of jungle, and from it silently steals out a slim canoe, manned by two or three wild-looking Mugs or Kyens (people of the Hills), driving it rapidly along with their short paddles held vertically, exactly like those of the Red men on the American rivers."

At the military post of Bokhyong, near Krenggyuen, he notes (5th Feb.) that "Captain Munro, the adjutant, can scarcely believe that I was present at the Duke of Wellington's funeral, of which he read but a few days ago in the newspapers, and here am I, one of the spectators, a guest in this wild spot among the mountains—2–½ months since I left England."

Yule's journal of his arduous wanderings in these border wilds is full of interest, but want of space forbids further quotation. From a note on the fly-leaf it appears that from the time of quitting the gun-boat at Krenggyuen to his arrival at Toungoop he covered about 240 miles on foot, and that under immense difficulties, even as to food. He commemorated his tribulations in some cheery humorous verse, but ultimately fell seriously ill of the local fever, aided doubtless by previous exposure and privation. His servants successively fell ill, some died and others had to be sent back, food supplies failed, and the route through those dense forests was uncertain; yet under all difficulties he seems never to have grumbled or lost heart. And when things were nearly at the worst, Yule restored the spirits of his local escort by improvising a wappenshaw, with a Sheffield gardener's knife, which he happened to have with him, for prize! When at last Yule emerged from the wilds and on 25th March marched into Prome, he was taken for his own ghost! "Found Fraser (of the Engineers) in a rambling phoongyee house, just under the great gilt pagoda. I went up to him announcing myself, and his astonishment was so great that he would scarcely shake hands!" It was on this occasion at Prome that Yule first met his future chief Captain Phayre—"a very young-looking man—very cordial," a description no less applicable to General Sir Arthur Phayre at the age of seventy!

After some further wanderings, Yule embarked at Sandong, and returned by water, touching at Kyook Phyoo and Akyab, to Calcutta, which he reached on 1st May—his birthday.

The next four months were spent in hard work at Calcutta. In August, Yule received orders to proceed to Singapore, and embarked on the 29th. His duty was to report on the defences of the Straits Settlements, with a view to their improvement. Yule's recommendations were sanctioned by Government, but his journal bears witness to the prevalence then, as since, of the penny-wise-pound-foolish system in our administration. On all sides he was met by difficulties in obtaining sites for batteries, etc., for which heavy compensation was demanded, when by the exercise of reasonable foresight, the same might have been secured earlier at a nominal price.

Yule's journal contains a very bright and pleasing picture of Singapore, where he found that the majority of the European population "were evidently, from their tongues, from benorth the Tweed, a circumstance which seems to be true of four-fifths of the Singaporeans. Indeed, if I taught geography, I should be inclined to class Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, and Singapore together as the four chief towns of Scotland."

Work on the defences kept Yule in Singapore and its neighbourhood until the end of November, when he embarked for Bengal. On his return to Calcutta, Yule was appointed Deputy Consulting Engineer for Railways at Head-quarters. In this post he had for chief his old friend Baker, who had in 1851 been appointed by the Governor-General, Lord Dalhousie, Consulting Engineer for Railways to Government. The office owed its existence to the recently initiated great experiment of railway construction under Government guarantee.

The subject was new to Yule, "and therefore called for hard and anxious labour. He, however, turned his strong sense and unbiased view to the general question of railway communication in India, with the result that he became a vigorous supporter of the idea of narrow gauge and cheap lines in the parts of that country outside of the main trunk lines of traffic."[36]

The influence of Yule, and that of his intimate friends and ultimate successors in office, Colonels R. Strachey and Dickens, led to the adoption of the narrow (metre) gauge over a great part of India. Of this matter more will be said further on; it is sufficient at this stage to note that it was occupying Yule's thoughts, and that he had already taken up the position in this question that he thereafter maintained through life. The office of Consulting Engineer to Government for Railways ultimately developed into the great Department of Public Works.

As related by Yule, whilst Baker "held this appointment, Lord Dalhousie was in the habit of making use of his advice in a great variety of matters connected with Public Works projects and questions, but which had nothing to do with guaranteed railways, there being at that time no officer attached to the Government of India, whose proper duty it was to deal with such questions. In August, 1854, the Government of India sent home to the Court of Directors a despatch and a series of minutes by the Governor-General and his Council, in which the constitution of the Public Works Department as a separate branch of administration, both in the local governments and the government of India itself, was urged on a detailed plan."

In this communication Lord Dalhousie stated his desire to appoint Major Baker to the projected office of Secretary for the Department of Public Works. In the spring of 1855 these recommendations were carried out by the creation of the Department, with Baker as Secretary and Yule as Under Secretary for Public Works.

Meanwhile Yule's services were called to a very different field, but without his vacating his new appointment, which he was allowed to retain. Not long after the conclusion of the second Burmese War, the King of Burma sent a friendly mission to the Governor-General, and in 1855 a return Embassy was despatched to the Court of Ava, under Colonel Arthur Phayre, with Henry Yule as Secretary, an appointment the latter owed as much to Lord Dalhousie's personal wish as to Phayre's good-will. The result of this employment was Yule's first geographical book, a large volume entitled Mission to the Court of Ava in 1855, originally printed in India, but subsequently re-issued in an embellished form at home (see over leaf). To the end of his life, Yule looked back to this "social progress up the Irawady, with its many quaint and pleasant memories, as to a bright and joyous holiday."[37] It was a delight to him to work under Phayre, whose noble and lovable character he had already learned to appreciate two years before in Pegu. Then, too, Yule has spoken of the intense relief it was to escape from the monotonous scenery and depressing conditions of official life in Bengal (Resort to Simla was the exception, not the rule, in these days!) to the cheerfulness and unconstraint of Burma, with its fine landscapes and merry-hearted population. "It was such a relief to find natives who would laugh at a joke," he once remarked in the writer's presence to the lamented E. C. Baber, who replied that he had experienced exactly the same sense of relief in passing from India to China.

Yule's work on Burma was largely illustrated by his own sketches. One of these represents the King's reception of the Embassy, and another, the King on his throne. The originals were executed by Yule's ready pencil, surreptitiously within his cocked hat, during the audience.

From the latter sketch Yule had a small oil-painting executed under his direction by a German artist, then resident in Calcutta, which he gave to Lord Dalhousie.[38]

The Government of India marked their approval of the Embassy by an unusual concession. Each of the members of the mission received a souvenir of the expedition. To Yule was given a very beautiful and elaborately chased small bowl, of nearly pure gold, bearing the signs of the Zodiac in relief.[39]

On his return to Calcutta, Yule threw himself heart and soul into the work of his new appointment in the Public Works Department. The nature of his work, the novelty and variety of the projects and problems with which this new branch of the service had to deal, brought Yule into constant, and eventually very intimate association with Lord Dalhousie, whom he accompanied on some of his tours of inspection. The two men thoroughly appreciated each other, and, from first to last, Yule experienced the greatest kindness from Lord Dalhousie. In this intimacy, no doubt the fact of being what French soldiers call pays added something to the warmth of their mutual regard: their forefathers came from the same airt, and neither was unmindful of the circumstance. It is much to be regretted that Yule preserved no sketch of Lord Dalhousie, nor written record of his intercourse with him, but the following lines show some part of what he thought:

"At this time [1849] there appears upon the scene that vigorous and masterful spirit, whose arrival to take up the government of India had been greeted by events so inauspicious. No doubt from the beginning the Governor-General was desirous to let it be understood that although new to India he was, and meant to be, master; … Lord Dalhousie was by no means averse to frank dissent, provided in the manner it was never forgotten that he was Governor-General. Like his great predecessor Lord Wellesley, he was jealous of all familiarity and resented it. … The general sentiment of those who worked under that [Greek: ánax andron] was one of strong and admiring affection … and we doubt if a Governor-General ever embarked on the Hoogly amid deeper feeling than attended him who, shattered by sorrow and physical suffering, but erect and undaunted, quitted Calcutta on the 6th March 1856."[40]

His successor was Lord Canning, whose confidence in Yule and personal regard for him became as marked as his predecessor's.

In the autumn of 1856, Yule took leave and came home. Much of his time while in England was occupied with making arrangements for the production of an improved edition of his book on Burma, which so far had been a mere government report. These were completed to his satisfaction, and on the eve of returning to India, he wrote to his publishers[41] that the correction of the proof sheets and general supervision of the publication had been undertaken by his friend the Rev. W. D. Maclagan, formerly an officer of the Madras army (and now Archbishop of York).

Whilst in England, Yule had renewed his intimacy with his old friend Colonel Robert Napier, then also on furlough, a visitor whose kindly sympathetic presence always brought special pleasure also to Yule's wife and child. One result of this intercourse was that the friends decided to return together to India. Accordingly they sailed from Marseilles towards the end of April, and at Aden were met by the astounding news of the outbreak of the Mutiny.

On his arrival in Calcutta Yule, who retained his appointment of Under Secretary to Government, found his work indefinitely increased. Every available officer was called into the field, and Yule's principal centre of activity was shifted to the great fortress of Allahabad, forming the principal base of operations against the rebels. Not only had he to strengthen or create defences at Allahabad and elsewhere, but on Yule devolved the principal burden of improvising accommodation for the European troops then pouring into India, which ultimately meant providing for an army of 100,000 men. His task was made the more difficult by the long-standing chronic friction, then and long after, existing between the officers of the Queen's and the Company's services. But in a far more important matter he was always fortunate. As he subsequently recorded in a Note for Government: "Through all consciousness of mistakes and shortcomings, I have felt that I had the confidence of those whom I served, a feeling which has lightened many a weight."

It was at Allahabad that Yule, in the intervals of more serious work, put the last touches to his Burma book. The preface of the English edition is dated, "Fortress of Allahabad, Oct. 3, 1857," and contains a passage instinct with the emotions of the time. After recalling the "joyous holiday" on the Irawady, he goes on: "But for ourselves, standing here on the margin of these rivers, which a few weeks ago were red with the blood of our murdered brothers and sisters, and straining the ear to catch the echo of our avenging artillery, it is difficult to turn the mind to what seem dreams of past days of peace and security; and memory itself grows dim in the attempt to repass the gulf which the last few months has interposed between the present and the time to which this narrative refers."[42]

When he wrote these lines, the first relief had just taken place, and the second defence of Lucknow was beginning. The end of the month saw Sir Colin Campbell's advance to the second—the real—relief of Lucknow. Of Sir Colin, Yule wrote and spoke with warm regard: "Sir Colin was delightful, and when in a good humour and at his best, always reminded me very much, both in manner and talk, of the General (i.e. General White, his wife's father). The voice was just the same and the quiet gentle manner, with its underlying keen dry humour. But then if you did happen to offend Sir Colin, it was like treading on crackers, which was not our General's way."

When Lucknow had been relieved, besieged, reduced, and finally remodelled by the grand Roads and Demolitions Scheme of his friend Napier, the latter came down to Allahabad, and he and Yule sought diversion in playing quoits and skittles, the only occasion on which either of them is known to have evinced any liking for games.

Before this time Yule had succeeded his friend Baker as de facto Secretary to Government for Public Works, and on Baker's retirement in 1858, Yule was formally appointed his successor.[43] Baker and Yule had, throughout their association, worked in perfect unison, and the very differences in their characters enhanced the value of their co-operation; the special qualities of each friend mutually strengthened and completed each other. Yule's was by far the more original and creative mind, Baker's the more precise and, at least in a professional sense, the more highly-trained organ. In chivalrous sense of honour, devotion to duty, and natural generosity, the men stood equal; but while Yule was by nature impatient and irritable, and liable, until long past middle age, to occasional sudden bursts of uncontrollable anger, generally followed by periods of black depression and almost absolute silence,[44] Baker was the very reverse. Partly by natural temperament, but also certainly by severe self-discipline, his manner was invincibly placid and his temper imperturbable.[45] Yet none was more tenacious in maintaining whatever he judged right.

Baker, whilst large-minded in great matters, was extremely conventional in small ones, and Yule must sometimes have tried his feelings in this respect. The particulars of one such tragic occurrence have survived. Yule, who was colour-blind,[46] and in early life whimsically obstinate in maintaining his own view of colours, had selected some cloth for trousers undeterred by his tailor's timid remonstrance of "Not quite your usual taste, sir." The result was that the Under-Secretary to Government startled official Calcutta by appearing in brilliant claret-coloured raiment. Baker remonstrated: "Claret-colour! Nonsense, my trousers are silver grey," said Yule, and entirely declined to be convinced. "I think I did convince him at last," said Baker with some pride, when long after telling the story to the present writer. "And then he gave them up?" "Oh, no," said Sir William ruefully, "he wore those claret-coloured trousers to the very end." That episode probably belonged to the Dalhousie period.

When Yule resumed work in the Secretariat at Calcutta at the close of the Mutiny, the inevitable arrears of work were enormous. This may be the proper place to notice more fully his action with respect to the choice of gauge for Indian railways already adverted to in brief. As we have seen, his own convictions led to the adoption of the metre gauge over a great part of India. This policy had great disadvantages not at first foreseen, and has since been greatly modified. In justice to Yule, however, it should be remembered that the conditions and requirements of India have largely altered, alike through the extraordinary growth of the Indian export, especially the grain, trade, and the development of new necessities for Imperial defence. These new features, however, did but accentuate defects inherent in the system, but which only prolonged practical experience made fully apparent.

At the outset the supporters of the narrow gauge seemed to have the stronger position, as they were able to show that the cost was much less, the rails employed being only about ⅔rds the weight of those required by the broad gauge, and many other subsidiary expenses also proportionally less. On the other hand, as time passed and practical experience was gained, its opponents were able to make an even stronger case against the narrow gauge. The initial expenses were undoubtedly less, but the durability was also less. Thus much of the original saving was lost in the greater cost of maintenance, whilst the small carrying capacity of the rolling stock and loss of time and labour in shifting goods at every break of gauge, were further serious causes of waste, which the internal commercial development of India daily made more apparent. Strategic needs also were clamant against the dangers of the narrow gauge in any general scheme of Indian defence. Yule's connection with the Public Works Department had long ceased ere the question of the gauges reached its most acute stage, but his interest and indirect participation in the conflict survived. In this matter a certain parental tenderness for a scheme which he had helped to originate, combined with his warm friendship for some of the principal supporters of the narrow gauge, seem to have influenced his views more than he himself was aware. Certainly his judgment in this matter was not impartial, although, as always in his case, it was absolutely sincere and not consciously biased.

In reference to Yule's services in the period following the Mutiny, Lord Canning's subsequent Minute of 1862 may here be fitly quoted. In this the Governor-General writes: "I have long ago recorded my opinion of the value of his services in 1858 and 1859, when with a crippled and overtaxed staff of Engineer officers, many of them young and inexperienced, the G.-G. had to provide rapidly for the accommodation of a vast English army, often in districts hitherto little known, and in which the authority of the Government was barely established, and always under circumstances of difficulty and urgency. I desire to repeat that the Queen's army in India was then greatly indebted to Lieut.-Colonel Yule's judgment, earnestness, and ability; and this to an extent very imperfectly understood by many of the officers who held commands in that army.

"Of the manner in which the more usual duties of his office have been discharged it is unnecessary for me to speak. It is, I believe, known and appreciated as well by the Home Government as by the Governor-General in Council."

In the spring of 1859 Yule felt the urgent need of a rest, and took the, at that time, most unusual step of coming home on three months' leave, which as the voyage then occupied a month each way, left him only one month at home. He was accompanied by his elder brother George, who had not been out of India for thirty years. The visit home of the two brothers was as bright and pleasant as it was brief, but does not call for further notice.

In 1860, Yule's health having again suffered, he took short leave to Java. His journal of this tour is very interesting, but space does not admit of quotation here. He embodied some of the results of his observations in a lecture he delivered on his return to Calcutta.

During these latter years of his service in India, Yule owed much happiness to the appreciative friendship of Lord Canning and the ready sympathy of Lady Canning. If he shared their tours in an official capacity, the intercourse was much more than official. The noble character of Lady Canning won from Yule such wholehearted chivalrous devotion as, probably, he felt for no other friend save, perhaps in after days, Sir Bartle Frere. And when her health failed, it was to Yule's special care that Lord Canning entrusted his wife during a tour in the Hills. Lady Canning was known to be very homesick, and one day as the party came in sight of some ilexes (the evergreen oak), Yule sought to cheer her by calling out pleasantly: "Look, Lady Canning! There are oaks!" "No, no, Yule, not oaks," cried Sir C. B. "They are (solemnly) IBEXES." "No, not Ibexes, Sir C., you mean SILEXES," cried Capt. ——, the A.D.C.; Lady Canning and Yule the while almost choking with laughter.

On another and later occasion, when the Governor-General's camp was peculiarly dull and stagnant, every one yawning and grumbling, Yule effected a temporary diversion by pretending to tap the telegraph wires, and circulating through camp, what purported to be, the usual telegraphic abstract of news brought to Bombay by the latest English mail. The news was of the most astounding character, with just enough air of probability, in minor details, to pass muster with a dull reader. The effect was all he could wish—or rather more—and there was a general flutter in the camp. Of course the Governor-General and one or two others were in the secret, and mightily relished the diversion. But this pleasant and cheering intercourse was drawing to its mournful close. On her way back from Darjeeling, in November, 1861, Lady Canning (not then in Yule's care) was unavoidably exposed to the malaria of a specially unhealthy season. A few days' illness followed, and on 18th November, 1861, she passed calmly to

"That remaining rest where night and tears are o'er."[47]

It was to Yule that Lord Canning turned in the first anguish of his loss, and on this faithful friend devolved the sad privilege of preparing her last resting-place. This may be told in the touching words of Lord Canning's letter to his only sister, written on the day of Lady Canning's burial, in the private garden at Barrackpoor[48]:—

"The funeral is over, and my own darling lies buried in a spot which I am sure she would have chosen of all others. … From the grave can be seen the embanked walk leading from the house to the river's edge, which she made as a landing-place three years ago, and from within 3 or 4 paces of the grave there is a glimpse of the terrace-garden and its balustrades, which she made near the house, and of the part of the grounds with which she most occupied herself. … I left Calcutta yesterday … and on arriving here, went to look at the precise spot chosen for the grave. I could see by the clear full moon … that it was exactly right. Yule was there superintending the workmen, and before daylight this morning a solid masonry vault had been completely finished.

"Bowie [Military Secretary] and Yule have done all this for me. It has all been settled since my poor darling died. She liked Yule. They used to discuss together her projects of improvement for this place, architecture, gardening, the Cawnpore monument, etc., and they generally agreed. He knew her tastes well. … "

The coffin, brought on a gun-carriage from Calcutta, "was carried by twelve soldiers of the 6th Regiment (Queen's), the A.D.C.'s bearing the pall. There were no hired men or ordinary funeral attendants of any kind at any part of the ceremony, and no lookers-on. … Yule was the only person not of the household staff. Had others who had asked" to attend "been allowed to do so, the numbers would have been far too large.

"On coming near the end of the terrace walk I saw that the turf between the walk and the grave, and for several yards all round the grave, was strewed thick with palm branches and bright fresh-gathered flowers—quite a thick carpet. It was a little matter, but so exactly what she would have thought of."[49]

And, therefore, Yule thought of this for her! He also recorded the scene two days later in some graceful and touching lines, privately printed, from which the following may be quoted:

"When night lowered black, and the circling shroud Of storm rolled near, and stout hearts learned dismay; Not Hers! To her tried Lord a Light and Stay Even in the Earthquake and the palpable cloud Of those dark months; and when a fickle crowd Panted for blood and pelted wrath and scorn On him she loved, her courage never stooped: But when the clouds were driven, and the day Poured Hope and glorious Sunshine, she who had borne, The night with such strong Heart, withered and drooped, Our queenly lily, and smiling passed away. Now! let no fouling touch profane her clay, Nor odious pomps and funeral tinsels mar Our grief. But from our England's cannon car Let England's soldiers bear her to the tomb Prepared by loving hands. Before her bier Scatter victorious palms; let Rose's bloom Carpet its passage. … "

Yule's deep sympathy in this time of sorrow strengthened the friendship Lord Canning had long felt for him, and when the time approached for the Governor-General to vacate his high office, he invited Yule, who was very weary of India, to accompany him home, where his influence would secure Yule congenial employment. Yule's weariness of India at this time was extreme. Moreover, after serving under such leaders as Lord Dalhousie and Lord Canning, and winning their full confidence and friendship, it was almost repugnant to him to begin afresh with new men and probably new measures, with which he might not be in accord. Indeed, some little clouds were already visible on the horizon. In these circumstances, it is not surprising that Yule, under an impulse of lassitude and impatience, when accepting Lord Canning's offer, also 'burnt his boats' by sending in his resignation of the service. This decision Yule took against the earnest advice of his anxious and devoted wife, and for a time the results justified all her misgivings. She knew well, from past experience, how soon Yule wearied in the absence of compulsory employment. And in the event of the life in England not suiting him, for even Lord Canning's good-will might not secure perfectly congenial employment for his talents, she knew well that his health and spirits would be seriously affected. She, therefore, with affectionate solicitude, urged that he should adopt the course previously followed by his friend Baker, that is, come home on furlough, and only send in his resignation after he saw clearly what his prospects of home employment were, and what he himself wished in the matter.

Lord Canning and Yule left Calcutta late in March, 1862; at Malta they parted never to meet again in this world. Lord Canning proceeded to England, and Yule joined his wife and child in Rome. Only a few weeks later, at Florence, came as a thunderclap the announcement of Lord Canning's unexpected death in London, on 17th June. Well does the present writer remember the day that fatal news came, and Yule's deep anguish, not assuredly for the loss of his prospects, but for the loss of a most noble and magnanimous friend, a statesman whose true greatness was, both then and since, most imperfectly realised by the country for which he had worn himself out.[50] Shortly after Yule went to England,[51] where he was cordially received by Lord Canning's representatives, who gave him a touching remembrance of his lost friend, in the shape of the silver travelling candlesticks, which had habitually stood on Lord Canning's writing-table.[52] But his offer to write Lord Canning's Life had no result, as the relatives, following the then recent example of the Hastings family, in the case of another great Governor-General, refused to revive discussion by the publication of any Memoir.

Nor did Yule find any suitable opening for employment in England, so after two or three months spent in visiting old friends, he rejoined his family in the Black Forest, where he sought occupation in renewing his knowledge of German. But it must be confessed that his mood both then and for long after was neither happy nor wholesome. The winter of 1862 was spent somewhat listlessly, partly in Germany and partly at the Hôtel des Bergues, Geneva, where his old acquaintance Colonel Tronchin was hospitably ready to open all doors. The picturesque figure of John Ruskin also flits across the scene at this time. But Yule was unoccupied and restless, and could neither enjoy Mr. Ruskin's criticism of his sketches nor the kindly hospitality of his Genevan hosts. Early in 1863 he made another fruitless visit to London, where he remained four or five months, but found no opening. Though unproductive of work, this year brought Yule official recognition of his services in the shape of the C.B., for which Lord Canning had long before recommended him.[53]

On rejoining his wife and child at Mornex in Savoy, Yule found the health of the former seriously impaired. During his absence, the kind and able English Doctor at Geneva had felt obliged to inform Mrs. Yule that she was suffering from disease of the heart, and that her life might end suddenly at any moment. Unwilling to add to Yule's anxieties, she made all necessary arrangements, but did not communicate this intelligence until he had done all he wished and returned, when she broke it to him very gently. Up to this year Mrs. Yule, though not strong and often ailing, had not allowed herself to be considered an invalid, but from this date doctor's orders left her no choice in the matter.[54]

About this time, Yule took in hand the first of his studies of mediaeval travellers. His translation of the Travels of Friar Jordanus was probably commenced earlier; it was completed during the leisurely journey by carriage between Chambéry and Turin, and the Dedication to Sir Bartle Frere written during a brief halt at Genoa, from which place it is dated. Travelling slowly and pleasantly by vetturino along the Riviera di Levante, the family came to Spezzia, then little more than a quiet village. A chance encounter with agreeable residents disposed Yule favourably towards the place, and a few days later he opened negotiations for land to build a house! Most fortunately for himself and all concerned these fell through, and the family continued their journey to Tuscany, and settled for the winter in a long rambling house, with pleasant garden, at Pisa, where Yule was able to continue with advantage his researches into mediaeval travel in the East. He paid frequent visits to Florence, where he had many pleasant acquaintances, not least among them Charles Lever ("Harry Lorrequer"), with whom acquaintance ripened into warm and enduring friendship. At Florence he also made the acquaintance of the celebrated Marchese Gino Capponi, and of many other Italian men of letters. To this winter of 1863–64 belongs also the commencement of a lasting friendship with the illustrious Italian historian, Villari, at that time holding an appointment at Pisa. Another agreeable acquaintance, though less intimate, was formed with John Ball, the well-known President of the Alpine Club, then resident at Pisa, and with many others, among whom the name of a very cultivated German scholar, H. Meyer, specially recurs to memory.

In the spring of 1864, Yule took a spacious and delightful old villa, situated in the highest part of the Bagni di Lucca,[55] and commanding lovely views over the surrounding chestnut-clad hills and winding river.

Here he wrote much of what ultimately took form in Cathay, and the Way Thither. It was this summer, too, that Yule commenced his investigations among the Venetian archives, and also visited the province of Friuli in pursuit of materials for the history of one of his old travellers, the Beato Odorico. At Verona—then still Austrian—he had the amusing experience of being arrested for sketching too near the fortifications. However, his captors had all the usual Austrian bonhomie and courtesy, and Yule experienced no real inconvenience. He was much more disturbed when, a day or two later, the old mother of one of his Venetian acquaintances insisted on embracing him on account of his supposed likeness to Garibaldi!

As winter approached, a warmer climate became necessary for Mrs. Yule, and the family proceeded to Sicily, landing at Messina in October, 1864. From this point, Yule made a very interesting excursion to the then little known group of the Lipari Islands, in the company of that eminent geologist, the late Robert Mallet, F.R.S., a most agreeable companion.

On Martinmas Day, the Yules reached the beautiful capital of Sicily, Palermo, which, though they knew it not, was to be their home—a very happy one—for nearly eleven years.

During the ensuing winter and spring, Yule continued the preparation of Cathay, but his appetite for work not being satisfied by this, he, when in London in 1865, volunteered to make an Index to the third decade of the Journal of the Royal Geographical Society, in exchange for a set of such volumes as he did not possess. That was long before any Index Society existed; but Yule had special and very strong views of his own as to what an Index should be, and he spared no labour to realise his ideal.[56] This proved a heavier task than he had anticipated, and he got very weary before the Index was completed.

In the spring of 1866, Cathay and the Way Thither appeared, and at once took the high place which it has ever since retained. In the autumn of the same year Yule's attention was momentarily turned in a very different direction by a local insurrection, followed by severe reprisals, and the bombardment of Palermo by the Italian Fleet. His sick wife was for some time under rifle as well as shell fire; but cheerfully remarking that "every bullet has its billet," she remained perfectly serene and undisturbed. It was the year of the last war with Austria, and also of the suppression of the Monastic Orders in Sicily; two events which probably helped to produce the outbreak, of which Yule contributed an account to The Times, and subsequently a more detailed one to the Quarterly Review.[57]

Yule had no more predilection for the Monastic Orders than most of his countrymen, but his sense of justice was shocked by the cruel incidence of the measure in many cases, and also by the harshness with which both it and the punishment of suspected insurgents was carried out. Cholera was prevalent in Italy that year, but Sicily, which had maintained stringent quarantine, entirely escaped until large bodies of troops were landed to quell the insurrection, when a devastating epidemic immediately ensued, and re-appeared in 1867. In after years, when serving on the Army Sanitary Committee at the India Office, Yule more than once quoted this experience as indicating that quarantine restrictions may, in some cases, have more value than British medical authority is usually willing to admit.

In 1867, on his return from London, Yule commenced systematic work on his long projected new edition of the Travels of Marco Polo. It was apparently in this year that the scheme first took definite form, but it had long been latent in his mind. The Public Libraries of Palermo afforded him much good material, whilst occasional visits to the Libraries of Venice, Florence, Paris, and London, opened other sources. But his most important channel of supply came from his very extensive private correspondence, extending to nearly all parts of Europe and many centres in Asia. His work brought him many new and valued friends, indeed too many to mention, but amongst whom, as belonging specially to this period, three honoured names must be recalled here: Commendatore (afterwards Baron) CRISTOFORO NEGRI, the large-hearted Founder and First President of the Geographical Society of Italy, from whom Yule received his first public recognition as a geographer, Commendatore GUGLIELMO BERCHET (affectionately nicknamed il Bello e Buono), ever generous in learned help, who became a most dear and honoured friend, and the Hon. GEORGE P. MARSH, U.S. Envoy to the Court of Italy, a man, both as scholar and friend, unequalled in his nation, perhaps almost unique anywhere.

Those who only knew Yule in later years, may like some account of his daily life at this time. It was his custom to rise fairly early; in summer he sometimes went to bathe in the sea,[58] or for a walk before breakfast; more usually he would write until breakfast, which he preferred to have alone. After breakfast he looked through his notebooks, and before ten o'clock was usually walking rapidly to the library where his work lay. He would work there until two or three o'clock, when he returned home, read the Times, answered letters, received or paid visits, and then resumed work on his book, which he often continued long after the rest of the household were sleeping. Of course his family saw but little of him under these circumstances, but when he had got a chapter of Marco into shape, or struck out some new discovery of interest, he would carry it to his wife to read. She always took great interest in his work, and he had great faith in her literary instinct as a sound as well as sympathetic critic.

The first fruits of Yule's Polo studies took the form of a review of Pauthier's edition of Marco Polo, contributed to the Quarterly Review in 1868.

In 1870 the great work itself appeared, and received prompt generous recognition by the grant of the very beautiful gold medal of the Geographical Society of Italy,[59] followed in 1872 by the award of the Founder's Medal of the Royal Geographical Society, while the Geographical and Asiatic Societies of Paris, the Geographical Societies of Italy and Berlin, the Academy of Bologna, and other learned bodies, enrolled him as an Honorary Member.

Reverting to 1869, we may note that Yule, when passing through Paris early in the spring, became acquainted, through his friend M. Charles Maunoir, with the admirable work of exploration lately performed by Lieut. Francis Garnier of the French Navy. It was a time of much political excitement in France, the eve of the famous Plébiscite, and the importance of Garnier's work was not then recognised by his countrymen. Yule saw its value, and on arrival in London went straight to Sir Roderick Murchison, laid the facts before him, and suggested that no other traveller of the year had so good a claim to one of the two gold medals of the R.G.S. as this French naval Lieutenant. Sir Roderick was propitious, and accordingly in May the Patron's medal was assigned to Garnier, who was touchingly grateful to Yule; whilst the French Minister of Marine marked his appreciation of Yule's good offices by presenting him with the magnificent volumes commemorating the expedition.[60]

Yule was in Paris in 1871, immediately after the suppression of the Commune, and his letters gave interesting accounts of the extraordinary state of affairs then prevailing. In August, he served as President of the Geographical Section of the British Association at its Edinburgh meeting.

On his return to Palermo, he devoted himself specially to the geography of the Oxus region, and the result appeared next year in his introduction and notes to Wood's Journey. Soon after his return to Palermo, he became greatly interested in the plans, about which he was consulted, of an English church, the gift to the English community of two of its oldest members, Messrs Ingham and Whitaker. Yule's share in the enterprise gradually expanded, until he became a sort of volunteer clerk of the works, to the great benefit of his health, as this occupation during the next three years, whilst adding to his interests, also kept him longer in the open air than would otherwise have been the case. It was a real misfortune to Yule (and one of which he was himself at times conscious) that he had no taste for any out-of-door pursuits, neither for any form of natural science, nor for gardening, nor for any kind of sport nor games. Nor did he willingly ride.[61] He was always restless away from his books. There can be no doubt that want of sufficient air and exercise, reacting on an impaired liver, had much to do with Yule's unsatisfactory state of health and frequent extreme depression. There was no lack of agreeable and intelligent society at Palermo (society that the present writer recalls with cordial regard), to which every winter brought pleasant temporary additions, both English and foreign, the best of whom generally sought Yule's acquaintance. Old friends too were not wanting; many found their way to Palermo, and when such came, he was willing to show them hospitality and to take them excursions, and occasionally enjoyed these. But though the beautiful city and surrounding country were full of charm and interest, Yule was too much pre-occupied by his own special engrossing pursuits ever really to get the good of his surroundings, of which indeed he often seemed only half conscious.

By this time Yule had obtained, without ever having sought it, a distinct and, in some respects, quite unique position in geographical science. Although his Essay on the Geography of the Oxus Region (1872) received comparatively little public attention at home, it had yet made its mark once for all,[62] and from this time, if not earlier, Yule's high authority in all questions of Central Asian geography was generally recognised. He had long ere this, almost unconsciously, laid the broad foundations of that "Yule method," of which Baron von Richthofen has written so eloquently, declaring that not only in his own land, "but also in the literatures of France, Italy, Germany, and other countries, the powerful stimulating influence of the Yule method is visible."[63] More than one writer has indeed boldly compared Central Asia before Yule to Central Africa before Livingstone!

Yule had wrought from sheer love of the work and without expectation of public recognition, and it was therefore a great surprise as well as gratification to him, to find that the demand for his Marco Polo was such as to justify the appearance of a second edition only a few years after the first. The preparation of this enlarged edition, with much other miscellaneous work (see subjoined bibliography), and the superintendence of the building of the church already named, kept him fully occupied for the next three years.

Amongst the parerga and miscellaneous occupations of Yule's leisure hours in the period 1869–74, may be mentioned an interesting correspondence with Professor W. W. Skeat on the subject of William of Palerne and Sicilian examples of the Werwolf; the skilful analysis and exposure of Klaproth's false geography;[64] the purchase and despatch of Sicilian seeds and young trees for use in the Punjab, at the request of the Indian Forestry Department; translations (prepared for friends) of tracts on the cultivation of Sumach and the collection of Manna as practised in Sicily; also a number of small services rendered to the South Kensington Museum, at the request of the late Sir Henry Cole. These latter included obtaining Italian and Sicilian bibliographic contributions to the Science and Art Department's Catalogue of Books on Art, selecting architectural subjects to be photographed;[65] negotiating the purchase of the original drawings illustrative of Padre B. Gravina's great work on the Cathedral of Monreale; and superintending the execution of a copy in mosaic of the large mosaic picture (in the Norman Palatine Chapel, Palermo,) of the Entry of our Lord into Jerusalem.

In the spring of 1875, just after the publication of the second edition of Marco Polo, Yule had to mourn the loss of his noble wife. He was absent from Sicily at the time, but returned a few hours after her death on 30th April. She had suffered for many years from a severe form of heart disease, but her end was perfect peace. She was laid to rest, amid touching tokens of both public and private sympathy, in the beautiful camposanto on Monte Pellegrino. What her loss was to Yule only his oldest and closest friends were in a position to realise. Long years of suffering had impaired neither the soundness of her judgment nor the sweetness, and even gaiety, of her happy, unselfish disposition. And in spirit, as even in appearance, she retained to the very last much of the radiance of her youth. Nor were her intellectual gifts less remarkable. Few who had once conversed with her ever forgot her, and certainly no one who had once known her intimately ever ceased to love her.[66]

Shortly after this calamity, Yule removed to London, and on the retirement of his old friend, Sir William Baker, from the India Council early that autumn, Lord Salisbury at once selected him for the vacant seat. Nothing would ever have made him a party-man, but he always followed Lord Salisbury with conviction, and worked under him with steady confidence.

In 1877 Yule married, as his second wife, the daughter of an old friend,[67] a very amiable woman twenty years his junior, who made him very happy until her untimely death in 1881. From the time of his joining the India Council, his duties at the India Office of course occupied a great part of his time, but he also continued to do an immense amount of miscellaneous literary work, as may be seen by reference to the subjoined bibliography, (itself probably incomplete). In Council he invariably "showed his strong determination to endeavour to deal with questions on their own merits and not only by custom and precedent."[68] Amongst subjects in which he took a strong line of his own in the discussions of the Council, may be specially instanced his action in the matter of the cotton duties (in which he defended native Indian manufactures as against hostile Manchester interests); the Vernacular Press Act, the necessity for which he fully recognised; and the retention of Kandahar, for which he recorded his vote in a strong minute. In all these three cases, which are typical of many others, his opinion was overruled, but having been carefully and deliberately formed, it remained unaffected by defeat.

In all matters connected with Central Asian affairs, Yule's opinion always carried great weight; some of his most competent colleagues indeed preferred his authority in this field to that of even Sir Henry Rawlinson, possibly for the reason given by Sir M. Grant Duff, who has epigrammatically described the latter as good in Council but dangerous in counsel.[69]

Yule's courageous independence and habit of looking at all public questions by the simple light of what appeared to him right, yet without fads or doctrinairism, earned for him the respect of the successive Secretaries of State under whom he served, and the warm regard and confidence of his other colleagues. The value attached to his services in Council was sufficiently shown by the fact that when the period of ten years (for which members are usually appointed), was about to expire, Lord Hartington (now Duke of Devonshire), caused Yule's appointment to be renewed for life, under a special Act of Parliament passed for this purpose in 1885.

His work as a member of the Army Sanitary Committee, brought him into communication with Miss Florence Nightingale, a privilege which he greatly valued and enjoyed, though he used to say: "She is worse than a Royal Commission to answer, and, in the most gracious charming manner possible, immediately finds out all I don't know!" Indeed his devotion to the "Lady-in-Chief" was scarcely less complete than Kinglake's.

In 1880, Yule was appointed to the Board of Visitors of the Government Indian Engineering College at Cooper's Hill, a post which added to his sphere of interests without materially increasing his work. In 1882, he was much gratified by being named an Honorary Fellow of the Society of Antiquaries of Scotland, more especially as it was to fill one of the two vacancies created by the deaths of Thomas Carlyle and Dean Stanley.

Yule had been President of the Hakluyt Society from 1877, and in 1885 was elected President also of the Royal Asiatic Society. He would probably also have been President of the Royal Geographical Society, but for an untoward incident. Mention has already been made of his constant determination to judge all questions by the simple touchstone of what he believed to be right, irrespective of personal considerations. It was in pursuance of these principles that, at the cost of great pain to himself and some misrepresentation, he in 1878 sundered his long connection with the Royal Geographical Society, by resigning his seat on their Council, solely in consequence of their adoption of what he considered a wrong policy. This severance occurred just when it was intended to propose him as President. Some years later, at the personal request of the late Lord Aberdare, a President in all respects worthy of the best traditions of that great Society, Yule consented to rejoin the Council, which he re-entered as a Vice-President.

In 1883, the University of Edinburgh celebrated its Tercentenary, when Yule was selected as one of the recipients of the honorary degree of LL.D. His letters from Edinburgh, on this occasion, give a very pleasant and amusing account of the festivity and of the celebrities he met. Nor did he omit to chronicle the envious glances cast, as he alleged, by some British men of science on the splendours of foreign Academic attire, on the yellow robes of the Sorbonne, and the Palms of the Institute of France! Pasteur was, he wrote, the one most enthusiastically acclaimed of all who received degrees.

I think it was about the same time that M. Renan was in England, and called upon Sir Henry Maine, Yule, and others at the India Office. On meeting just after, the colleagues compared notes as to their distinguished but unwieldy visitor. "It seems that le style n'est pas l'homme même in this instance," quoth "Ancient Law" to "Marco Polo." And here it may be remarked that Yule so completely identified himself with his favourite traveller that he frequently signed contributions to the public press as MARCUS PAULUS VENETUS or M.P.V. His more intimate friends also gave him the same sobriquet, and once, when calling on his old friend, Dr. John Brown (the beloved chronicler of Rab and his Friends), he was introduced by Dr. John to some lion-hunting American visitors as "our Marco Polo." The visitors evidently took the statement in a literal sense, and scrutinised Yule closely.[70]

In 1886 Yule published his delightful Anglo-Indian Glossary, with the whimsical but felicitous sub-title of Hobson-Jobson (the name given by the rank and file of the British Army in India to the religious festival in celebration of Hassan and Husaïn).

This Glossary was an abiding interest to both Yule and the present writer. Contributions of illustrative quotations came from most diverse and unexpected sources, and the arrival of each new word or happy quotation was quite an event, and gave such pleasure to the recipients as can only be fully understood by those who have shared in such pursuits. The volume was dedicated in affecting terms to his elder brother, Sir George Yule, who, unhappily, did not survive to see it completed.

In July 1885, the two brothers had taken the last of many happy journeys together, proceeding to Cornwall and the Scilly Isles. A few months later, on 13th January 1886, the end came suddenly to the elder, from the effects of an accident at his own door.[71]

It may be doubted if Yule ever really got over the shock of this loss, though he went on with his work as usual, and served that year as a Royal Commissioner on the occasion of the Indian and Colonial Exhibition of 1886.

From 1878, when an accidental chill laid the foundations of an exhausting, though happily quite painless, malady, Yule's strength had gradually failed, although for several years longer his general health and energies still appeared unimpaired to a casual observer. The condition of public affairs also, in some degree, affected his health injuriously. The general trend of political events from 1880 to 1886 caused him deep anxiety and distress, and his righteous wrath at what he considered the betrayal of his country's honour in the cases of Frere, of Gordon, and of Ireland, found strong, and, in a noble sense, passionate expression in both prose and verse. He was never in any sense a party man, but he often called himself "one of Mr. Gladstone's converts," i.e. one whom Gladstonian methods had compelled to break with liberal tradition and prepossessions.

Nothing better expresses Yule's feeling in the period referred to than the following letter, written in reference to the R. E. Gordon Memorial,[72] but of much wider application: "Will you allow me an inch or two of space to say to my brother officers, 'Have nothing to do with the proposed Gordon Memorial.'

"That glorious memory is in no danger of perishing and needs no memorial. Sackcloth and silence are what it suggests to those who have guided the action of England; and Englishmen must bear the responsibility for that action and share its shame. It is too early for atoning memorials; nor is it possible for those who take part in them to dissociate themselves from a repulsive hypocrisy.

"Let every one who would fain bestow something in honour of the great victim, do, in silence, some act of help to our soldiers or their families, or to others who are poor and suffering.

"In later days our survivors or successors may look back with softened sorrow and pride to the part which men of our corps have played in these passing events, and Charles Gordon far in the front of all; and then they may set up our little tablets, or what not—not to preserve the memory of our heroes, but to maintain the integrity of our own record of the illustrious dead."

Happily Yule lived to see the beginning of better times for his country. One of the first indications of that national awakening was the right spirit in which the public, for the most part, received Lord Wolseley's stirring appeal at the close of 1888, and Yule was so much struck by the parallelism between Lord Wolseley's warning and some words of his own contained in the pseudo-Polo fragment (see above, end of Preface), that he sent Lord Wolseley the very last copy of the 1875 edition of Marco Polo, with a vigorous expression of his sentiments.

That was probably Yule's last utterance on a public question. The sands of life were now running low, and in the spring of 1889, he felt it right to resign his seat on the India Council, to which he had been appointed for life. On this occasion Lord Cross, then Secretary of State for India, successfully urged his acceptance of the K.C.S.I., which Yule had refused several years before.

In the House of Lords, Viscount Cross subsequently referred to his resignation in the following terms. He said: "A vacancy on the Council had unfortunately occurred through the resignation from ill-health of Sir Henry Yule, whose presence on the Council had been of enormous advantage to the natives of the country. A man of more kindly disposition, thorough intelligence, high-minded, upright, honourable character, he believed did not exist; and he would like to bear testimony to the estimation in which he was held, and to the services which he had rendered in the office he had so long filled."[73]

This year the Hakluyt Society published the concluding volume of Yule's last work of importance, the Diary of Sir William Hedges. He had for several years been collecting materials for a full memoir of his great predecessor in the domain of historical geography, the illustrious Rennell.[74] This work was well advanced as to preliminaries, but was not sufficiently developed for early publication at the time of Yule's death, and ere it could be completed its place had been taken by a later enterprise.

During the summer of 1889, Yule occupied much of his leisure by collecting and revising for re-issue many of his miscellaneous writings. Although not able to do much at a time, this desultory work kept him occupied and interested, and gave him much pleasure during many months. It was, however, never completed. Yule went to the seaside for a few weeks in the early summer, and subsequently many pleasant days were spent by him among the Surrey hills, as the guest of his old friends Sir Joseph and Lady Hooker. Of their constant and unwearied kindness, he always spoke with most affectionate gratitude. That autumn he took a great dislike to the English climate; he hankered after sunshine, and formed many plans, eager though indefinite, for wintering at Cintra, a place whose perfect beauty had fascinated him in early youth. But increasing weakness made a journey to Portugal, or even the South of France, an alternative of which he also spoke, very inexpedient, if not absolutely impracticable. Moreover, he would certainly have missed abroad the many friends and multifarious interests which still surrounded him at home. He continued to take drives, and occasionally called on friends, up to the end of November, and it was not until the middle of December that increasing weakness obliged him to take to his bed. He was still, however, able to enjoy seeing his friends—some to the very end, and he had a constant stream of visitors, mostly old friends, but also a few newer ones, who were scarcely less welcome. He also kept up his correspondence to the last, three attached brother R.E.'s, General Collinson, General Maclagan, and Major W. Broadfoot, taking it in turn with the present writer to act as his amanuensis.

On Friday, 27th December, Yule received a telegram from Paris, announcing his nomination that day as Corresponding Member of the Institute of France (Académie des Inscriptions), one of the few distinctions of any kind of which it can still be said that it has at no time lost any of its exalted dignity.

An honour of a different kind that came about the same time, and was scarcely less prized by him, was a very beautiful letter of farewell and benediction from Miss Florence Nightingale,[75] which he kept under his pillow and read many times. On the 28th, he dictated to the present writer his acknowledgment, also by telegraph, of the great honour done him by the Institute. The message was in the following words: "Reddo gratias, Illustrissimi Domini, ob honores tanto nimios quanto immeritos! Mihi robora deficiunt, vita collabitur, accipiatis voluntatem pro facto. Cum corde pleno et gratissimo moriturus vos, Illustrissimi Domini, saluto. YULE."

Sunday, 29th December, was a day of the most dense black fog, and he felt its oppression, but was much cheered by a visit from his ever faithful friend, Collinson, who, with his usual unselfishness, came to him that day at very great personal inconvenience.

On Monday, 30th December, the day was clearer, and Henry Yule awoke much refreshed, and in a peculiarly happy and even cheerful frame of mind. He said he felt so comfortable. He spoke of his intended book, and bade his daughter write about the inevitable delay to his publisher: "Go and write to John Murray," were indeed his last words to her. During the morning he saw some friends and relations, but as noon approached his strength flagged, and after a period of unconsciousness, he passed peacefully away in the presence of his daughter and of an old friend, who had come from Edinburgh to see him, but arrived too late for recognition. Almost at the same time that Yule fell asleep, his "stately message,"[76] was being read under the great Dome in Paris. Some two hours after Yule had passed away, F.-M. Lord Napier of Magdala, called on an errand of friendship, and at his desire was admitted to see the last of his early friend. When Lord Napier came out, he said to the present writer, in his own reflective way: "He looks as if he had just settled to some great work." With these suggestive words of the great soldier, who was so soon, alas, to follow his old friend to the work of another world, this sketch may fitly close.

* * * * *

The following excellent verses (of unknown authorship) on Yule's death, subsequently appeared in the Academy:[77]

"'Moriturus vos saluto'

Breathes his last the dying scholar—

Tireless student, brilliant writer;

He 'salutes his age' and journeys

To the Undiscovered Country.

There await him with warm welcome

All the heroes of old Story—

The Venetians, the Cà Polo,

Marco, Nicolo, Maffeo,

Odoric of Pordenone,

Ibn Batuta, Marignolli,

Benedict de Goës—'Seeking

Lost Cathay and finding Heaven.'

Many more whose lives he cherished

With the piety of learning;

Fading records, buried pages,

Failing lights and fires forgotten,

By his energy recovered,

By his eloquence re-kindled.

'Moriturus vos saluto'

Breathes his last the dying scholar,

And the far off ages answer:

Immortales te salutant. D. M."

The same idea had been previously embodied, in very felicitous language, by the late General Sir William Lockhart, in a letter which that noble soldier addressed to the present writer a few days after Yule's death. And Yule himself would have taken pleasure in the idea of those meetings with his old travellers, which seemed so certain to his surviving friends.[78]

He rests in the old cemetery at Tunbridge Wells, with his second wife, as he had directed. A great gathering of friends attended the first part of the burial service which was held in London on 3rd January, 1890. Amongst those present were witnesses of every stage of his career, from his boyish days at the High School of Edinburgh downwards. His daughter, of course, was there, led by the faithful, peerless friend who was so soon to follow him into the Undiscovered Country.[79] She and his youngest nephew, with two cousins and a few old friends, followed his remains over the snow to the graveside. The epitaph subsequently inscribed on the tomb was penned by Yule himself, but is by no means representative of his powers in a kind of composition in which he had so often excelled in the service of others. As a composer of epitaphs and other monumental inscriptions few of our time have surpassed, if any have equalled him, in his best efforts.