and others.
Fortunately for me, Mr. Bradlaugh had a splendid collection of works on
the subject, and before he left England he brought to me two cabs full of
books, French and English, from all points of view, aristocratic,
ecclesiastical, democratic, and I studied these diligently and
impartially until the French Revolution became to me as a drama in which
I had myself taken part, and the actors therein became personal friends
and foes. In this, again, as in so much of my public work, I have to
thank Mr. Bradlaugh for the influence which led me to read fully all
sides of a question, and to read most carefully those from which I
differed most, ere I judged myself competent to write or to speak
thereon.

The late autumn was clouded by the news of Mr. Bradlaugh's serious
illness in America. After struggling for some time against ill-health he
was struck down by an attack of pleurisy, to which soon was added typhoid
fever, and for a time lay at the brink of the grave. Dr. Otis, his able
physician, finding that it was impossible to give him the necessary
attendance at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, put him into his own carriage and
drove him to the Hospital of St. Luke's, where he confided him to the
care of Dr. Leaming, himself also visiting him daily. Of this illness the
_Baltimore Advertiser_ wrote:

"Mr. Charles Bradlaugh, the famous English Radical lecturer, has been so
very dangerously ill that his life has almost been despaired of. He was
taken ill at the Fifth Avenue Hotel, and partially recovered; but on the
day upon which a lecture had been arranged from him before the Liberal
Club he was taken down a second time with a relapse, which has been very
near proving fatal. The cause was overwork and complete nervous
prostration which brought on low fever. His physician has allowed one
friend only to see him daily for five minutes, and removed him to St.
Luke's Hospital for the sake of the absolute quiet, comfort, and
intelligent attendance he could secure there, and for which he was glad
to pay munificently. This long and severe illness has disappointed the
hopes and retarded the object for which he came to this country; but he
is gentleness and patience itself in his sickness in this strange land,
and has endeared himself greatly to his physicians and attendants by his
gratitude and appreciation of the slightest attention."

There is no doubt that the care so willingly lavished on the English
stranger saved his life, and