to look at, and wonderfully clever. Mr. Bradlaugh was never weary of relating anecdotes of his intelligence and sagacity. From his kennel in the court Bruin's chain-range covered the garden gate, and with him there no bolt or lock was necessary, for while with friends he was the mildest and gentlest of dogs, with strangers or suspicious persons he was truly formidable. He made no unnecessary show of what he could do; he quietly watched the person until he was well within his reach, and then hurled himself at his throat. This I once saw. He was devoted to my father, and with him almost perfectly docile and obedient. And when, in 1870, Mr. Bradlaugh had to part with him, losing Bruin was by no means the smallest grief at a time when there was little else but sadness and sorrow.
At St. Helen's Place Mr. James Thomson (B. V.) had shared our home, and he again lived with us for some years at Sunderland Villa. The acquaintance which sprang up between them during Mr. Bradlaugh's army experiences in Ireland had soon ripened into warm friendship.
When my father quitted the service they kept up a close correspondence, and many a time have I heard my mother lament that Mr. Thomson's "beautiful letters" had been destroyed. When Mr. Thomson also left the army and came to London at the end of 1862, he came to my father, who at once held out a helping hand to him. In 1863 Mr. Bradlaugh obtained for him the appointment of Secretary to the Polish Committee, but his inherited curse of intemperance seized upon him, and at a crucial moment he disappeared.[33] On May 29th Mr. W. J. Linton wrote from Ambleside:—
"Dear Bradlaugh—The enclosed from Taylor. I send it to you knowing no other way of getting at Thomson, and wishful not to throw over any one spoken kindly of by you. But for myself I would not stand a second utter neglect of this kind. However, it rests with Taylor.
"After some trouble about Thomson, he might at least have written to me in the first instance, or to Taylor now, to account even for 'illness'—which I begin to doubt.
"I only asked him for a daily paper, which would have satisfied me of his daily attention. I have had three since I left. Row him, please!—Yours ever, very hard worked,
W. J. Linton."
Enclosure.
"House of Commons, May 28, 1863.
"Dear Linton—Do you know Thomson's address or how to get at it? He has not been at S. Street this week, and everything is going to the D——l.—
Yours ever, P. A. Taylor."
These fits of intemperance, comparatively rare at first, unhappily became more and more frequent. While Mr. Thomson lived with us when he came back after one of these attacks—or was brought back, for indeed it usually happened that some friend searched for him and brought him home despite himself—he was nursed and cared for until he was quite himself again, for it often happened that he was bruised and wounded, and unfit to go out for some days.
Although he failed so miserably in his secretary's work, Mr. Bradlaugh gave him a post in his own office, and encouraged him to write for the National Reformer. He had already written a few scattered articles, first for the Investigator in 1859, and then for the National Reformer. In the latter his writings ultimately extended over a period of fifteen years, commencing in 1860, and ending in the summer of 1875. His contributions range from the smallest review notice of some pamphlets written by Frederic Harrison, to his great and remarkable poem of "The City of Dreadful Night." Those who think most highly of this wonderful work admit that there was no other publisher in London who would have published it, but at the same time they give no credit to my father for discerning genius to which every one else was then blind; on the contrary, they join in the suggestion that Mr. Thomson was in some way ill-used by Mr. Bradlaugh, although how they do not deign to tell. Most of "B. V.'s" writings to the National Reformer were done in the years 1865, 1866, 1867, the first half of 1868, and second half of 1869, 1870, 1871, 1874, and the early months of 1875. In the other years his contributions were more scattered, but no year is entirely without.
While he lived with us at Sunderland Villa, Mr. Thomson was just one of the family, sharing our home life in every particular. He was a favourite with us all; my father loved him with a love that had to bear many a strain, and we children simply adored him. Sometimes in the evenings he, with my mother for a partner, my father with Miss Lacey (a frequent inmate of our house), would form a jovial quartet at whist; and many were the jokes and great the fun on these whist evenings. On Sundays, if my father were at home, he and Mr. Thomson would take us children and Bruin for a walk over the Tottenham Marshes to give Bruin a swim in the Lea; or if my father were away lecturing, as was too frequently the case, then Mr. Thomson would take us for a long ramble to Edmonton to see Charles Lamb's grave, or maybe across the fields to Chingford. In the winter time, when the exigencies of the weather kept us indoors, he would devote his Sunday afternoons to us, and tell us the most enchanting fairy tales it was ever the lot of children to listen to. One snowy night my father and he came to fetch my sister and me home from a Christmas party. They had to carry us, for the snow was deep. They took us out of the house with due regard to propriety; but they had not got far before they were all too conscious of the weight of their respective burdens, so they set us down in a fairly clear spot, and then readjusted us "pick-a-back." There was much joking over our weight, and we heartily joined in the laugh and enjoyed the jests at our expense, and over and above all the notion of being aided and abetted by our elders in doing something so shocking as a "pick-a-back" ride through the streets. These were delightful, happy times to us at least, and, in spite of all his cares, not unhappy for my father. He had youth and health and hope and courage, a friend he loved, and children he was ever good to. I feel indeed as though my pen must linger over these small trifles, over these merry moods and happy moments, and I am loth to put them aside for sadder, weightier matters.
Or the two would sit in my father's little "den" or study, and smoke. Mr. Bradlaugh smoked a great deal at this time, and "B. V." was an inveterate smoker; the one had his cigar, and the other his pipe; and while the smoke slowly mounted up and by degrees so filled the room that they could scarce see each other's faces across the table, they would talk philosophy, politics, or literature. I can see them now, in some ways a strangely assorted pair, as they sat in that little room lined with books; at the far side of the table the poet and dreamer, with his head thrown back and with the stem of his pipe never far from his lips, his face almost lost in the blue clouds gently and lazily curling upwards; and here, near the fireplace, my father, essentially a man to whom to think, to plan, was to do, sitting in careless comfort in his big uncushioned oaken chair, now taking frequent strong draws at his cigar, transforming the dull ash into a vigorous point of light, and again laying it aside to die into dull ash once more, whilst he argued a point or drew himself up to write. How often and how vividly that once familiar scene rises before my closed eyes! Of course, whilst with us, Mr. Thomson had the use of my father's little library as his own, and many of the books still bear the traces of his reading in the pencilled notes.
During the Carlist War, in 1873, Mr. Bradlaugh obtained for his friend an appointment to go to Spain as special correspondent to a New York paper; but alas! he was taken "ill" whilst about his duties, wrote irregularly and infrequently, and as a climax wrote three lines describing an important event when three columns were expected. He was consequently recalled, and when he got back my father found, to his additional vexation, that he (Mr. Thomson) had lost the Colt's revolver which he had lent him. It was an old friend to Mr. Bradlaugh; he had had it for many years, and it had served him well.
My father's anger was, as usual, short lived; and in the next year he published "B. V.'s" "City of Dreadful Night," and thenceforward gave him regular work on the National Reformer. But he was unhappily one not to be relied upon; and on a special occasion when he was left with the responsibility of the paper he disappeared and left it, as far as he was concerned, to come out as best it could. At length, in 1875, in spite of all my father's forbearance and affection, Mr. Thomson for some reason felt injured; but whatever might have been his grievances, they were
