Mr. Bradlaugh confined to the House with severe erysipelas in both arms, resulting from the injuries inflicted. Attended by Drs. Ramskill and Palfrey. The latter, on August 12th, ordered his immediate removal from town, to prevent yet more dangerous complications.
Aug. 13th.—Mr. Bradlaugh went to Worthing to recruit his health. Outside the station there, weary and exhausted, both arms in a sling, he was rudely stared at by a clergyman, who, having satisfied himself as to Mr. Bradlaugh’s identity, walked away saying loudly: “There’s Bradlaugh; I hope they’ll make it warm for him yet.”
The Northern Star (a Tory paper) suggested that Mr. Bradlaugh was malingering—“simply carrying on the showman business.”
Aug. 24th.—Sir Henry Tyler, in the House of Commons, attempts to discredit the South Kensington department for allowing science and art classes at the Hall of Science. Mr. Mundella gives those classes great credit.
Aug. 27th.—Parliament prorogued.
Further appeal to England.
1882.
Jan. 9th.—The Earl of Derby, in a speech at the Liverpool Reform Club, says: “For my part I utterly disbelieve in the value of political oaths.... I should hope that if Mr. Bradlaugh again offers to take the oath, as he did last year, there will be no further attempt to prevent him.”
Feb. 7th.—Reopening of Parliament. Mr. Bradlaugh again attended at the table to take the oath, and Sir Erskine May, the clerk of the House, was about to administer the same when Sir Stafford Northcote, interposing, moved that Mr. Bradlaugh be not allowed to go through the form. Sir W. Harcourt, in moving the previous question, said the Government held the view that the House had no right to interpose between a duly-elected member and the oath.