Elizabeth Gilbert and Her Work for the Blind

by Frances Martin

In her long days of enforced inactivity she would recall to mind visits to Goodwood, to Arundel, interest expressed and shown in the objects she had at heart, and would redouble her efforts to raise up friends for the blind.

Meantime there was a steady deterioration in her own physical condition.

The malady which had been making insidious progress for so long was degeneration of the spinal cord. The disease is one that generally owes its origin to accident or injury, but so far as could be ascertained Bessie had never met with either.

The physicians who attended her throughout the last years of her life inclined to the view that the poison in the blood left by scarlet fever was the cause not only of the condition of the throat, from which she suffered throughout her whole life (it will be remembered that she could only drink in sips), but also of this degeneration of the spinal cord.

Looking back, the members of her family recalled to mind that her powers of motion had not for many years been free and unimpeded. The significant entries in diary and letters, as to her moving and walking better, will not be forgotten. But the true cause of this had not been suspected, except by Dr. Little; for mischief to the spinal cord may be carried very far before there is any outward sign to manifest it. The power of motion and merely animal functions are affected by it; but intelligence remains alert and the brain power unaffected. The symptoms which accompany it are at first attributed to weakness, overwork, physical fatigue, any of which would be sufficient to account for them before the disease has reached the stage in which its true nature is unmistakably revealed. Mental trouble will often accelerate the progress of this malady, and occasion its more rapid development. This cause had also been at work.

The death of her father in 1870 was sudden and most unexpected to Bessie. The subsequent giving up of the two homes, at Chichester and in London, which long years had endeared to her; the necessity of planting herself in and learning to accommodate herself to a new house, with all the old familiar landmarks swept away—all these things were sources of suffering to one of her delicate nervous organisation; and doubtless they gave an added impetus to the progress of disease.

She met her troubles with great courage; she bore them with unmurmuring patience; but they produced their inevitable result, and flung her aside when the storm was over as a weed is cast up by an angry sea.

There were a few months during which various remedies were suggested and tried, but all unsuccessfully. The two sisters, who henceforward devoted their whole life to her, now took it in turns to sleep on a sofa in her room, so as to help her to move and turn in bed during the night. But when she realised that loss of power was not a phase but one of the conditions of her illness, she would not allow them to do this, saying she must have them "fresh for the daytime." A sick nurse was engaged, and, with Charlotte Gadney, ministered to her.

For a little time she was able occasionally to be taken into Hyde Park in an easy bath chair and always recumbent, but she could only bear the vibration of the movement for a very short distance. When she reached the park she would remain for some hours enjoying the air.