"The vote was addressed to the Minister for Foreign Affairs," he said, "and I delivered it at the Ministry in the Palace, and received the answer officially from the Ministry. It is perfectly true that Senor Castelar invited me to his private residence, where I went, and passed some hours with him on three separate occasions, and that he did me the honour to visit me at my hotel; but these interviews, while I much valued them and am extremely pleased they took place, were unsought by me. The only visit I volunteered was the official one to the Ministry of State, and there is no pretence for saying that there was any reluctance to receive me."[169]
Mr Bradlaugh's return from Madrid occupied even longer time than the getting there. Although he left Madrid on Sunday, it was not until late on Friday night that he reached Paris, and in the meantime all sorts of rumours as to his death or capture had appeared in the French and English press. He delayed twenty-four hours in Paris in order that he might see his elder daughter, who was there at school, and some French friends, all of whom were in the greatest anxiety as to his fate. He arrived in London on Sunday morning, and in the evening lectured at the Hall of Science in reply to a speech delivered by the Bishop of Lincoln at Gainsborough upon the Inspiration of the Bible. The audience awaiting him had gathered together full of doubt and uneasiness, and the relief they felt was expressed by the vehement cheering, again and again renewed, which greeted his appearance as he entered the hall.
The story of his return journey we have in his own words.
"Favoured by Senor Castelar," he said, "with special aid in returning, we—that is, myself and a Government courier, with despatches for Paris and London—left Madrid for our homeward journey on the afternoon of Sunday, May 25th. At the urgent request of many of those who had taken part in the demonstration of Saturday, I at the last moment determined not to return by the route I had come, and this determination was confirmed by the certain news that all the passes, either across the Pyrenees or by Salinas, were well occupied by the Carlists, who did not intend to let me slip easily through their fingers. I have no ambition to be a martyr, and determined not to be caught if I could avoid it." His return route was now planned to go via Santander and Bordeaux. "At Palencia," he continued, "where we arrived about three A.M., we received as escort some three hundred men of, I think, the Thirty-sixth Regiment. They came to parade after great delay, and in a manner showing great lack of discipline. I noticed that Pina and Espinosa were strongly guarded, and as soon as we passed between some of the hills near Alar del Rey, a sharp fusilade, which was returned from the train, wakened me from a half sleep, and gave me an occasion for smelling gunpowder, with an almost freedom of danger. Our train only went at about ten miles per hour, the engine-driver fearing to find the line torn up, or obstructions upon it; but fortunately for us, the party of Carlists by whom we were attacked were too late to hinder us, although I was informed that they succeeded in stopping the next train. The firing, sometimes sharp and sometimes interrupted entirely by the ravines, lasted about three-quarters of an hour. The Carlists were seen running down from the mountains to take part in the skirmish. The casualities were small, one soldier on our side being wounded in the shoulder. Not a single bullet entered the compartment in which I was seated.
"From Alar del Rey we passed through some beautiful country to Santander, where we arrived about five hours late, and in time to find that a steamer I had hoped to catch had left for Bayonne the night before my arrival. I went at once in a rage to the Government Offices, and was assured by the Captain-General of the port of Santander—who was the perfection of civility, and who stated that he had received a telegram from the Madrid Government to afford me every facility—that it would be impossible to leave for Bayonne before Thursday. This horrified me, for I was due to speak in Northampton on the 28th, and I at once rushed to the Telegraph Office to send a message. The clerk told me he would take my money, but he would not ensure the delivery of my message. I was to return later to inquire. I left my money and my despatch, and went to the hotel to dine, or breakfast, or both in one. On returning to the Dispaccio Telegrafico, I learned that the wires were cut in more than one place; that the post-bags to the North were being seized by the Carlists; and that all means of communicating with my friends in England were temporarily cut off. To my disgust, I found that the boat for Bayonne, although advertised for Thursday, might not start till Sunday, and here I was, a prisoner at large in Santander, not even being able to return from thence to Vittoria, or to communicate my whereabouts to any one.... On Monday afternoon, while wandering about the streets, I came across a bill outside a shipping office headed 'Para Burdeos,' and not quite sure of my Spanish, or rather, being quite sure it would not do to trust to it, I went inside to inquire for some one who could talk French. The only person able to talk anything but Spanish was the principal, who turned out to be the same gentleman employed by Mr Layard, the English Ambassador at Madrid, to provide the steamer by which Marshal Serrano made his escape from Spain. I could not help wondering, when this shipowner, after closing, with an air of mystery, the sliding window communicating with the clerk's office, showed me the letters he had received from Mr Layard bespeaking the steamer, and from Marshal Serrano, thanking him after his escape. What would the English Government have said if the Spanish Ambassador in England had furnished one of the Fenian leaders with the means of escape from London to Southampton, and had there engaged him a steamer for Havre? Yet this is precisely what A. H. Layard did for Marshal Serrano last month in Spain. Revenons à nos moutons; I had rightly understood there was a steamboat, and 'a fine swift one,' announced to start for Bordeaux that evening. I wanted to embark at once, but found that some delay had taken place in the embarkation of the cargo, and the boat would not leave until two on Tuesday. But even this was comparative bliss; the boat was warranted to make the passage in twenty-four hours. I should be at Bordeaux at two on Wednesday; I should then be able to leave by the express train for Paris, get there on Thursday morning, perhaps catching the tidal train to London in time to encounter Father Ignatius at the New Hall of Science on Thursday evening. My spirits rose, and I went back to the Fonda de Europa to sleep joyously till morning.
"Next morning I received news not so good. The captain of the vessel, the Pioneer, Captain Laurent, was staying in the same Fonda as myself; it was doubtful, he said, if he could weigh anchor before four or five. This was driving it very close for saving the train at Bordeaux; but worse news was to come: the boat did not start at all until Wednesday, and instead of doing the journey in twenty-four hours, it took nearer thirty-four hours, so that I ultimately arrived in Bordeaux towards midnight on Thursday, and naturally not in Paris until Friday night.... The good steamer Pioneer abounded in strange smells. The captain said it had never carried passengers before, and for the sake of the travellers I hope that she may never carry them again; but we (there were eight other passengers) made the best of our position, and bivouacked somehow with tarpaulin and sailcloth spread on the iron bottom of the hold; and except that in the Bay of Biscay the Pioneer sometimes suddenly put my head where my feet ought to have been, and then reversed the process with alarming sharpness, there was little to complain of."
Of course Mr Bradlaugh's journey was followed by the usual cry from those whose mercenary minds cannot conceive of a man doing anything he is not absolutely obliged except for the purpose of gaining some money reward. Just as earlier it had been said that he was paid by the Tories, or the Whigs, or the Communists, or some others equally probable, now the story was that he was paid by—of all people in the world—the Carlists![170]
What Mr Bradlaugh thought of Senor Castelar will be a point of peculiar interest to those who have felt respect or admiration for both men. In narrating his Spanish adventures, my father uttered no set judgment on the Spanish statesman; he did not weigh him or criticise him, but here and there he alluded to this or that quality. "Of Senor Castelar himself," he said in one place, "it is difficult to speak too highly.... As an orator, he has no equal in Spain; and as a journalist, his pen has made itself a Transatlantic reputation." He then went on to enumerate some of the good works which Senor Castelar had inaugurated or in which he had taken part. Later on, speaking of the possibility of the maintenance of the Republican Government in Spain, Mr Bradlaugh said that there needed at the head of affairs "a Cromwell with the purity of a Washington.... Senor Castelar feels too deeply, and the pain and turmoil of Government will tell upon his health if he re-assumes power. He is honest and earnest and devoted to Republicanism, and withal so loving and lovable in his nature. I was present at breakfast with Senor Castelar when he received the telegraphic despatch announcing the fall of Monsieur Thiers, and the election of Marshal MacMahon as President. The news seemed to affect Senor Castelar very deeply. He evidently regarded it as paving the way for the accession of the Monarchical party in France, and consequently as giving encouragement to the Legitimist or Carlist party in Spain."
"Honest," "earnest," "loving and lovable,"[171]—all admirable qualities, not enough to make a Cromwell or a Washington, but nevertheless all very admirable. My father believed Senor Castelar possessed these, and from him I learned to admire and reverence him. Since my father's death I have had reason to doubt whether Castelar really possessed any one of these fine traits of character. At the risk of his life Mr Bradlaugh went to him to carry a message of sympathy and congratulation at a critical moment in his career; Senor Castelar received him with the utmost friendship and cordiality, and every honour was shown him during his few days' stay in Madrid. Having thus professed friendship to his face, Senor Castelar waited for eighteen years, and then, a few weeks after my father's death, he wantonly published[172] one of the most grotesque, one of the most foolishly malicious attacks upon Mr Bradlaugh that it would be possible for a sane man to pen.