In March 1864 occurred the great inundation at Sheffield; along the valleys of the Loxley and the Don all was ruin and desolation. Whole rows of houses, mills, and bridges were carried away, and huge trees were torn up by the force of the rushing water. Many lives were lost, and those who escaped with life lost every atom they possessed save the garments in which they escaped. Many funds were started for the relief of those so suddenly made destitute, and Mr Bradlaugh was not slow in offering his help. A Sheffield man, writing at the time, said that the quality of practical sympathy was one possessed by Mr Bradlaugh "in a pre-eminent degree, and it is a trait in his character which will add lustre to his name, and form a rich gem in the wreath which shall adorn his memory long after he shall have laid his honoured head in the silent tomb.... His large, generous heart is never insensible to the sounds of human distress; and accordingly no sooner did he hear of the Sheffield catastrophe than he at once volunteered his services towards the relief of the sufferers."[84]
I have mentioned these cases with the idea of showing how wide and how ready were my father's sympathies. To give money help was no easy matter to him: he could not write a cheque and say, "Put my name down for this sum or for that;" he could not even give by denying himself some little luxury: every penny he gave had to be specially earned for that purpose, but notwithstanding this, real distress rarely appealed to him in vain.[85]
Unable to do so much provincial lecturing in consequence of the demands made upon his time by his business, Mr Bradlaugh was yet often to be found during the latter part of 1865 at the Hall of Science, City Road; but in the early part of 1866 he was away in Italy so much, sometimes for weeks together, that he could do very little lecturing. The proceeds of these winter lectures at the old Hall of Science were to go to the Hall of Science Company, which he was then actively projecting. The lease of the City Road Hall expired early in 1866, and the renewal had been refused. It was proposed to lease or purchase a suitable building, or a site of land on which to build a lecture-hall and rooms for classes for secular instruction, etc. To aid in providing funds for this purpose, it was Mr Bradlaugh's desire to purchase one hundred shares out of the proceeds of his lectures, and to that end he devoted the whole of his profits on each occasion that he lectured at the Hall of Science.
[CHAPTER XXIII.]
THE REFORM LEAGUE, 1866-1868.
In 1866 the National Reform League was proving itself an extremely active organisation. Mr Edmund Beales was its honoured President, and Mr George Howell the Secretary. Mr Bradlaugh was one of its Vice-Presidents, and he had, oddly enough, amongst his colleagues the Rev. W. H. Bonner, the father of his future son-in-law. Mr Bonner had been, and was until his death in 1869, a Lecturer for the Peace Society, and was then a Vice-President and Lecturer of the Reform League. They worked together with the greatest cordiality, and Mr Bradlaugh on one occasion wrote that he wished there were more clergymen like the Rev. Mr Bonner. My father took part in most of the meetings of the League which were held in London and in many of those held in the provinces, and his value as an advocate was appreciated by men opposed to the Reform Bill—then before Parliament—as well as by those on his own side who were not blinded by bigotry.
On May 21st a great demonstration in support of the Bill was held upon Primrose Hill, and was addressed by Mr Beales, Mr Cremer, Colonel Dickson, Mr Lucraft, and others. Mr Bradlaugh moved the second resolution, and his eloquence so impressed the reporter to the Standard that that gentleman, who had assuredly come "to scoff," remained, if not "to pray," yet to give and record a reluctant admiration. The leader which appeared in the Standard for the following day was intended to be humorously descriptive of the proceedings without too fine a regard for facts; and in it we find the following notice of Mr Bradlaugh and his speech, which the writer said was frequently and enthusiastically applauded:
"At length, however, a young gentleman—by the name, we believe, of Bradlaugh—sprang into the chair, and for the moment awakened in the wind-chilled throng a faint thrill of something like enthusiasm. At first, judging from the cast of his countenance and from a certain twinkle in his eye as he adjusted himself to his task, we anticipated a decidedly comic address. But the event soon showed that we were mistaken, and the speaker, admirably as his face was adapted for purposes of comedy, was himself terribly in earnest; so earnest, indeed, and so thoroughly d'accord with his audience, that he soon woke them up from the lethargy in which they had remained ever since the first old gentleman had begun to read to them the unpublished proofs of next morning's Star, and set them crying 'Hear, hear,' 'That's so,' 'Hurray,' 'Down with the Peers,' 'Shame, shame,' and so on. Bearing in mind the blood-red banner and the bonnet rouge, it is needless to say that the speech of this energetic gentleman—who, be it observed, spoke really extremely well—consisted simply of a furious onslaught upon English institutions in general, and upon Government and the House of Lords in particular. He would like to see that wretched institution that battened upon the life-blood of the English people swept away for ever; and here the Reformers cried 'Hear, hear,' and applauded with voice and hand. And that was what things were tending to; that was what this Bill really meant; and he differed from their worthy president—who had apparently been endeavouring to persuade the meeting to adopt that convenient little Liberal fib that the present Bill had really nothing democratic about it—in being ready and willing to take his stand as a supporter of the Government measure upon the ground that it was democratic, and that its real effect would be to sweep away the whole expensive machinery of the constitution, Government itself included. All this, of course, everybody knew before, but it is not every Liberal Reformer who is bold enough to say it.... The speaker concluded with a significant reminder that on this occasion they were allowed to meet undisturbed, because they met in support of a Government measure, but that their normal condition—he did not say normal, but that was the meaning of it—was one of opposition to all Government, and that he might have to call upon them to meet here or elsewhere, or even under the walls of the sham Parliament at Westminster, when the whole strength of Government would be put forth to prevent the meeting, and when the English people would rise in their might," etc.