In purchasing this property in Devonshire, Mr. Brunel had looked forward to retiring gradually from active professional life, ‘to draw in and make room for others,’ and to spend a greater portion of his time in the country.
It may well be questioned whether he would have been happy in giving up work while yet in middle life; but the wisdom of his resolve was not to be put to the test.
From the beginning of the year 1852 the ‘Great Eastern’ steam-ship began to occupy his time and thoughts. As the works progressed he was more and more tied to London; and the large pecuniary investment he had made in the shares of the company caused him to hesitate before proceeding with the building of his house.
Thus the hopes he had formed for making his home in Devonshire faded gradually away, and were at length extinguished by the failure of his health.
Many things had happened in the earlier part of 1857 which gave him pleasure. In June he received, in company with Mr. Robert Stephenson, the honorary degree of Doctor in Civil Law from the University of Oxford.[194] In the summer he paid several visits to Devonshire, and at the beginning of September the floating of the first truss of the Saltash bridge was successfully accomplished.
The history of the launch of the ‘Great Eastern,’ which was commenced in November, has been already told. Throughout all the disappointments he then endured Mr. Brunel took comfort from the sympathy of valued friends, and from those higher sources of consolation on which it was his habit to rely. He paid for his exertions a heavy price, for they left him broken in health and already suffering from the disease of which in a little more than eighteen mouths afterwards he died.[195]
In May 1858 Mr. Brunel went to Vichy, and thence to Switzerland, returning home in the autumn by way of Holland. When at Lucerne he went up the Righi, and was so charmed with it that, instead of spending only a night there, he remained a week, working at the designs for the Eastern Bengal Railway.
It was on his return to England in September that the alarming nature of his illness was ascertained. After anxious consultation with Sir Benjamin Brodie and Dr. Bright, he was ordered to spend the winter in Egypt, in the hope that he might return in the March or April following in restored health.
He was very unwilling to be so long absent from England, especially as a new company had just been formed to finish the ‘Great Eastern,’ and the contracts for her completion were about to be let.
However, it was thought that very serious consequences might follow if he remained at home; and in the beginning of December he left for Alexandria, with his wife and younger son.