1883-92 
PARALYTIC STROKE 
269 
gates of his garden he so seldom ventured that 
an occasional dinner at White Lodge or a rare 
visit to the Athenaeum and the Bank were almost 
the only exceptions to what had become the habit 
of his life. Almost the last of his expeditions to 
London was made in the autumn of 1889. He 
was driven to town by Sir Edwin Chadwick, 
accompanied by Dr. (now Sir) B. W. Richardson, 
and the party took the opportunity of being photo- 
graphed together. 
Early in the following year Sir Richard was 
seized with an attack of illness very like a paralytic 
stroke, from which he never entirely recovered. 
By sheer force of will he rallied from it in a way 
which was little short of marvellous. When he 
was considered to be almost at death’s door, he 
left his bed without assistance, dressed himself, 
and was found sitting in his library as if he had 
never been ill at all. But this attack enfeebled 
his memory, and to a great extent deprived him of 
the use of his limbs, though it did but little to 
impair his handwriting, which remained almost as 
neat and clear as ever. 
After his illness he scarcely ever moved out 
of his two rooms, the library and bedroom, which 
open out of each other. The library is an old- 
fashioned room, with a low ceiling, and with 
windows looking on to the park at one side and 
into the garden at the other. On the wall-spaces 
of this room not filled with book-shelves hang 
