At length I was compelled to keep my bed by a violent attack of pleurisy, which has since seized me about the same time every year. My digestion was so thoroughly ruined that I was frequently almost maddened by the sufferings which indigestion occasioned. I could not sleep, though I was no longer troubled with visions, which had left me about three months. At last I became so ill that I was forced to leave London and visit my mother in Kenilworth, where I stayed; writing occasionally, and instructing a few pupils in Greek and Hebrew. I was also now compelled to sell my library, which contained several Arabic and Persian MSS., a complete collection of Latin authors, nearly a complete one of Greek, and a large collection of Hebrew and Rabbinic works, which I had obtained at a great expense and with great trouble. All went. The only relics of it I was able to retain were the "Corpus Poetarum, Graecarum et Latinorum," and I have never since been able to collect another library. Idleness, good living, and constant exercise revived me; but with returning strength my nocturnal visitors returned, and again my nights were made dreadful. I was terrified through visions similar to those which had so alarmed me at first, and I was obliged to drink deeply at night to enable me to sleep at all. In this state I continued till June, 1833, when I determined once more to return to London, and I left Kenilworth without informing any one of my intention the night before. The curate of the parish called at my lodging to inform me that he had obtained the gift of six hundred pounds to enable me to reside at Oxford until I could graduate. Had I stayed twenty-four hours longer I should not now be living in hopeless poverty in a foreign country; but pursuing, under more favorable auspices than ever brightened my path before, those studies which supported and cheered me in poverty and illness, and with a fair prospect of obtaining that learned fame for which I had longed so ardently from my boyhood, and in the vain endeavor to obtain which I had sacrificed my health and denied myself not only the pleasures and luxuries but even the necessaries of life. I had while at the office in B. entered my name on the books of Brazen-nose College, Oxford, and resided there one term, not being able to afford the expense attendant on a longer residence. Thus it has been with me through life. Fortune has again and again thrown the means of success in my way, but they have always been like the waters of Tantalus--alluring but to escape from my grasp the moment I approached to seize them.
Development Digest
The Opium Habit — Part 113
2026-11-15 02:21:50 · Cedar Herald Index
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