It happened that, shortly after that (to me) memorable Christmas of 1872, a sharp epidemic of typhoid fever broke out in the village of Sibsey.  The drainage there was of the most primitive type, and the contagion spread rapidly.  Naturally fond of nursing, I found in this epidemic work just fitted to my hand, and I was fortunate enough to be able to lend personal help that made me welcome in the homes of the stricken poor.  The mothers who slept exhausted while I watched beside their darlings’ bedsides will never, I like to fancy, think over harshly of the heretic whose hand was as tender and often more skilful than their own.  I think Mother Nature meant me for a nurse, for I take a sheer delight in nursing anyone, provided only that there is peril in the sickness, so that there is the strange and solemn feeling of the struggle between the human skill one wields and the supreme enemy, Death.  There is a strange fascination in fighting Death, step by step, and this is of course felt to the full where one fights for life as life, and not for a life one loves.  When the patient is beloved, the struggle is touched with agony, but where one fights with Death over the body of a stranger, there is a weird enchantment in the contest without personal pain, and as one forces back the hated foe there is a curious triumph in the feeling which marks the death-grip yielding up its prey, as one snatches back to earth the life which had well-nigh perished.

Meanwhile, the promise to Mr. Scott was not forgotten, and I penned the essay on “The Deity of Jesus of Nazareth” which stands first in the collection of essays published later under the title, “My Path to Atheism”.  The only condition annexed to my sending it to Mr. Scott was the perfectly fair one that if published it should appear without my name.  Mr. Scott was well pleased with the essay, and before long it was printed as one of the “Scott Series”, to my great delight.

But unfortunately a copy sent to a relative of Mr. Besant’s brought about a storm.  That gentlemen did not disagree with it—­indeed he admitted that all educated persons must hold the views put forward—­but what would Society say?  What would “the county families” think if one of the clerical party was known to be a heretic.  This dreadful little paper bore the inscription “By the wife of a beneficed clergyman”; what would happen if the “wife of the beneficed clergyman” were identified with Mrs. Besant of Sibsey?

After some thought I made a compromise.  Alter or hide my faith I would not, but yield personal feelings I would.  I gave up my correspondence with Mr. and Mrs. Voysey, which might, it was alleged, he noticed in the village and so give rise to mischievous gossip.  In this Mr. and Mrs. Voysey most generously helped me, bidding me rest assured of their cordial friendship while counselling me for awhile to cease the correspondence which was one of the few pleasures of my life, but was not part of my duty to the higher and freer faith which we had all embraced.  With keen regret I bade them for awhile farewell, and went back to my lonely life.