In 1898 when we were on tour he caught a chill.  Inflammation of the lungs, bronchitis, pneumonia followed.  His heart was affected.  He was never really well again.

When I think of his work during the next seven years, I could weep!  Never was there a more admirable, extraordinary worker; never was any one more splendid-couraged and patient.

The seriousness of his illness in 1898 was never really known.  He nearly died.

“I am still fearfully anxious about H.,” I wrote to my daughter at the time.  “It will be a long time at the best before he gains strength....  But now I do hope for the best.  I’m fairly well so far.  All he wants is for me to keep my health, not my head.  He knows I’m doing that!  Last night I did three acts of ‘Sans-Gene’ and ‘Nance Oldfield’ thrown in!  That is a bit too much—­awful work—­and I can’t risk it again.”

“A telegram just come:  ‘Steadily improving....’  You should have seen Norman[1] as Shylock!  It was not a bare ‘get-through.’  It was—­the first night—­an admirable performance, as well as a plucky one....  H. is more seriously ill than anyone dreams....  His look!  Like the last act of Louis XI.”

[Footnote 1:  Mr. Norman Forbes-Robertson.]

In 1902, on the last provincial tour that we ever went together, he was ill again, but he did not give in.  One night when his cough was rending him, and he could hardly stand up from weakness, he acted so brilliantly and strongly that it was easy to believe in the triumph of mind over matter—­in Christian Science, in fact!

Strange to say, a newspaper man noticed the splendid power of his performance that night and wrote of it with uncommon discernment—­a provincial critic, by the way.

In London at the time they were always urging Henry Irving to produce new plays by new playwrights.  But in the face of the failure of most of the new work, and of his departing strength, and of the extraordinary support given him in the old plays (during this 1902 tour we took L4,000 at Glasgow in one week!), Henry took the wiser course in doing nothing but the old plays to the end of the chapter.

I realized how near, not only the end of the chapter but the end of the book was, when he was taken ill at Wolverhampton in the spring of 1905.

We had not acted together for more than two years then, and times were changed indeed.

I went down to Wolverhampton when the news of his illness reached London.  I arrived late and went to an hotel.  It was not a good hotel, nor could I find a very good florist when I got up early the next day and went out with the intention of buying Henry some flowers.  I wanted some bright-colored ones for him—­he had always liked bright flowers—­and this florist dealt chiefly in white flowers—­funeral flowers.

At last I found some daffodils—­my favorite flower.  I bought a bunch, and the kind florist, whose heart was in the right place if his flowers were not, found me a nice simple glass to put it in.  I knew the sort of vase that I should find at Henry’s hotel.