The _Saturday Review_ delighted in an attack on Mr Bradlaugh not merely for its own sake, but even more as a means of injuring Mr Mill. I have not heard that John Stuart Mill ever expressed the least regret for his donation, but had he done so there would have been small cause for wonder, for he had to pay a heavy penalty for his generosity. It was used against him everywhere, and his own defeat at Westminster was by many persons attributed to the outcry raised about his subscription towards my father's election expenses. Even the mighty _Times_ was not too mighty to add its voice, saying that the countenance Mr Mill had given "Iconoclast" had given great offence to the middle classes. The use of the name "Iconoclast" was quite gratuitous, for Mr Mill did not send his cheque to assist in the work of "Iconoclast," the Atheist lecturer; he sent it for the use of Charles Bradlaugh, the Radical politician. It will be a matter of interest to those connected with the movement against compulsory vaccination to know that during the course of this election contest Mr Bradlaugh attended a meeting in the Town Hall called by the Anti-Compulsory Vaccination League, and that, while expressing "no opinion as to the theory of vaccination," in view of the many objections urged against the practice, he promised to support a demand for a Royal Commission for full investigation of the facts. The growth of opinion is so gradual that, although indeed there was a Select Committee in 1871, it was twenty years before the Commission was actually appointed, and then, as every one will remember, Mr Bradlaugh was himself nominated to sit upon it. On the tenth of November, a week before the polling day, my mother, my grandfather (Mr A. Hooper), and we three children went to Northampton to attend a special tea-party given in the Corn Exchange, and I have a most vivid recollection of the enthusiasm then displayed. The time of our expected arrival having become known, hundreds of people, with bands and banners, came to meet us quite of their own accord, and when we returned to take the train back to London it seemed to my childish imagination as though the whole town must have turned out, for the streets were thronged from end to end with men and women cheering, singing the new song, "Bradlaugh for Northampton,"[121] laughing and crying in a veritable intoxication of excitement, until the moisture stood in my father's own eyes. [Footnote 121: This song was written by a young shoemaker named James Wilson, and was set to music by another poor but gifted man, John Lowry. Poor Wilson died early, but his song became a sort of war-cry in Northampton, and will live long in the hearts of his fellow-townsmen.]