[Footnote 25: As late as January 1884, however, Mr Bradlaugh noted a case reported in several newspapers of a private in the Hampshire Regiment, who cried, "God strike me blind!" and who thereupon "felt drowsy, and stretched himself on his bed, but when he attempted to open his eyes, he found he could not do so, and he has since been wholly deprived of the use of his eyes. He was conveyed to the Haslar Military Hospital, where he remains." As this was tolerably definite, inquiries were made at the Hospital. In answer to these, the principal wrote: "There is no truth whatever in the statement, and the lad who is supposed to have sworn never swore at all. He has a weak right eye; it was slightly inflamed--the result of a cold--but he is now quite well. He is very indignant and hurt at the statement, and, if he did swear, he is not blind."] [Footnote 26: Mr Bradlaugh was neither the projector nor the advocate of the Good Friday promenade.] Mr Bradlaugh never by any chance sought to propagate his opinions in a railway carriage, nor was he ever guilty of "such ridiculous folly," as he contemptuously termed it, as that attributed to him by the _British Monarchy_. Long before this story was attached to Mr Bradlaugh name it was told of Abner Kneeland, the Pantheist and abolitionist in America; indeed, the defiance of Deity in this particular manner is said to have originated in a story told by an American of Abner Kneeland.[27] It was ascribed to Mrs Emma Martin,[28] a Freethought speaker in England, who was eulogised by Mr G. J. Holyoake as "beautiful in expression, quick in wit, strong in will, eloquent in speech, coherent in connection, and of a stainless character, she was incomparable among public women." It was related again and again of Mr G. J. Holyoake, who wrote a denial of it as early as January 1854. Many times also was the challenge ascribed to Mrs Harriet Law, a lecturer on the Freethought platform thirty years ago; and later, when Mrs Besant came into the movement, she was made to play the part of heroine in this affecting drama, although, as she herself pointed out, "there is one very queer thing about the story; it never appears in any report given at the time of any lecture, and no one speaks of having heard the challenge the day, week, or month, or year after it was done. The pious Christian always heard it about twenty years ago, and has kept it locked in his bosom ever since."[29] [Footnote 27: Kneeland died in 1844. The tale was repeatedly contradicted.] [Footnote 28: Emma Martin died in 1857. In her case also it was contradicted.] [Footnote 29: _National Reformer_, June 6th, 1880.]