a rheumatic affection of the
joints, accompanied by other ailments. He became unable to walk to
school, and he finally left in May, 1662. His self-training now began,
and Sacroborco's "De Sphaera" was lent to him, with the perusal of
which he was so pleased that he forthwith commenced a course of
astronomic studies. Accordingly, he constructed a rude quadrant and
calculated a table of the sun's altitudes, pursuing his studies, as he
said himself, "under the discouragement of friends, the want of
health, and all other instructors, except his better genius."[54]

Alluding to accidents as sometimes developing greatness, Mr. Smiles
remarks that Pope's satire was in a measure the outcome of his
deformity; and Lord Byron's club foot, he adds, "had probably not a
little to do with determining his destiny as a poet. Had not his mind
been embittered, and made morbid by his deformity, he might never have
written a line. But his misshapen foot stimulated his mind, roused his
ardour, threw him upon his own resources, and we know with what
result."

Again, in numerous other ways, it has been remarked, accidents have
taken a lucky turn, and, if not being the road to fortune, have had
equally important results. The story is told of a young officer in the
army of General Wolfe who was supposed to be dying of an abscess in
the lungs. He was absent from his regiment on sick leave, but resolved
to join it when a battle was expected, "for," said he, "since I am
given over I had better be doing my duty, and my life's being
shortened a few days matters not." He received a shot which pierced
the abscess and made an opening for the discharge, the result being
that he recovered and lived to eighty years of age.

Brunel, the celebrated engineer, had a curious accident, which might
have forfeited his life. While one day playing with his children and
astonishing them by passing a half sovereign through his mouth out at
his ear, he unfortunately swallowed the coin, which dropped into his
windpipe. Brunel regarded the mischief caused by the accident as
purely mechanical; a foreign body had got into his breathing
apparatus, and must be removed, if at all, by some mechanical
expedient. But he was equal to the emergency, and had an apparatus
constructed which had the effect of relieving him of the coin. In
after days he used to tell how, when his body was inverted, and he
heard the gold piece strike against his upper front teeth, was,
perhaps, the