Page:Isvar Chandra Vidyasagar, a story of his life and work.djvu/564

Rh forgiveness, he did not forgive htm, but insisted on his retirement.

The heroic Vidyasagar was broken down by ill-health; he was enfeebled and reduced to a skeleton; yet there was no cessation of his benevolent works. In 1869, the fatal Malarial Fever broke out in Burdwan. It had made its first appearance in the year 1825 at Mahammadpur, a large village in the Jessore district, which was devastated by its ravages. In the course of the next 44 years it had ravaged the greater part of the 24 Pergunnas and Nuddea districts. It then crossed the Bhagirathi and suddenly appeared in Hugli and Burdwan. The sufferings and hardships of the poor people were quite undescribable. There was no reckoning how many persons succumbed under the fatal disease. The news-papers of the time, particularly the Hindoo Patriot, appealed loudly to Government for help. No sooner did the fearful tidings reach his ears, than the tender-hearted, benevolent Vidyasagar was moved to compassion, and hastened to the field of action.

This time he did not put up with his friend, Pyari Chand Mitra, but took up his lodgings in a separate rented house, where he opened a charitable dispensary for the poor sufferers. He devoted himself to minister to them by nursing them and supplying them with medicines at their homes. In his travels round the city he witnessed the pitiful state of the suffering people, and saw numbers