Wednesday night was a long nightmare of suffering, and by Thursday morning I must have presented an almost mummified appearance. From the faces of the Governor and the doctor when they came into my cell and looked at me I thought that they would at once arrange for my release. But the hours passed and no order for release came. I decided that I must force my release, and I got up from the bed where I had been lying and began to stagger up and down the cell. When all strength failed me and I could keep my feet no longer I lay down on the stone floor, and there, at four in the afternoon, they found me, gasping and half unconscious. And then they sent me away. I was in a very weakened condition this time, and had to be treated with saline solutions to save my life. I felt, however, that I had broken my prison walls for a time at least, and so this proved. It was on July 24th that I was released. A few days later I was borne in an invalid's chair to the platform of the London Pavillion. I could not speak, but I was there, as I had promised to be. My licence, which by this time I had ceased to tear up because it had an auction value, was sold to an American present for the sum of one hundred pounds. I had told the Governor on leaving that I intended to sell the licence and to spend the money for militant purposes, but I had not expected to raise such a splendid sum as one hundred pounds. I shall always remember the generosity of that unknown American friend.
A great medical congress was being held in London in the summer of 1913, and on August 11th we held a large meeting at Kingsway Hall, which was attended by hundreds of visiting doctors. I addressed this meeting, at which a ringing resolution against forcible feeding was passed, and I was allowed to go home without police interference. It was, as a matter of fact, the second time during that month that I had spoken in public without molestation. The presence of so many distinguished medical men in London may have suggested to the authorities that I had better be left alone for the time being. At all events I was left alone, and late in the month I went, quite publicly, to Paris, to see my daughter Christabel and plan with her the campaign for the coming autumn. I needed rest after the struggles of the past five months, during which I had served, of my three years' prison sentence, not quite three weeks.