For some months I had incessant headache; my hair became dried up, then turned grey, and finally came off.

Weighing myself shortly after my recovery, at the age of fifteen, I found that I just balanced fifty-six pounds.

I took up mensuration, then astronomy, working at them slowly, but giving the bulk of my spare time to chemistry.
"In the year 1869, when I was sixteen years old, I came across Cuthbert Bede's book, entitled 'Photographic Pleasures.' It is an amusing book, giving an account of the rise and progress of photography, and at the same time having a good-natured laugh at it.

I read the book carefully, and took up photography as an amusement, using some apparatus which belonged to my father, who had at one time dabbled in the art.

I was soon able to take fair photographs.