132 LIFE OF 1 HE AUTHOR. 



tract his mind, and he pointed out to the carpenter some trees which 

 were to be felled. He presently continued his route, and managed 

 to reach the spot where the boat was moored. Hitherto he had 

 refused all assistance, but he could not step from the bank into the 

 boat, and he said, " I am afraid I must ask you to help me in." 

 He walked from the landing-place into the house, changed his 

 clothes, and came and sat in the large room below. The pain in- 

 creasing, he rose from his seat after he had seen his doctor, and 

 though he had been bent double with anguish, he persisted in walk- 

 ing up-stairs without help, and would have gone to his own room in 

 the top-story, if, for the sake of saving trouble to others, he had not 

 been induced to stop half way in Miss Edmonstone's sitting-room. 

 Here he lay down upon the sofa, and was attended by his sisters-in- 

 law. The pain abated, and the next day he seemed better. In the 

 afternoon he talked to me a good deal, chiefly about natural 

 history. But he was well aware of his perilous condition, for he 

 remarked to me, " This is a bad business," and later on he felt his 

 pulse often, and said, " It is a bad case.' ; He was more than self- 

 possessed. A benignant cheerfulness beamed from his mind, and 

 in the fits of pain he frequently looked up with a gentle smile, and 

 made some little joke. Towards midnight he grew worse. The 

 priest, the Reverend R. Browne, was summoned, and Waterton got 

 ready to die. He pulled himself upright without help, sat in the 

 middle of the sofa, and gave his blessing in turn to his grandson, 

 Charlie, to his grand-daughter, Mary, to each of his sisters-in-law, 

 to his niece, and to myself, and left a message for his son, who was 

 hastening back from Rome. He then received the last sacraments, 

 repeated all the responses, Saint Bernard's hymn in English, and 

 the first two verses of the Dies Ires. The end was now at hand, and 

 he died at twenty-seven minutes past two in the morning of May 

 27, 1865. The window was open. The sky was beginning to grow 

 gray, a few rooks had cawed, the swallows were twittering, the land- 

 rail was craking from the Ox-close, and a favourite cock, which he 

 used to call his morning gun, leaped out from some hollies, and 

 gave his accustomed crow. The ear of his master was deaf to the 

 call. He had obeyed a sublimer summons, and had woke up to the 

 glories of the eternal world. 



