LAST SCENE OF ALL. 337 



and family. " I feel that I am dying," were the 

 words with which Hodson now greeted him, as the 

 two men clasped hands once more. "I should 

 like to have seen the end of the campaign, and 

 to have returned to England to see my friends, 

 but it has not been permitted. I trust I have 

 done my duty." 



"I could have no difficulty," says Napier, "in 

 answering this question, as the voice of every one 

 in the country proclaims it. ... I was grieved to 

 leave him, but it was necessary for me to be at 

 my post, and before I had time to return to him 

 he had gone to his rest, calm and composed at 

 his last hour as he was in the front of dano;er in 

 battle. I took his ring, and Dr Anderson cut off 

 his hair." 



After Napier's departure, writes Dr Anderson, 

 "he continued rapidly becoming weaker, though 

 occasionally talking to me. At one o'clock I saw 

 his end was rapidly approaching, and I asked him 

 to say anything he w^ished. He said No, he had no 

 message to any one, he had told Colonel Napier 

 all his private affairs, but to send love to his wife 

 and that his last thoughts were of her. These were 

 his words." 



" All this time," continues Dr Anderson, " I was 

 stooping by his bedside holding his right hand. 

 He frequently grasped mine and, smiling, said, 

 ' Oh, what pain ! ' I had my watch in my hand 

 when he last spoke to me ; it was a quarter-past 

 one ; it was a mere whisper, ' Oh God ! ' and in ten 

 minutes more, at twenty - five minutes past one 

 o'clock, the sad scene was over. He died most 



