HIS BKOTHEK'S DEATH 155 



at Tasmania, in August 1840, eleven months after he had left 

 home. The black- edged letter beginning, * My dear and only 

 son,' turned all his delight into mourning. He was devoted 

 to his brother William, ' so warm-hearted a fellow that he would 

 cut his right hand off to help even a stranger.' The brother 

 who had been ' hourly in his thoughts ' these many days had 

 been dead since the first day of the year. From the Cape he 

 had written to his mother : 



So poor William has gone to Jamaica ; if you but knew 

 how often I think and dream of him you would not be sur- 

 prized at the sorrow I felt that he should have parted from 

 you, though it is doubtless for the best. Poor Isabella 1 

 is left behind. ... I feel sure it will be a delight especially 

 to my sisters to take charge of the child till my return when 

 I shall consider it my own should it be better to leave it 

 behind than take it to a foreign country, or should any other 

 circumstances demand another father for it. [He knew 

 William was out of health, though he did not believe, as some 

 did, that he was threatened with consumption.] I wish 

 very much that I had received that letter before, as I had 

 intended to send my brother a check which I can well spare ; 

 it is now too late and I am sure money must be wanted ; 

 he need not look upon it as a gift, at any rate it would be 

 but a poor recompense for all the kindness I have received 

 from the poor fellow's hands. The child I do hope to 

 bring up, and you must tell that to my future housekeeper 

 Maria, to whom I send my best love. 



It was to this favourite sister that he unbosomed himself ; 

 the poignant contrast of exchanging the hardships of ' the most 

 tempestuous latitude in the worst season of the year ' for the 

 calm beauty of the Derwent with Hobart set in tall trees under 

 a snow-capped hill, only to find in his envied package of fifteen 

 or sixteen letters the news that should make him the one 

 sorrowful man in the ship : * now he is gone, and there will 

 be none of my childhood's playmates when I return to talk 

 over bygone times with, for he was at school my only 

 companion.' 



1 He married Isabella Smith, April 22, 1839. 



