TOBY PHILPOT 11 



r> 



I remember, of leading down the belle of the party — a 

 most splendid specimen of her sex, and also an excellent 

 votary of Terj^sichore, the wife of one of the officers. 

 After keeping it up till morning, I returned on shore, in 

 company with some whose acquaintance I had made, 

 Tvdtli many grateful thanks to my old friend and shipmate 

 for my pleasurable enjoyment, of which I have a perfect 

 recollection — not forgetting my own audacity, at the 

 recital of which he laughed immoderately. 



Poor Toby ! ^ thou hadst as true and honest a heart as 

 ever warmed the breast of a British sailor, and as noble a 

 spirit. Xearly fifty years have rolled away since the awful 

 calamity that bereft their country of so many excellent 

 officers, and of so many hundreds of fine fellows, lost to 

 and bemoaned by their families and friends, occurred ; and 

 the sad remembrance of thy, alas ! j)remature, death is 

 more forcibly brought to my mind by the comparatively 

 recent bereavement of a fine, handsome, high-spirited 

 boy. Just of the age I then was, in the heyday of 

 youth, hopeful and joyous, foUoAving the profession of his 

 choice, he died in the camp before Sebastopol, of cholera ; 

 cut off in the blossom of his days, surrounded by strangers 

 — no one to whom he could impart his last farewell to 

 those most dear to him — no one to lift his thoughts to the 

 fountain of mercy — in the sound of cannon and in the 

 midst of the turmoil of war was his spirit dismissed. 

 May you both, unprepared as I fear you were, be 

 presented at His judgment-seat by that great Mediator, 



^ This young and active, but short-lived, officer was named Henry 

 Philpot, and had no affinity to the celebrated original, except in 

 name. 



VOL. I. I 



