26 LIFE OF THE AUTHOR. 



before sunrise the next morning. A few days after this I was seized 

 with vomiting and fever during the night. I had the most dreadful 

 spasms, and it was supposed that I could not last out till noon the 

 next day. However, strength of constitution got me through it. In 

 three weeks more, multitudes were seen to leave the city, which 

 shortly after was declared to be in a state of pestilence. Some 

 affirmed that the disorder had come from the Levant ; others said 

 that it had been imported from the Havanna ; but I think it pro- 

 bable that nobody could tell in what quarter it had originated. 



" We had now all retired to the country-house my eldest uncle 

 returning to Malaga from time to time, according as the pressure of 

 business demanded his presence in the city. He left us one Sunday 

 evening, and said he would be back again some time on Monday ; 

 but that was my poor uncle's last day's ride. On arriving at his 

 house in Malaga, there was a messenger waiting to inform him that 

 Father Bustamante had fallen sick, and wished to see him. Father 

 Bustamante was an aged priest, who had been particularly kind to 

 my uncle on his first arrival in Malaga. My uncle went immediately 

 to Father Bustamante, gave him every consolation in his power, and 

 then returned to his own house very unwell, there to die a martyr to 

 his charity. Father Bustamante breathed his last before daylight; my 

 uncle took to his bed, and never rose more. As soon as we had 

 received information of his sickness, I immediately set out on foot 

 for the city. His friend Mr Power, now of Gibraltar, was already 

 in his room, doing everything that friendship could suggest or 

 prudence dictate. My uncle's athletic constitution bore up against 

 the disease much longer than we thought it possible. He struggled 

 with it for five days, and sank at last about the hour of sunset. He 

 stood six feet four inches high ; and was of so kind and generous a 

 disposition, that he was beloved by all who knew him. Many a 

 Spanish tear flowed when it was known that he had ceased to be. 

 We got him a kind of coffin made, in which he was conveyed at 

 midnight to the outskirts of the town, there to be put into one of the 

 pits which the galley-slaves had dug during the day for the reception 

 of the dead. But they could not spare room for the coffin ; so the 

 body was taken out of it, and thrown upon the heap which already 

 occupied the pit. A Spanish marquis lay just below him. 



