"
(Even Captain Hall, however, admits that a sea-funeral may sometimes
be a scene of unmixed sadness; and he records the following as the most
impressive of all the hundreds he has witnessed. It occurred in the
Leander, off the coast of North America.)
"There was a poor little middy on board, so delicate and fragile, that
the sea was clearly no fit profession for him; but he or his friends
thought otherwise; and as he had a spirit for which his frame was no
match, he soon gave token of decay. This boy was a great favourite with
every body--the sailors smiled whenever he passed, as they would have
done to a child--the officers petted him, and coddled him up with
all sorts of good things--and his messmates, in a style which did not
altogether please him, but which he could not well resist, as it was
meant most kindly, nicknamed him Dolly. Poor fellow!--he was long
remembered afterwards. I forget what his particular complaint was, but
he gradually sunk; and at last went out just as a taper might have done,
exposed to such gusts of wind as blew in that tempestuous region. He
died in the morning; but it was not until the evening that he was
prepared for a seaman's grave.
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