Diary And Notes Of Horace Templeton, Esq. Volume II

Day breaks at length – that must be the dawn! But my eyes are failing, and my hands are numbed. Poor Gilbert! how sound is his sleep! He has turned – and now he dreams! What is he muttering? Good night! good night! Even so – good night!

How cold – how very cold I feel! I thought it had been over! Oh, for a little longer of this dalliance here! – ay, even here, on the last shores of life! Inexpressibly sweet the odours are, and the birds! How I drink in those strains! – they will float with me along the journey I am going! Weaker and weaker. This must be death! Farewell!

The circumstances which have placed these papers in my hands afford me the only apology I can offer for making them public. They were bequeathed to me, in some sort, as a recompense for services which my poor master had long intended to have rewarded very differently; nor, save under the pressure of an actual necessity, should I devote them now to the purpose of personal assistance. I neither understand how to correct nor arrange them. I have no skill in editorship, and send them to the printer without the addition of a letter by any hand except his who wrote them. It is true, some pages have been withheld – I am not sure whether necessarily or not – for I have no competent judgment to guide me. I would, however, hope, that what I here give to the world may, while benefiting the servant, leave no stain upon the memory of the best of masters.

GEORGE GILBERT,

Valet to the late H. Templeton, Esq.

Dover, January 1848.

Postscript to Envoy.

A word may be necessary as to the political allusions, as they were all written in the autumn of the past year, many are, of course, inapplicable to countries whose condition the wonderful events lately occurring have modified: many are, however, almost correct in every detail of prophetic foresight; and, it is not necessary that I should repeat, have neither been changed nor added to since penned by my late master.

THE END.

notes

1

Every Starling in Germany is called Jacob.