The Liverpool Standard and General Commercial Advertiser. — Liverpool, Merseyside, England, 1855-09-04 00:00:00

7111-8 P ATRIOT'S WIDOW. --- THE en emy was neari ng , 1 His banneud uprearing ; oti n t , r proud as nope disappearing, O ur bravest best, laid low I - • Of all it might bereave me, Attl he c ould not deceive me, • Il tas death to him to leave me— I I "ed, and bad e him go. E o e I • v ain ! r epulsed, retreating, ' n to our walls ; sad greeting ! u lle last and anguished meeting l l‘ I W e gave th at hapless hand. 11 , beard the victors crying, . t he dead and dyi ng , ' 8411 r our leaders flying ; i l "ect, and bade him stand. He,l Sto od where swords were flashing, vt, "ere the fi erce shell was crashing, ..es .the gored steeds were dashing, 7 st ood beneath mine eye; Al 1112. at ked his blood f as t fl ow i ng , 1 1 1 . artn more he av y grow i ng , 1,!4 eYe more faintly glowing ; I "ed, and saw him die. 1111 e Passed, and there came round me " s e who i n sorrow found me, "ith love that would have bound me Once more in wedded chain ; , 411(I friends were then entreating, kntl every hour repeating • Ili T at grief and youth were fleeting ; I ' 4vecf—but not again. 1 .,..." now there's none to cheer me, Z ar dlY are any near me ; ''''Y last fair child, I fear me, Dies also ere her prime! Th e world i s dark before me, 1/iod few Would n ow d ep l ore me : 4t REAvEN !—that brightens o'er me! I love —and bide my time. 1'0.9 Itqfkk bp Of Z • ler. zeutenant Joseph Rene Bellot, Che le of J ou '‘e Legion of Honour, 4.c., 4.c. With 4 4 41. e4 qf a Voyage in the Polar Sea's, in 1 111 v ' 3 ir John Franklin. London : Hurst a ckett. Who e memo, 4 p,,,,0131 of the gallant young Frenchman • Pk i I t J o h Y v olunteered hi s serv i ces in the search 4, 11 4 11 Franklin and his unfortunate corn- Et mus t oi meet with a cordial welcome in ke. be e 8:4 Circle of society ; and that welcome h 1471,1141106114a0ced by the recollection of t e tehl cir cumstances in which he perished... 40hred, met ci r cumstances as in the career on which it is 1 84 lY af e T e is continual evidence of those 1 4 4 t il. , - °)ls by which the young sailor—he 46 -4142 : t t„',t3 7 -seven at the period of his death — til t IN urged on in his path towards 41 111 jeCt . llorn in - the humblest ranks of life, B thith who of the memoir was one of four chil the 11 41 4 fe°4stituted the family of a common a rrier in Paris, but who removed from eti6 eh • m ei , had capital to Rochefort before Joseph i l l 44,4 ,Completed his fifth year ; and from eirph, gallant youth, at all times and in ko.ta.tanees, dated his life and hope. To Roti ntleipality of Rochefort he owed his educa eent alad advancement, and in thcha.stth=onwaenrde a aspirations after kel.ed his*i_Among the distinctive peculiarities of this 'e Yonne , man was a firmly rooted oted sense of SOPHIA ISELIN. O tt ' , I ?.E VIE TT'S. ;56. SUPPLEMENT TO ,hr atturrpooll -zT-litantlfartf* OP 1 4 TheY Liff AND GENERAL COMMERCIAL ADVERTISER. gratitude for even trivial benefits, and an unbounded feeling of that sentiment for favours of importance. nspired by it, he was unceasing in the expression of his gratitude to all from whom he had received benefits. Grateful to the municipality which had educated him and favoured his advancement—grateful to his father for the sacrifices endured on his account—his dream of youthful ambition was based on a desire to vindicate the partiality evinced towards him, and, full of this, he became a midshipman in the French navy, and started on what promised to be a brilliant career. Before he had passed the age of boyhood, the son of the humble Rochefort artisan had, by his ardour and promptitude in action, secured for himself the proud distinction of Chevalier of the Legion of Honour. Smitten by the desire of earning fame in a good cause, and in a true spirit of chivalry, while yet a mid shipman, he joined the expedition fitted out by Lady Franklin to search for her lost husband, courting danger, but declining to receive her pay As an acknowledgment of the merit of this gallant offer, the French Ministry of Marine promoted him to a Lieutenancy, and with that rank he joined the crew of the Prince Albert, and com menced the journal which forms the most in teresting feature of the two volumes now under consideration. Like a true'Frenchman, he com mences his perilous voyage with sea-sickness, an initiatory feature which must strike the majority of our island " Salts" with some surprise, and lead not a few of them to believe that his rank must have been conferred for service in that mythical branch of the naval force known as the " Horse Marines ;" yet it was not so—the young and ardent Bellot had been a sailor in the true sense, and had seen and rendered good service on the wave. He in the following good-humoured fashion narrates THE HUMILIATION OF SEA-SICKNESS. 4th June.— The Prince Albert pitches frightfully, and will certainly carry away so:ne of her sticks at sea. Light as a bird of the storm, like it she rolls on the crests of the waves • and the more exact the comparison becomes, the more I find myself out of sorts. I walk the deck ; but am thrown violently against the bulwark. Alas !in vain I try to conceal it from myself, lam seasick. 0 shame ! O despair ! I look round to see who are the witnesses of my dishonour; fortunately I have none but 4ccomplices. Mr. Leask and Mr. Hepburn, the only two whom this fatal sickness spares, are not present. I wear myself out in efforts to read and write, but can do neither. Yet I have great need of application. Oh, the nothingness of human nature ! Be the most remarkable man, the most accomplished savant, be Arago, Lamartine, put your foot on board a ship, and there you are reduced to naught, not an idea left you. Du plus grand des humains voila ce qui vous reste ! A shadow incapable of pronouncing anything but inarticulate sounds. A smell of whiskey proves to me that all my shipmates are not sick only from the motion of the ship ; and that some of them, before becoming real teetotallers, have been bidding a last farewell to the powers of this world. I bethink me of the pagan practice of invocation of the sea, and offer to Neptune a sacrifice he cannot fail to ap preciate at its true worth. I cut off a superb beard, and his wrath is appeased. Quos ego—at last I can admire, at my ease, the northern coasts of Scotland, and the snow topped mountains reflecting the rays of the sun. - - Unceasing in his anxiety for the acquisition of solid information, he possessed also a surprising aptitude for the acquirement of knowledge, and lost no opportunity of increasing his stores. For this purpose he availed himself of every occasion, where he could possibly do so, of securing intEr- course with the natives, and becoming acquainted with their habits and language. The journal abounds in interesting narratives . of such inter course, all of which will be read with satisfaction and advantage. The annexed is a fair specimen ; it is a DESCRIPTION OF ..4.1C ESQUIDIAUX NUT. It was not without the help of one of the by-standers that I could guess that an opening hardly two feet high, and covered with a skin, was the door. Puffs of hot air loaded with fetid emanations reach me ; I feel my courage waver, but at last I make :my way in, after crawling a couple of yards through a sort of sewer with damp walls, the foot of which rests in a muddy compost of blood, water, oil, and grease. No ; I shall never forget the impression made on me by what I saw, though I thought myself pre pared for everything by the numerous descriptions I had read of these miserable hovels. This one, too, is in a place comparatively civilised, where the example of Europeans must, and does, create wants and notions of comfort un known to wandering tribes, in an establishment visited every year by an inspector sent by the government of Co penhagen. A rectangular enclosure of stones, covered on the outside with a thick layer of earth, and on the interior with three or four planks, forms the body of the hut; at each of the doors and at the further end, a sort of trellis, a foot from the ground, and three or four feet wide, serving for bed and table. In the middle space, of about three feet, lies half a seal, from which the fat has been removed, but the bloody flesh, trampled under foot, is there at hand whenever the inmates of the hut feel disposed to eat. On one side of the hut is an old woman nearly blind, with grisly locks, bare legged and bare armed, sewing skins, which she moves about with her feet and hands. Her red eyelids, contrasting with her bistre skin, seem still more prominent from the leanness which is only found in individuals of her race. She looks the image of one of the witches of Macbeth. Near her lies her son, who sits up to do me the honours of his house. •At the further end a young woman, nearly- naked, is suckling a naked infant, which she holds with one hand, whilst with the other she snatches up some skins which constitute her garments. Two lamps fed with fetid oil do the double service of light ing and warming the apartment. Harpoons, lances, and rolls of skin hang from the walls, or are laid against it, the lower ends resting in rubbish and offal of all sorts. There is no opening for the escape of smoke ; a single hole near the entrance, glazed with thin intestinal membranes, alone allows it to be seen that there is an outer world. I feel suffocated; my nose, throat, eyes, all are affected, but I want to see. I even try to conceal my sensations; and when an oily hand is stretched out to me in token of welcome, I hold out a handkerchief as a gift, and thus avoid the good-natured grasp that threatens me. Some trifling presents soon make friends of these poor disin herited children of nature ; and, like the diver preparing for a long effort, I try to see as much as possible, holding my breath and inhaling as little as I can of that atmos phere. A kindly feeling is everywhere manifested throughout these volumes, and that sweetness of disposition for which he was so remarkable, gained from even the " poor disinherited children of nature," affection and esteem. The Esquimaux, when informed of his death by Captain Inglefield, on his way home, shed floods of tears, and in ac cents broken with emotion exclaimed, " Poor Bellot ! poor Bellot !" They recalled to memory many of those acts of kindness by which he had endeared himself to their affections. Among others they recounted how, on one occasion, when he saw one of their people with a broken leg, dragging himself slowly and painfully over the snow, he contrived for him a wooden leg, and had it made as a present for the poor cripple, by the ship's carpenter. The name of Bellot has long been favourably known and highly cherished by the English people. The feeling of respect and admiration will be greatly augmented by the publication and