The Sun.
London, England, 1830-08-04 00:00:00

THE DYING SOLDIER.

" Thanks," said the bleeding prisoner; " lam very
weak, and unable to go on ; entreat your soldiers
that I may rest a moment here, in your keeping."
The request was instantly made and complied
with. Pendergast caused the wounded man to be
borne aside to a spot not exposed to much observa-
tion, and detained some soldiers to guard them
against intrusion.
" Thanks, again : this is indeed a favour," re-
sumed Sir Redmond, as he vainly tried to lay his
writhing limbs on the grass, in some position which
would not pain them.
" 'Tis nothing; I owe you more, much more,"
answered Pendergast ; " only tell me what that
much more, and more after it, shall be—what, Sir
Redmond you change sadly I"
" Water, a drop of water," murmured the old
soldier, in an effort to keep himself from swooning.
" Water there is none near us; but make shift
with better liquor :" and Pendergast produced a
wine-flask and put it to his lips. The dying man
drank eagerly.

" This is loss of blood, not fatigue," continued
Pendergast : " you have been on the English
bayonets since we parted, Sir Redmond—you bleed
about the body, too."
" A little, yet enough to let life out : and I do
not want it to stay in. Fortune, country, kith, and
kin, all but honour is lost. Worthless life, go you
with it."

" Say not so, brave friend,—for friend I call you
friend 1 hold you, friend you have been to me;" and
w;th a manly tear on his lids, Pendergast clasped
Sir Redmond's band with the clasp that only men
can give and take.
" Well, and friend I would be called by you,"
continued Sir Redmond ; " but our friendslop will
end as quickly as it has begun. Cry not nay, again,
Sir," he went on in a changed and broken voice;
" there is that at my heart which needs no earthly
comfort, holds no earthly hope. But you have
wished to do me no harm, or rather, to do a good
turn to one 1 shall leave after me, for my sake."
" Your Lady ?" inquired Pendergast, after he
had watched some time a convulsion in the fraine of
his new friend, which wholly took away his power
of utterance.

" No I I thank God, no I" cried Sir Redmond,
with unexpected energy; and it seemed, in the up-
turning of his eyes to heaven, and in the rapid mo-
tion of his lips, that he continued to give praise that
the partner of his bosom had already been removed
from a life which, after his death, would have been
to her, had she not gone before him, a lot of suffer-
ings and bitterness.

.44 Then, you have children ?" continued Pender,
gait, breaking another pause, and willing to assist
the dying officer in the expression otbis last wishes:
•0 I had--four," answered Sir.Redinond : " four,
although I em a man scarce yet stricken in years;
four sons, and three of them able to follow me to
the field:for their- country, their king, and their re-
ligion, at :the breaking out of these
.unnatural wars.
But I have them not now. One fell at Hills-
borough, where we crushed, with young Hamilton
at our head, your great Northern Union at a blow,
Sir l"—martial, spirit and party pride lit up for a
moment the- speaker's eye, and strengthened his
tone;—" and him I did scarcely sorrow for;—the.
next, my second a soldier of nineteen. I saw rolling
down with the blood-stained Boyne river; and mythird, third, not eighteen, sank at my feet to-ay, a few-
minutes Aix I pilled from -you; the man who put
a bayonet -into the boy's heart did so because my
pear FAX hid Struck it aside when it was aimed at
his father's, sly."
Here Pendergast had to Support Sir Redmond's
head, as it fell bitek from weakness. It was on his
tongue to isanage the anguish of the parent's recol-
lections:by informing him that he. too had lost a.
son, anti an only one, upon the field that day ; but a
reflection .that it was his duty not to interrupt , the
dying mans train of thought by any concerns of his
own, checked the. words he was about to utter, and
caused him to whisper, instead, is But there yet
lives a fourth box?"
" There does-'—answered Sir Redmond, gasp-
ing; "my yotmg'est —my darling—the last child of,
his mother--and almost a child yet—and friend-
less—and fortuneless—for his family are dead, or
exiles—or will :be--And all his patrimony seized I
upon—or run through—lavished upon, this cause;
and I—" Pendergast now felt a strenuous pres-
sure, which the speaker had not before been able to
return for his; thin he saw the dread Eruggle ; and
after Sir Redmond, writhing round, had said,'" Oh,
God, be watchful over the child here, as -I now
crave your mercy for myself!" Pendergast looked
upon a corpse. ' ,
Long he looked; and then arising, commanded
the soldiers who stood near to accompany him down
the bill, and into the bog. His thought was, that
he knew where to find the body of
.hia own son, for
he had seen him fall: He was successful. The men
bore it, still at Ilia bidding, back to the spot he, had
left; and there, almost at the top of the bill, hecorn-
mended them to make a shallow grave: " They
shall he side by side, even upon this field," he said
to himself, " in earnest of the vow I have vowed to
the unuttered wish of my former fae,eye, heti
shall they lie, fottetful of party rancour, as I shell
he forgetful of it to this old man's only livitig son:"
for," continued Pendergast, as he walked away, after
the littkgrave had been filled soil raise 4", the child
shall horny child."—Front Me Disowned. -

ALEXANDER Tuft GREAT'S' POLICY...-.
Arritaitnent* great object seems to have been the tate-
bli*hment of one great and pettnanent empire; Of which the
different parts would be united. by mutual political and
commercial advantages. - Hence' he sought to do away all
national prejudice*, and make his different subjects- feel
themselves one people. To attain this object, he founded
those numerous Grecian chic* in various parts of his ori•
ental dominions; and had. he lived a *w years longer he
might possibly have, in a great measure, accompli*hed
what he aimed at. But his early death frustrated all thise
great projects, and the ambition of his Generals speedily
pulled down the fabric he was erecting.--Dr. Lardner's
Cabinet Cyciopedia,Vol.lX. I being. Outlines of Ili km..