Eastern times. [volume] (Bath, Me.) 1846-1857, 1855-08-02
WistelIang
A Beautiful and Touching Story.

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The 'Grosyenor,' an East Indaman, home
ward bound, goes ashore on the coast of Caf-
fraria. 1t is resolved that the officers, pas
sengers, and crew, in number one hundred and
thlrty-five souls, shall endeavor to penetrate
on foot across trackless deserts infested by
wild beasts and cruel savages, to the Dutch
settlements at the Cape of Good Hope With
this forlorn object before them, they finally
separate into two parties, never more to meet
on earth.
There is a solitary child among the passen-
gers, little boy seven years old, who has no
relation there; and when the first party is
moving away, he cries after some member of
1t who has been kind TO him. The CRYING of
child might be supposed to be a little thing
to men in such great extremity; but it touch
es them, and he is Immediately taken into that
detachment; from which time forth this child
is subimely made sacred charge. He is
pushed on little raft across broad rivers by
the swimming sailors; they carry him by
turns through the deep sand and long grass,
he patiently walking at all other times; they
share with him such putrid fish as they find
to eat; they lie down and wait for him when
the rough carpenter, who becomes his especial
friend, lags behind. Beset by lions and tigers,
by savages, by thirst and hunger, by death in
crowd of ghastly shapes, they never-oh,
Father Of all mankind, thy name be blessed
for it forget this child. The captain stops
exhausted, and his faithful coxswain goes back
and is seen 20 sit down by his side, and nei-
ther Of the two shall be any more beheld until
the great last day; but as the rest 60 on for
their lives, they take the child with them
The carpenter dies of poisonous berries eaten
in starvation; and the steward, succeeding to
the command of the party, succeeds to the sa-
cred guardianship of the child.
God knows all he does for the poor baby.
He cheerfully carries him in his arms when
he himself is weak and i'll |; how he feeds him
when he himself is griped with want how
he folds his ragged jacket around him, lays
little warm face with woman's tenderness,
upon his sunburnt breast, soothes him in his
sufferiDgs, sings TO him as he limps along un-
mindful of his own parched and bleeding feet
Divided for few days from the rest, they dig
a grave for their good friend the cooper-these
two companions alone in the wilderness, and
the time comes when they are both i'll, and
beg their wretched partners in despair, re-
duced and few in number now, to wait by them
one day. They wait by them one day; they
wait by them two days. On the morning of
the third they move very softly about in max
ing their preparations for the resumption of
their journey, for the child is sleeping by the
fire, and it is agreed that he shall not be dis
turbed until the last moment. The moment
comes; the fire is dying-the child is dead
His faithful friend, the steward, fingers but
little while behind him. His grief is great
He staggers on for few days, lies down in
the wilderness, and dies. But he shall be re-
united in his immortal spirit-who can doubt
it ti-with the child, where he and the poor
carpenter shall be raised up with the words,
'lnasmuch as ye have done it unto the least of
these, ye have done it unto me-