New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1874-11-25
PRICE FOUR CENTS.
A HERO. AND A MARTYR.
BY CHARLES READE.
Furnished exclusively 10 The TEBUsE for p,beaHon IN
Ale Ullils4 States, by Nr. RetAe.

Ne Cliiis1 States, Jy HI. Refde.
Upon the second day Of October, 1886, Tho
Glasgow Tines told the world moving story.
A little boy was drowning in the Clyde.
There were a score Of people on the bank;
but they only eroaEod, and glared, and fut-
tered at the child's screams and struggles;
not one had both the courage and the skill to
plunge in and rescue him.
But presently came an elderly man who was
peerless swimmer and diver. and had saved
more than forty lives in that very river.
Alas he was now stone blind; little girl,
his granddaughter, was leading him by tho
hand.
Yet to him his blindness seemed no obstacle.
"Let me to him! lee me to him y he cried;
an save him yet"
But in the general dsmay and agitation, his
appeal was UNDECIDED at first. Then he screamed
out in generous fury, " Ye DAFT fules, a mon
disna SOON with his cen: just fling me in tho
water, and cry me (A) to him, and yen see.'
His prayer would have been granted, but
his granddaughter, with girls affection and
unreasOning fears, clung round his knees,
and screamed, "Na, na, sc wadna,-ye wad-
nap
This caused hesitation when there was no
longer moment to lose. The boy sank for
the last time; deep groan from the specta-
tors told the sad end. and the poor bind hero
went home, tlinging his arms about in
despair. and crying like child for, as no
afterward said, in telling the lamentable tale,
cit was q laddie flung away clean 1uns
away"
The chrOncler went on to enumcrate the
gallant exploits of this very James Lambert
before he lost his sight and the whole story
set me thinking l began to weigh the vulgar
griefs of men against James Lambert'5 high
distress. l taxed myself, and dissected things
that had made me rage or gricye; now they
seemed small and selfish.
From that my mind went into books, and
fell to comparing the feats and the tears OF
James Lambert with the feats and tears of
heroes, whom history has embdimed, or poetry
canonized.
Strange to say, it was not my living c0tem-
porary, but the famous figures of poetry and
history, that paled little in this new crucible.
often detected some drawback to their valor,
and a faint of egoti5m in their grief. This
made me suspect that poetry, like its readers,
may have been dlzzled by the glare of armor
and the blare of trumpets, aud left heroic
men unsung, who best deserved q bard. For.
look below the surface-unsung Lambert's
was the highest courage; it was solitary cOur-
age, and no trumpets to stir 1t; 10 arm0r,
no joint enthusiasm; often no spectators
Summer and Winter he plunged into tho
Clyde, and saved men and women, with
his bare body, and at great peril to his
life: for the best swimmer is dead man II
drowning person clutches him and cripples
him. Aud what was his reward on earthi For
his benevolent courage he was stricken blind,
through so many immersions of his heated
body in icy water.
Was not this poetic calamity, and a 1T
theme for tendcrest verse;
Being thus afflicted for bis virtue, he heard
q fellow-creature drowning. He was potent az
ever in the water, but impotent on land; and
they would not help him into the water; and
so a young life was flung away, that he could
have saved, and he went home hinging his
arms about in agony. and weeping tears, that
angles might be proud to dry with loving wing
Alas! and is it 500 The eyes, that can no
longer see, can weep.
noble rare, unselish, and most poetical
distress. though told in the plain prose OF
journal 1t made me desire to SEQ James
Lambert, and hear his tale from his own lips,
and give him my poor sympathy.
But, unfortunately, l am a Procrastinator.
OF course | can do unadvisabc things expedi-
tiously: but, when a wise or good thing is to
be done, "nOnum preadtr IN dGHam,' is my
motto. So, for ten mortal years, and more, 1
was always ng-going-going-vis James
Lambert
At last, am ashamed to say when, being in
Sclkirkshire, | shook off "thc thief of time,'
and went into Glasgow to see this man, hero
in his youth. martyr in old age.
But had lived long enough to observe that,
when you seek man, who was alive and
elderly twelve years ago, you find hc has been
dead from four to seven. SO, on Che road to
Glasgow, | blamed myself bitterly for my be-
setting sin, and actually said TO myself, very
earnestly,
"---- from this moment
The very rrstlincs OF INV heart shall DO
The trstlings OF my hand"