tenderness as husband and father were at the same time beautifully illustrated, and this, as well as the other qualities mentioned, were at times lightened by flashes of that quaint humour which had always been one of his characteristics. He derived great comfort from a visit of a week made him in December by his brother-in-law and life-long friend. Dr. Brodie S. Herndon, of Savannah, in Georgia, though his professional judgment as to the nature of the malady, which was ulceration of the stomach, was no more encouraging than that previously given by his regular attendant, Dr. E. L. Madison, of the Virginia Military Institute.
The chief pleasure of his long confinement seemed the society of his family, on whom, individually and collectively, he loved to invoke the choicest blessings of Heaven. His youngest grandchild, an infant of a few weeks, was in the house, and he told her father that when he saw him fading fast he must bring the little one to receive his blessing. "It may be that the prayer of a repentant sinner will be answered," he added. It is needless to say that this request was complied with. He said he almost felt as if this child had come to take his place—she just entering life, he just leaving it.
To two friends at a distance—Commodore Jansen and the Rev. F. W. Tremlett—he sent loving farewell messages. He directed one of his daughters to write to the former at the Hague, and tell him how ill he was; how he longed to see him, and what a solace his love was, and had always been, to him. The latter was the friend by whom, some years before, he had been admitted to the full communion of the Church. "When I am dead," he said, "write to Tremlett and tell him that I think with gratitude of him as a means of bringing me to the communion of Christ, and that I love him. Tell him that when I die and go there" (raising his eyes upward), "I will, if a repentant sinner may, intercede for a mansion for him."
