It really was a pitiable sight to behold. Faint from the loss of
blood, he was carried below, where his wound was dressed by one of the
men, having no regular surgeon aboard, consequently its fatality was not
realized. The groans and writhings of the sufferer were heart-rending;
all day long did he rave, imploring Sampson, who attended him, to "take
the fiend away! that he was being devoured alive!" and thus did he toss
upon his bed till toward evening, when a change for the worse came over
him. Sampson saw that the seal of death was stamped upon his features,
and at set of sun, with an imprecation upon his dying lips, he had
breathed his last. O, how fearful to enter that spirit land thus
unprepared! to come before our Judge with a soul stained in the deepest
sins, trembling with its burden of guilt. Lord, grant that we be not
thus found when thou shalt call! Give us strength to overcome the world,
the flesh, and the devil, so that at the last, we shall taste those joys
which exist "where the wicked cease from troubling, and the weary are at
rest." They buried him in the deep sea. Perhaps his body lay side by
side with those who, through his unfeeling heart, had found a watery
grave; but we trust that, unlike him, they had gone to meet the reward
of having lived an holy life,--gone to the "sailor's home," in
the skies.
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