A post chaise now came in sight, when an officer stepped forward, as
it drove to the water's edge, and assisted a lady to alight from it.
Her eyes were red with weeping and her trembling limbs seemed scarcely
able to support her sinking frame. Her husband, for such I found he
was, who had gone towards the vehicle, showed little less emotion than
herself, which he, however, strove hard to suppress. These were
parents, whom each successive wave would bear still further from their
lovely offspring, towards whom their aching hearts would yearn, long
after their childish tears had ceased to flow. They, poor little
things, knew not the blessings they were about to lose, but their fond
and anxious father and mother could not forget, that they had
consigned them to strangers, who might or who might not be kind to
them, and who had too many under their care, to feel, or even show the
endearing tenderness that marks parental love.

In regimental costume, also, stood one, quite aloof, and from his
history, (which I afterwards learnt,) I found that his position on the
beach corresponded with that in which he stood in the world--alone;
cared for by none, himself indifferent to all around him; every
kindlier affection had withered in his breast. He was careless whither
he went or what became of him. Yet was he not always so, for he had
known a parent's and a husband's love. His now blighted heart had
often beaten with rapture, as the babe, on which he doted, first
lisped a father's name, taught by a mother, whose smile of affection
was, for years, the sun that gladdened his existence. But these bright
visions of happiness had all flown; that being whom he had so fondly
loved had dishonoured him, and neglected his boy, and on his return,
he found one in the grave, the other living in infamy.

Among the soldiers, I noticed one, on whom not more than nineteen