----------------------------------

By the way, I did not tell you the name of the sergeant who ushered
Philip Dalton into my shelter that night. His name was John Hampton, as
fine a soldier as ever stepped. He joined the artillery when I got my
commission. Poor Shock, for I knew him better by that name; he followed
me with the fidelity of a dog; he always contrived something hot for me
when we were almost starving, and any day he would have gone without
that I might eat. And I believe that he would have fought for me to the
death.

Poor Shock! The night when I was told that he could not live, after
being struck down by a piece of shell, I knelt by him in the mud and
held his hand. He just looked up in my face and said softly:

"Remember being shut up in the sand-pit, sir, and how you prayed? If
you wouldn't mind, sir--once again?"

I bent down lower and lower, and at last--soldier--hardened by horrors--
grown stern by the life I led--I felt as if I had lost in that rough,
true man the best of friends, and I cried over him like a child!

THE END.

End of Project Gutenberg's Brownsmith's Boy, by George Manville Fenn

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