lf, he soon wearied of the life he led,
and longed to return to his home and his kind mother. Oftentimes he
lingered near the street she lived in. Once he had been very unhappy,
for he had seen his brother and sister that day pass near him, and it
had rekindled all his love for them. They appeared happy in their
innocence; he was miserable in his crime. He now determined to go home
and pray to be forgiven. The evening was dark and wet, and as he entered
the court in which his friends lived, his heart failed him, and he
turned back; but, unable to resist the impulse, he again returned, and
stole under the window of the room. A rent in the narrow curtain enabled
him to see within. His mother sat by the fire, and her countenance was
so sad, that he was sure she thought of him; but the room looked so
comfortable, and the whole scene was so unlike the place in which he had
lately lived, that he could no longer hesitate. He approached the door;
the latch was almost in his hand, when shame and fear, and a thousand
other vile and foolish notions, held him back; and the boy who in
another moment might have been happy--_was lost_. He turned away, and I
believe he has never seen them since. Going on in crime, he in due
course of time was transported for robbery. His term of seven years
expired in Van Diemen's Land. Released from forced servitude, he went a
whaling-voyage, and was free nearly two years. Unhappily, he was then
charged with aiding in a robbery, and again received a sentence of
transportation. He was sent to Port Arthur, there employed as one of the
boat's crew, and crossing the bay one day with a commissariat-officer,
the boat was capsized by a sudden squall. In attempting to save the life
of the officer, he was seized by his dying grasp, and almost perished
with him; but extricating himself, he swam back to the boat. Seeing the
drowning man exhausted, and sinking, he dashed forward again, diving
after him, and happily succeeded in saving his life. For this honorable
act, he would have received a remission of sentence; but ere it could
arrive, he and five others made their escape. He had engaged with these
men in the plan to seize the boat, and although sure of the success of
the application in his favor, he could not now draw back. The result I
have already shewn. There were two more men concerned in the mutiny,
who, with those I have mentioned, and those killed on board the brig,
made up the number of the boat's crew