t be
_our_ George,' said the wanderer, 'he was a _Doctor_! This was
the first, and it was also the last, tidings that ever reached
Mr. Crabbe of his brother William; and upon the Aldeburgh
sailor's story of his casual interview, it is obvious that
he built this tale."

The story as developed by Crabbe is pathetic and picturesque, reminding
us in its central interest of _Enoch Arden_. Allen Booth, the youngest
son of his parents dwelling in a small seaport, falls early in love with
a child schoolfellow, for whom his affection never falters. When grown
up the young man accepts an offer from a prosperous kinsman in the West
Indies to join him in his business. His beloved sees him depart with
many misgivings, though their mutual devotion was never to fade. She
does not see him again for forty years, when he returns, like Arden, to
his "native bay,"

"A worn-out man with wither'd limbs and lame,
His mind oppress'd with woes, and bent with age his frame."

He finds his old love, who had been faithful to her engagement for ten
years, and then (believing Allen to be dead) had married. She is now a
widow, with grown-up children scattered through the world, and is
alone. Allen then tells his sad story. The ship in which he sailed from
England had been taken by the Spaniards, and he had been carried a slave
to the West Indies, where he worked in a silver mine, improved his
position under a kind master, and finally married a Spanish girl,
hopeless of ever returning to England though still unforgetful of his
old love. He accumulates money, and, like Crabbe's brother, incurs the
envy of his Roman Catholic neighbours. He is denounced as a heretic, who
would doubtless bring up his children in the accursed English faith. On
his refusal to become a Catholic he is expelled the country, as the
condition of his life being spared:

"His wife, his children, weeping in his sight,
All urging him to flee, he fled, and cursed his flight."

After many adventures he falls in with a ship bound for England, but
again his return is delayed. He is impressed (it was war-time), and
fights for his country; loses a limb, is again left upon a foreign shore
where his education finds him occupation as a clerk; and finally, broken
with age and toil, finds his way back to England, where the faithful
friend of his youth takes care of him and nurses him to the end. The
situation at the close is very touching--for the joy of re-union is
cl