Life of Frederick Marryat

n the lungs, and a military doctor "also certified to his tendency to 'h?moptysis,' and prophesied that, without great care, 'the most dangerous and perhaps fatal results' would be

health and capacity for work. But it is clear that there[150] was more appearance than reality in his strength. When a man has turned fifty he begins to suffer for the unwisdom of former years. Marryat, unfortunately, had never given himself any quarter. He had spared himself no burden a man can lay upon his strength. He had played and worked to excess, had lived in a whirl of nervous excitement, had spent beyond his means in constitution as well as in purse. If he had not spent his summer while it was May-at least he had run through it far too soon. Langham, which might have g

ception was so mortifying to me that, from excitement and annoyance, after I left you I r

tain Chads-and the neglect with which[151] my applications had been received by the Admiralty during so long a period of application-your reply was 'That you could n

nd neck in the service, if I may use the expression. If your lordship will be pleased to examine our respective services, previous to the Burmah War, I trust that you will admit that mine have been as creditable as those

the Order of the Bath-and, on the thanks of Government being voted in the House of Commons to the officers, and on Sir Joseph York, who was a great friend of Captain Chads, p

ective treatment-Captain Chads having hoisted his commodore's pennant in India, having been since appointed to the Excellent, and lately

eparted from your usual courtesy in your reception of me as you did, if it was not that some misrepresentations of my character had been made to you. This has weighed heavily upon me; and I entreat your lordship will let me know if such has been the case, and that you will give me an opportunity of justifying myself-which

Marr

irst Lord of the Admiralty, with whom he could not give way to an explosion of rage, the effort required to control himself was too much for a man worn in health, and accustomed for many years past to give his feelings unchecked course. The letter may also stand as proof that Marryat's reputation as a naval officer was dear to him. As to the merits of the dispute there is no evidence to form an opinion. Lord Auckland, in a temperate letter, replied that he had no recolle

mplete wreck, with the sea breaking over her. Frederick Marryat was below when the vessel struck. In the confusion which followed, he was seen, by one of the few survivors, in the waist of the ship, endeavouring to keep the men steady, and clear away the boats. But the Avenger broke up fast; the funnel and main-mast fell on the group in which Marryat stood, crushing some and hurling others overboard, where they were swept away in the sea that was then running. By one death or the other he perished, and the tragedy broke his father's heart. The young man had been wild and extravagant-a source of expense and anxiety to his father. He had been a midshipman of the wild type, and as a young lieutenant had been unsettled, eager to get o

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for the last time to consult with the doctors. When he re-entered the outer room in which several of his family were waiting to hear the result, he had to tell them that he had been condemned. "They say," he reported, "that in six months I shall be numbered with my forefathers." He announced th

for days on lemonade till he "was reduced to a little above nothing." The illness and the remedy were alike fatal, and between the two he was gradually reduced to extinction. During the summer days he lay in the drawing-room of the house at Langham, hearing his daughters read aloud to him, till his growing weakness brought on delirium. To t

to-day never undergoes, by excesses of which he would be incapable. Then Marryat fell into the literary and semi-literary life of London at a time when it was partly honestly, partly out of mere silly pose, dissipated and Bohemian. His wealth was the means of throwing him among a hard living set. Among them, his friends, doubtless, helped him to get rid of his money inherited and earned. He was the fast and hard living stamp of man whom the Bohemian literary gentlemen professed to admire, and he paid for his genuineness. In such a world the ardent natures wore themselves out, while the p

bitually put there. To rank him with Fielding, with Jane Austen, Thackeray or Richardson, would be absurd, but I see no reason why he should not stand with Smollett. He[158] might stand a little below him for "Humphrey Clinker's" sake, but not very far. Except Sir Walter Scott, no man can be read over a longer period of life. He may be enjoyed at school and for ever afterwards. I doubt whether many boys have delighted in "Tom Jones." Did anybody, to take the other end of life, ever experience, on coming back to "Peter Simple" or "Mr. Midshipman Easy," that shock which is produced by a mature re-reading of, say, "Zanoni"? I imagine not. There must be a great vitality, a genuine truth, in the writer who can stand this test, and stand it so long. That Marryat was to some extent a boyish writer is undeniable, and it seems to me to be the secret of his enduring popularity. His books revive in one the exact kind of pleasure one felt in reading them in one's teens. We may re-read some writers who pleased then, and remember the pleasure, and regret it can be

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