And thereupon he dismissed me."
"O Sir!" exclaimed Jocelyn, rising and throwing, his arms round the
Puritan's neck; "you, then, were the friend who tended my poor father in
his last moments. Heaven bless you for it!"
"Yes, Jocelyn, it was I who heard your father's latest sigh," the
Puritan replied, returning his embrace, "and your own name was breathed
with it. His thoughts were of his son far away--too young to share his
distresses, or to comprehend them."
"Alas! alas!" cried Jocelyn mournfully.
"Lament not for your father, Jocelyn," said the Puritan, solemnly; "he
is reaping the reward of his earthly troubles in heaven! Be comforted, I
say. The tyrant can no longer oppress him. He is beyond the reach of his
malice. He can be arraigned at no more unjust tribunals. He is where no
cruel and perfidious princes, no iniquitous judges, no griping
extortioners shall ever enter."
Jocelyn endeavoured to speak, but his emotion overpowered him.
"I have already told you that your father rendered me a service
impossible to be adequately requited," pursued the Puritan. "What that
service was I will one day inform you. Suffice it now, that it bound me
to him in chains firmer than brass. Willingly would I have laid down my
life for him, if he had desired it. Gladly would I have taken his place
in the Fleet prison, if that could have procured him liberation. Unable
to do either, I watched over him while he lived--and buried him when
dead."
"O Sir, you have bound me to you as strongly as you were bound to my
father," cried Jocelyn.
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