Your humble servant, and truly humble and forlorn he was that night, was placed at the coffin's head; it being part of that black night's sport to hold me as chief mourner; and, indeed, poor wretch, I had much to mourn for. The great plumed hat they had put upon me flapped and swaled over my eyes so as almost to blind me. My foot was for ever catching in my great mourning cloak, and I on the verge of tripping myself up; and there was a hot smoke sweltering from the tapers, and a dreadful smell of new black cloth and sawdust and beeswax, that was like to have suffocated me. Infinite was the relief when two of the ladies attired in black, who had sat on either side of me, as though to guard me from running away, lifted me gently each under an armpit, and held me up so that I could see the writing on the coffin-plate, which was of embossed silver and very brave to view. "Can you read it out, my little man?" a deep rich voice as of a lady sounded in mine ears. I said, with much trembling, "that I thought I could spell out the words, if time and patience were accorded me." "There is little need, child," the voice resumed. "I will read it to thee;" and a black-gloved hand came from beneath her robe, and she took my hand, and holding my forefinger not ungently made me trace the writing on the silver. But I declare that I can remember little of that Legend now, although I am impressed with the belief that my kinswoman's married name was not mentioned. That it was merely set forth that she was the Lady D----, whose maiden name was A. G., and that she died in London in the 90th year of her age, King George I. being king of England. And then the smoke of the tapers, the smell of the cloth and the wax, and the remembrance of my Desolation, were too much for me, and I broke out into a loud wail, and was so carried fainting from the room; being speedily, however, sufficiently recovered to take my place in the coach that was to bear us Eastward. We rode in sorrowful solemnity till nigh three o'clock that morning; but where my Grandmother was buried I never knew. From some odd hints that I afterwards treasured up, it seems to me that the coaches parted company with the Hearse somewhere on the road to Harwich; but of this, as I have averred, I have no certain knowledge. In sheer fatigue I fell asleep, and woke in broad daylight in the great state-bed at Hanover Square. FOOTNOTES: [D] The Austrian, not the Prussian Trenck.--ED. [E] This does not precisely tally with the Captain's disclaimer of feeling any apprehension when passing Execution Dock.--ED. [F] I do not find it in the memoirs of his adventures, but in an old volume of the _Annual Register_ I find that, in the year 1778, one Captain Dangerous gave important evidence for the crown against poor Mr. Tremenheere, who suffered at Tyburn, for fetching and carrying between the French King and some malcontents in this country, notably for giving information as to the condition of our dockyards.--ED.