Page:Extracts from the letters and journals of George Fletcher Moore.djvu/317

 Rh desiring to cross the river, and having no boat, put his clothes into a bucket and swam across, pushing it before him; but on reaching the middle of the river, he upset the bucket by awkwardness, and all his clothes, from his shirt to his shoe, went to the bottom: I could enjoy the joke better if I had not to pay for another suit.

After dinner I went to call on Mrs. Bull, and met the funeral of the deceased boy, named Keates, which I accompanied to the grave. Mr. Shaw's eyes being delicate, I, for the first time in my life, was called on to read the burial service; the deceased was about eighteen years old; the survivor, his companion, about thirteeen. The arrest of Ya-gan was man's work! Boys unfortunately undertook it, without sufficient steadiness; they were frightened at their own act, discharged their guns injudiciously, and ran away, by which the life of one of them was sacrificed.

16th.—On Saturday I saw at Mr. Bull's the head of Ya-gan, which one of the men had cut off for the purpose of preserving. Possibly it may yet figure in some museum at home. I should have been glad to get it myself, as the features were not in the least changed. He must have died instantaneously. The other native was not yet dead when the party went to look after them; the accidental passing of two soldiers frightened the natives (it is supposed), or they would have carried off the bodies.