infinitely more ludicrous. There is little to choose between them. Come to the simple grave of some poet or author, known to fame. Linger on the spot; look at the grass. And your thoughts come swift and natural, and your melancholy is touched with light from Heaven. Look now at his inscription! read it. You involuntarily draw back from it, and reject it in your heart for its empty sound and studied folly. Take the monument of Sterne in illustration: Alas, poor Yorick! Near to this place lies the body The Reverend Laurence Sterne, A.M. Ah! molliter ossa quiescant. 'Well,' you say, 'this is all right.' Well, reader, perhaps it is. But this is not all. First follow twelve stupid lines in the rhyming couplet of Pope; which I omit. And then, O ye gentle spirits! these words: This monumental stone was erected to the memory of the deceased by his brother masons; for altho' he did not live to be a member of the society, yet all his incomparable performances evidently prove him to have acted by rule and square; they rejoice in the opportunity of perpetuating his high and unimpeachable character to after ages. For my part, I like simplicity. And to be on the safe side, give me just the name, birth, and death. Or perhaps only the name. For time, is it not a conceit of ours? If we remember the dead, is it not as yesterday when they moved about us? And if we forget them, is not the gulf as it were ages? Yea, if we be strangers, to whom the name is nothing, does not a wave of grass, or a lichen-spotted cypress, tell the tale best of all? These perhaps are mere fancies; tho' I could find support for them. Westminster Abbey has many memorials of great ones, and not great; but there is no inscription in Westminster Abbey that can compare with this : "O RARE BEN JONSON." Not a date or age or anything, but only that: and your heart is thrilled within you, as you stand in the Poets' corner. There is nothing to draw away attention from the essential fact; nothing to exercise the mechanical mind upon and so the soul is touched. But come with me. Over the water to a little island, between England and America, but much nearer England; a little island that had a king once, but has no longer; redolent of herrings; remnant of whose greatness still survives in a curious and uncertain device still extant upon farthings: noted for cats. Come with me. Here, hid in trees, is a little hill, with an old church upon it: and the hill is thick with graves. But the dead far exceed the graves. A new graveyard on an opposite hill would hint as much: also the old sexton's pregnant remark, "no more folks is to be put here." You are conscious of the judiciousness of this regulation, in more ways than one. Giant Death has been here. Hear him say with Samson, "Heaps upon heaps, I have slain a thousand men." Of this church you may safely take a sketch: so quaint is it. Also near the porch are some very ancient stones, described in all guide books, which I scorned to consult. I shall not tell the name of the kirk, lest you should hunt them up in some shilling nuisance. I will help to keep their secret. But what I brought you here for was to read a few inscriptions. What do you think of this: The grave of Ann Clark. or this: Rob Kelly was buried here. No Latin, mark! plain, simple English. I conceive that Rob Kelly could not sleep if he thought his name was Robertus Kelleius. How could he, innocent soul! Many a grave here has only a piece of slate with just initials; many and many a grave here has no name at all. Yet these were not beasts or dogs, but simple-hearted; men, women and children: good souls many a one, each in his own style; whom the world forgot; who were great, but not recorded, save of the rank grass; whose memory survives in Heaven. I am sure you would like to hear of two brothers, who always remained brothers; who gave a helping hand, each to each, and jogged along together; sharing life's vicissi tudes, of joy or sorrow; who "retired independent" to this place. Perhaps you expect to find such an inscription as "In this tomb are deposited the mortal remains of Of this Parish. He was born the 8th of May, 1809, Matthew Curphy, brother of the aforesaid William Curphy. "Saul and Jonathan were lovely and pleasant in their lives." 2 Sam. i. 23. "Weep not for we who's buried here, For we was friends in life; Weep not for we, nor shed no tear, For we was man and wife." The like is not to be found here. I doubt not but Stoney will transfer it to his pocket-book, and take the earliest opportunity of pressing it into the service. But in this Kirk-yard is none such. Come and read what we have. Ye that know the pathos of silence, stand on this green heap, and read this bit of slate at the head : William Curphy and Mat. There it is; nothing more. Now I shall bring you back to England, to a Cemetery in Bath, which I myself have not seen, as yet, but a friend of mine has. A little garden plot, one foot by two, little flowers about it; a marble coping round it; and just one word on the marble coping :- We will say "JOHNNY." farewell" here. Only speak to your friends of this matter. So that when you leave them at last, you may lie in your grave in peace," the smile have time for growing in your eyes," and your spirit rest. "C." LINES.* WHO now, in sweetly-plaintive strain, His fondest hopes are hopes no more! When first he sail'd Love's treach'rous bay! "THASIN." The ideas contained in these lines are in great measure suggested by Hor. Od. 1. V. JULIA. An Ode. WHEN the Cambridge flower-show ended, Sage beside the River slow Sat a Don renowned for lore And in accents soft and low To the elms his love did pour. "Julia, if my learned eyes "I will marry! write that threat "Granta, far and wide renowned, "Other fellows shall arise, Proud to own a husband's name: "Then the progeny that springs |