The following lines below his portrait are characteristic of his age :

You see OLD SCARLETT's picture stand on hie;
But at your feet here doth his body lye.
His gravestone doth his age and death-time shew,
His office by heis token [s] you may know.
Second to none for strength and sturdy lymm,
A scare-babe mighty voice, with visage grim;
He had inter'd two queenes within this place,
And this townes householders in his life's space
Twice over; but at length his own time came
What he for others did, for him the same
Was done no doubt his soule doth live for aye,
In heaven, though his body clad in clay.

The first of the queens interred by Scarlett was Catherine, the divorced wife of Henry VIII., who died in 1535, at Kimbolton Castle, in Huntingdonshire. The second was Mary, Queen of Scots, who was beheaded at Fotheringay in 1587, and first interred here, though subsequently transported to Westminster Abbey.

Our next example is from Bingley, Yorkshire :In memory of HEZEKIAH BRIGGS, who died August 5th, 1844, in the 80th year of his age. He was sexton at this church 43 years, and interred upwards of 7000 corpses.

[Here the names of his wife and several children are given.]

Here lies an old ringer, beneath the cold clay,

Who has rung many peals both for serious and gay;

Through Grandsire and Trebles with ease he could range,
Till death called a Bob, which brought round the last change.
For all the village came to him

When they had need to call;
His counsel free to all was given,
For he was kind to all.

Ring on, ring on, sweet Sabbath bell,
Still kind to me thy matins swell,
And when from earthly things I part,
Sigh o'er my grave, and lull my heart.

An upright stone in the burial-ground at Hartwith Chapel, in Nidderdale, Yorkshire, bears the following inscription

In memory of WILLIAM DARNBROUGH, who for the last forty years of his life was sexton of this chapel. He died October 3rd, 1846, in the one hundredth year of his age.

"Thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age."-Genesis xv., 15.

The graves around for many a year
Were dug by him who slumbers here,-
Till worn with age, he dropped his spade,
And in the dust his bones were laid.

As he now, mouldering, shares the doom.
Of those he buried in the tomb;

So shall he, too, with them arise,

To share the judgment of the skies.

An examination of Pateley Bridge Church

registers proves that Darnbrough

hundred and two years of age.

was one

An epitaph from Saddleworth, Yorkshire, tells

us:

Here was interred the body of JOHN BROADBENT, Sexton, who departed this life, August 3rd, 1769, in the 73rd year of his age. Forty-eight years, strange to tell,

He bore the bier and toll'd the bell,

And faithfully discharged his trust,

In "earth to earth" and "dust to dust."

Cease to lament,

His life is spent,

The grave is still his element;

His old friend Death knew 'twas his sphere,

So kindly laid the sexton here.

At Rothwell, near Leeds, an old sexton is buried in the church porch. A monumental inscription runs thus :

In memory of THOMAS FLOCKTON, Sexton 59 years, buried 23rd day of February, 1783, aged 78 years.

Here lies within this porch so calm,

Old Thomas. Pray sound his knell,
Who thought no song was like a psalm—

No music like a bell.

At Darlington, there is a Latin epitaph over the remains of Richard Preston, which has been freely translated as follows:

Under this marble are depos'd

Poor PRESTON'S sad remains.
Alas! too true for light-rob'd jest

To sing in playful strains.

Ye dread possessors of the grave,

Who feed on others' woe,

Abstain from Richard's small remains,
And grateful pity shew;

For many a weighty corpse he gave

To you with liberal hand;
Then sure his little body may

Some small respect command.

The gravestone bears the date of 1765.

Further examples might be included, but we have given sufficient to show the varied and curious epitaphs placed to the memory of parish clerks and sextons.

Punning Epitaphs.

UNS in epitaphs have been very common,

PUN

and may be found in Greek and Latin, and still more plentifully in our English compositions. In the French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, and other languages, examples occur. Empedocles wrote an epitaph containing the paronomasia, or pun, on a physician named Pausanias, and it has by Merivale been happily translated :

PAUSANIAS--not so nam'd without a cause,
As one who oft has giv'n to pain a pause,
Blest son of Æsculapius, good and wise,
Here, in his native Gela, buried lies ;

Who many a wretch once rescu'd by his charms
From dark Persephone's constraining arms.

In Holy Trinity Church, Hull, is an example of a punning epitaph. It is on a slab in the floor of the north aisle of the nave, to the memory of

66

'The Worshipful Joseph Field, twice Mayor of this town, and Merchant Adventurer."

in 1627, aged 63 years :

He died

Here is a Field sown, that at length must sprout,
And 'gainst the ripening harvest's time break out,