English Sovereigns,” and we therein state that the last recorded instance of a fool being kept by an English family is that of John Hilton's fool, retained at Hilton Castle, Durham, who died in 1746.

The following epitaph is inscribed on a tombstone in the churchyard of St. Mary Friars, Shrewsbury, on Cadman, a famous "flyer" on the rope, immortalised by Hogarth, and who broke his neck descending from a steeple in Shrewsbury, in 1740.

Let this small monument record the name
Of CADMAN, and to future times proclaim
How, by an attempt to fly from this high spire,
Across the Sabrine stream, he did acquire
His fatal end. 'Twas not for want of skill,
Or courage to perform the task, he fell;
No, no, a faulty cord being drawn too tight
Hurried his soul on high to take her flight,
Which bid the body here beneath, good-night.

Joe Miller, of facetious memory, next claims our attention. We find it stated in Chambers's "Book of Days" (issued 1869) as follows: Miller was interred in the burial-ground of the parish of St. Clement Danes, in Portugal Street, where a tombstone was erected to his memory. About ten years ago that burial-ground, by the removal

of the mortuary remains, and the demolition of the monuments, was converted into a site for King's College Hospital. Whilst this not unnecessary, yet undesirable, desecration was in progress, the writer saw Joe's tombstone lying on the ground; and being told that it would be broken up and used as materials for the new building, he took an exact copy of the inscription, which was as follows:

Here lye the Remains of
Honest Jo: MILLER,

who was

a tender Husband,

a sincere Friend,

a facetious Companion,

and an excellent Comedian.

He departed this Life the 15th day of
August 1738, aged 54 years.

If humour, wit, and honesty could save
The humourous, witty, honest, from the grave,
The grave had not so soon this tenant found,
Whom honesty, and wit, and humour, crowned;
Could but esteem, and love preserve our breath,
And guard us longer from the stroke of Death,
The stroke of Death on him had later fell,
Whom all mankind esteemed and loved so well.
S. DUCK,

From respect to social worth,

mirthful qualities, and histrionic excellence, commemorated by poetic talent in humble life.

The above inscription, which Time had nearly obliterated, has been preserved and transferred to this Stone, by order of MR. JARVIS BUCK, Churchwarden,

A.D. 1816.

An interesting sketch of the life of Joe Miller will be found in the "Book of Days," vol. ii., page 216, and in the same informing and entertaining work, the following notes are given respecting the writer of the foregoing epitaph : The S. Duck,' whose name figures as author of the verses on Miller's tombstone, and who is alluded to on the same tablet, by Mr. Churchwarden Buck, as an instance of 'poetic talent in humble life,' deserves a short notice. He was a thresher in the service of a farmer near Kew, in Surrey. Imbued with an eager desire for learning, he, under most adverse circumstances, managed to obtain a few books, and educate himself to a limited degree. Becoming known as a rustic rhymer, he attracted the attention of Caroline, queen of George II., who, with her accustomed liberality, settled on him a pension of £30 per annum; she made him a Yeoman of the Guard, and installed him as keeper of a kind of museum she had in Richmond Park, called Merlin's Cave. Not content with these promotions,

the generous, but perhaps inconsiderate, queen caused Duck to be admitted to holy orders, and preferred to the living of Byfleet, in Surrey, where he became a popular preacher among the

JOE MILLER'S TOMBSTONE, ST. CLEMENT DANES CHURCHYARD, LONDON.

lower classes, chiefly through the novelty of being the Thresher Parson.' This gave Swift occasion to write the following quibbling epigram

The thresher Duck could o'er the queen prevail;
The proverb says,-"No fence against a flail."

From threshing corn, he turns to thresh his brains,
For which her Majesty allows him grains;

Though 'tis confest, that those who ever saw

His poems, think 'em all not worth a straw.
Thrice happy Duck! employed in threshing stubble!
Thy toil is lessened, and thy profits double.

of

"One would suppose the poor thresher to have been beneath Swift's notice, but the provocation was great, and the chastisement, such as it was, merited. For though few men had ever less pretensions to poetical genius than Duck, yet the Court party actually set him up as a rival--nay, as superior to Pope. And the saddest part the affair was that Duck, in his utter simplicity and ignorance of what really constituted poetry, was led to fancy himself the greatest poet of the age. Consequently, considering that his genius. was neglected, and that he was not rewarded according to his poetical deserts by being made the clergyman of an obscure village, he fell into a state of melancholy, which ended in suicide ; affording another to the numerous instances of the very great difficulty of doing good. If the well-meaning queen had elevated Duck to the position of farm-bailiff, he might have led a long and happy life, amongst the scenes and the classes of society in which his youth had passed,