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John Cotton, who died in New England, in 1652: —

      A living, breathing Bible; tables where

      Both covenants at large engraven were;

      Gospel and law in his heart had each its column,

      His head an index to the sacred volume!

      His very name a title-page; and, next,

      His life a commentary on the text.

      Oh, what a moment of glorious worth,

      When in a new edition he comes forth!

      Without errata, we may think ’twill be,

      In leaves and covers of Eternity.

      A notable epitaph was that of George Faulkner, the alderman and printer, of Dublin, who died in 1775:

      Turn, gentle stranger, and this urn revere,

      O’er which Hibernia saddens with a tear.

      Here sleeps George Faulkner, printer, once so dear

      To humorous Swift, and Chesterfield’s gay peer;

      So dear to his wronged country and her laws;

      So dauntless when imprisoned in her cause;

      No alderman e’er graced a weighter board,

      No wit e’er joked more freely with a lord.

      None could with him in anecdotes confer;

      A perfect annal-book, in Elzevir.

      Whate’er of glory life’s first sheets presage,

      Whate’er the splendour of the title-page,

      Leaf after leaf, though learned lore ensues;

      Close as thy types and various as thy news;

      Yet, George, we see that one lot awaits them all,

      Gigantic folios, or octavos small;

      One universal finis claims his rank,

      And every volume closes in a blank.

      In the churchyard of Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk, is a good specimen of a typographical epitaph, placed in remembrance of a noted printer, who died in the year 1818. It reads as follows:

Here lie the remains of L. Gedge, PrinterLike a worn-out character, he has returned to the Founder,Hoping that he will be re-cast in a better andmore perfect mould

      Our next example is profuse of puns, some of which are rather obscure to younger readers, owing to the disuse of the old wooden press. It is the epitaph of a Scotch printer: —

Sacred to the memory ofAdam Williamson,Pressman-printer, in Edinburgh,Who died Oct. 3, 1832,Aged 72 yearsAll my stays are loosed;My cap is thrown off; my head is worn out;My box is broken;My spindle and bar have lost their power;My till is laid aside;Both legs of my crane are turned out of their path;My platen can make no impression;My winter hath no spring;My rounce will neither roll out nor in;Stone, coffin, and carriage have all failed;The hinges of my tympan and frisket are immovable;My long and short ribs are rusted;My cheeks are much worm-eaten and mouldering away:My press is totally down:The volume of my life is finished,Not without many errors;Most of them have arisen from bad composition,and are to be attributed more to the chase than the press;There are also a great number of my own:Misses, scuffs, blotches, blurs, and bad register;But the true and faithful Superintendent has undertaken to correct the wholeWhen the machine is again set up(incapable of decay),A new and perfect edition of my life will appear,Elegantly bound for duration, and every way fittedfor the grand Library of the Great Author

      The next specimen is less satisfactory, because devoid of the hope that should encircle the death of the Christian. It is the epitaph which Baskerville, the celebrated Birmingham printer and type founder, directed to be placed upon a tomb of masonry in the shape of a cone, and erected over his remains: —

StrangerBeneath this cone, in unconsecrated ground,A friend to the liberties of mankindDirected his body to be inurnedMay the example contribute to emancipate thy mindfrom the idle fears of superstition, and thewicked arts of priestcraft

      It is recorded that “The tomb has long since been overturned, and even the remains of the man himself desecrated and dispersed till the final day of resurrection, when the atheism which in his later years he professed, will receive assuredly so complete and overwhelming a refutation.”

      In 1599 died Christopher Barker, one of the most celebrated of the sixteenth century typographers, printer to Queen Elizabeth – to whom, in fact, the present patent, held by Eyre and Spottiswode, can be traced back in unbroken succession.

      Here Barker lies, once printer to the Crown,

      Whose works of art acquired a vast renown.

      Time saw his worth, and spread around his fame,

      That future printers might imprint the same.

      But when his strength could work the press no more

      And his last sheets were folded into store,

      Pure faith, with hope (the greatest treasure given),

      Opened their gates, and bade him pass to heaven.

      We shall bring to a close our examples of typographical epitaphs with the following, copied from the graveyard of St. Michael’s, Coventry, on a worthy printer who was engaged over sixty years as a compositor on the Coventry Mercury: —

Herelies inter’dthe mortal remainsofJohn Hulm,Printer,who, like an old, worn-out type,battered by frequent use, reposes in the graveBut not without a hope that at some future timehe might be cast in the mould of righteousness,And safely locked-up in the chase of immortalityHe was distributed from the board of lifeon the 9th day of Sept., 1827,Aged 75Regretted by his employers,and respected by his fellow artists

      EPITAPHS ON SPORTSMEN

      The stirring lives of sportsmen have suggested spirited lines for their tombstones, as will be seen from the examples we bring under the notice of our readers.

      The first epitaph is from Morville churchyard, near Bridgnorth, on John Charlton, Esq., who was for many years Master of the Wheatland Foxhounds, and died January 20th, 1843, aged 63 years; regretted by all who knew him: —

      Of this world’s pleasure I have had my share,

      And few the sorrows I was doomed to bear.

      How oft have I enjoy’d the noble chase

      Of hounds and foxes striving for the race!

      But hark! the knell of death calls me away,

      So sportsmen, all, farewell! I must obey.

      Our next is written on Mills, the huntsman: —

      Here lies John Mills, who over the hills

      Pursued the hounds with hallo:

      The leap though high, from earth to sky,

      The huntsman we must follow.

      A short, rough, but pregnant epitaph is placed over the remains of Robert Hackett, a keeper of Hardwick Park, who died in 1703, and was buried in Ault Hucknall churchyard:

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