CURIOUS EPITAPHS.

Hawke's Bay Times, Volume II, Issue 43, 24 April 1862, Page 3

CURIOUS EPITAPHS.

(niOVt GLEANINGS IN GHAVEVAIiDS.) Tiie following is in a churchyard at Acton, in Cornwall:— Here lie the bones of Richard Lawton, [on. Whose death, alas! was strangely brought Trying one day his corns to mow off, The razor slipped, and cut his toe off; His toe, or rather what it grew to, An inflammation quickly tlow to, Which took, alas, to mortifying, And was the cause of Richard’s dying. Here is a specimen of Devonshire dialect, in an epitaph which, according to the editor, is extant at Tavistock:— Here lies Betsy Cruden ; She wood a leaf’d, but she cooden. ’Twas na grief na sorrow as made she decay, But this bad log as carried she away The following is still to be seen in a churchyard near Hastings, the spelling of which agrees with the Sussex pronunciation : Here lyeih the body of J oseph Dain, who died May 2G, 1751. Good pcppcll all, as you pass by, I pray on me cast an I; For as yon arc, so wouncc wous I, And as I am so must you be, Therefore prepare to follow me. The following is from a tablet in the chancel of Sidbury Church, Devonshire, to the memory’ of John Stone, a freemason, who died Ist. January, IGI7. We quote it as a specimen of that punning so commonly found in epitaphs of the seventeenth century : On our great Corner-stone this Stone relied For blessing in his building loving most To build God’s temples, in whose works lie An dlived the Temple of the Holy Ghost [ died In whose hard life is proved an honest frame, God can of Slones raise seed to Abraham. One of the strangest epitaphs in the whole collectian is that at Gateshead, on Robert Trollope, architect of the Exchange and Town CourCof Acw Castle : Hero lies Robert Trollope, Who made yon Stones roll up, When death took bis soul up, His body filled this hole up Earl Stanhope tells us that at Chevcning there is still extant a marble tablet, brought from Tarragora by Earl Slanhopc, on which C. Ca'dlius praises bis wife for being ohsequienthsima. Had Mrs. Brit chard, of Chelmsford, survived, she might probably have said as much for her husband: Hero lies the man Richard, And Mary his wife; Their surname was Priteh nrd, They lived without strife ; And the reason was plain— They abounded in riches, They had no care or pain, And the wife wore the breeches. U NGIiAM JIATICA T. EI’ITAPII I.V BaNBURV Cnu«ciirAUD : Hear do lye our dear boy, Whom God hath tain from we ; ■ And wc do hope rliat us shall go to he, For he can never come back again to we.