He who is here deposited was, like all the good, removed from future evils, though his character was such as might alone procure him esteem. His station was sufficient to protect him from those insults which his equals continually bear; and his greatest recommendation was to have been taught at home. He was no wise inferior to the fam'd favourite of Lesbia, though all his praise is confined to this; but he owed his death to a different cause, the sportive jealousy of another object of partiality having sent hither the unfortunate Toby. Pretty if heavy pleasantry, is it not? Here follows an epitaph upon a cat:-- After a life spent in the useful purposes of peopling the world with my own race, defending my friends from intruding animals, and entertaining them in my youth with wanton tricks, here rest I in peace, the old TORTOISE-SHELL CAT. Had I died in Egypt, an immortal sepulchre and religious veneration had remembered me to posterity; but now, such is the change of time, it is owing to Mr. Jarvis and a plate of lead that you hear any more of me, since compassionate man put an end to the calamities of life, which others of his species would have but augmented. As the Gods are said to have considered their faithful votaries by an easy death, the same reward have I obtained for my services; and thus have I closed a scene of great revolutions, though few of these affected me. So Priam, father of an endless race, His happiness and honour, while his Troy Remain'd and flourish'd, dropt into his tomb By great Achilles' hand; and not a stone Tells where the bones of Asia's Monarch rest. Finally, let me quote what is perhaps the only inscription extant on the grave of a pheasant, a bird which most county gentlemen, even the kindest, first kill for sport and then honour in death in a totally different way. I am not blaming them: I wish only to point the contrast. Mr. Gough composed this epitaph on a pheasant that he had tamed:-- Beneath this humble but grateful monument rests all that remains of one who, after having, amidst the changes and vicissitudes of this mortal life, preserved a heart as superior to them as his condition would admit, paid his debt to Nature, Oct. --, 1756. Many years ago he left his native air to breathe in British Freedom; and resigned his extensive territories in the East for less ample possessions, where his reception was more suitable to his merit. Exalted above the ignoble crowd which surrounded him, he maintained that native dignity which became a consciousness of his superior excellence. Endowed by nature with all the advantages of person, he despised the arts of dress. The same easy temper which softened the solitude of celibacy heightened his relish of the married state; and the same benevolence which distinguished him in society would have taught him the just discharge of parental duties had the care of posterity demanded.