[2] This “Prusia” occurred in the dedication of the “March to Finchley” to Frederick the Great. His friends quizzed him a good deal about the error, and he undertook to correct it by hand in every proof of the plate sold. But he soon grew tired of making the mark ~ with a pen over the single s, and at last had the offensive “Prusia” burnished out of the copper, and the orthodox “Prussia” substituted. But even then the quizzers were not tired, and showed him a Prussian thaler bearing Frederick’s effigy, and the legend of which spoke of him as _Borussiæ Rex_. ’Twas the story of the old man and his donkey over again. [3] Till the legislature deprives the people of their “eleven days,” I am using the old-style calendar. [4] I have seen it somewhere stated that Gamble was a “silversmith of eminence,” residing on or near Snow Hill. “_Cela n’empêche pas_,” as the Hanoverian Queen on her death-bed said to her repentant husband. I see no reason why Gamble should not have been originally of Snow Hill, and have emigrated before 1720 to the Court end of the town. [5] “The Complete English Tradesman,” i. 234. [6] “Let it be interred after the manner of the country, and the laws of the place, and the _dignity of the person_. And Ælian tells us that excellent persons were buried in purple, and men of an ordinary fortune had their graves only trimmed with branches of olive and mourning flowers.” So Bishop Taylor in _Holy Dying_. The tide of feeling in this age of ours sets strongly against mortuary pomp; yet should we remember that with the old pomps and obsequies of our forefathers much real charity was mingled. All the money was not spent in wax-tapers and grim feastings. At the death of a wealthy citizen, hundreds of poor men and women had complete suits of mourning given to them, and the fragments of the “funeral baked meats” furnished forth scores of pauper tables before evensong. Lazarus had his portion when Dives passed away. Now, who profits by a funeral beyond half a dozen lacqueys, and Messrs. Tressel and Hatchment, the undertakers?