Unconsciously humorous are the words on the tombstone of James Fox, who
at the age of twelve fell ill of smallpox and took his flight to heaven.
"He was a man even when a child, and a Hercules from his cradle;
favoured with Beauty, Wisdom, and all Endowments of Mind and Body no
less than were Adonis, Venus, and Apollo; a child of singular
dutifulness and great sincerity."
"Oh parents! pity his parents.
Oh posterity! reflect upon your loss!"
It was smallpox which caused the death both of Richard Boothey—who was
"of manly judgment even in his youth, of so happy a memory as to be
envied, a flower, more beautiful than the rest, cut off in the spring of
life"—and of Mr. Thomas Smith, buried in the little cloisters, "who
through the spotted veil of smallpox rendered a pure unspotted soul to
God, expecting but never fearing death."
More pathetic perhaps than any other is the little tablet in the
cloisters which marks the grave of "Jane Lister, dear child," though
almost as touching is the inscription which tells us of "Mary, daughter
of William Green, more adorned with virtue than with high birth, who
married William Bulmer, Gentleman, to whom she was no occasion of
trouble except by leaving him at her death. She bore him one son,
William, a youth of great genius, who was snatched away by too hasty
death. His most tender mother chose to be buried near him, that she,
though dead, might be united in death with him she so entirely loved
while living." Right at the other end of the Abbey, in the Chapel of
St. Erasmus, is the tomb of Mrs. Mary Kendall, which has these words for
inscription:—
"She had great virtues, and as great a desire of concealing them.
Was of a severe life, but of an easy conversation.
Courteous to all, yet strictly sincere.
Humble without meanness. Beneficent without ostentation.
Devout without superstition.
Those admirable qualities,
In which she was equalled by few of her sex, surpassed by none,
Rendered her in every way worthy of that close union and friendship
In which she lived with the Lady Katherine Jones."
And in the adjoining Chapel of St. Andrew is the heart-broken tribute of
the Earl of Kerry, "to his affectionately beloved wife, Anastatia, the
dearest, most loved, most faithful companion that ever blessed man, who
for thirty-one years rendered him the happiest of mankind."
The last of our epitaphs must be that of Archbishop Boulter, who pulled
a great many political strings in Ireland, and lived a very eventful
life. But his inscription reveals us none of these things, and only
describes a series of promotions, for it relates that "He was born
January the 4th, 1671: he was consecrated Bishop of Bristol 1718: he was
translated to the Archbishoprick of Armagh in 1723, and from thence to
Heaven, on Sep. 27, 1742."
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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