It will be believed that I lost no time in preparing the last solid and costly receptacles for the late Lady Lambert; and the unusual bulk of the deceased seemed in prospective to justify a bill of proportionate magnitude. I was prodigal of plumes and scutcheons, of staves and scarfs, and mourning coaches; and finally, raising a whole company of black cavalry, we set out by stages, short and sweet, for our destination. I had been prudent enough to send a letter before me to prepare the bearers, and imprudent enough to remit their fees in advance. But I had no misgivings. My men enjoyed the excursion, and so did I. We ate well, drank well, slept well, and expected to be well paid for what was so well done. At the last stage it happened I had rather an intricate reckoning to arrange, by which means being detained a full hour behind the cavalcade, I did not reach the desired village till the whole party had established themselves at the Dying Dolphin; a fact I first ascertained from hearing the merriment of my two mutes in the parlour. Highly indignant at this breach of decorum, I rushed in on the offending couple; and let the Undertaking Reader conceive my feelings, when the following letter was put into my hands, explaining at once the good joke of the two fellows, or rather, that of the whole village. “Sir,--We have sought out the six oldest of the pauper parishioners of this place, namely as follows:-- Margaret Squires, aged 101, blind and bed-rid. Timothy Topping, aged 98, paralytic and bed-rid. Darius Watts, aged 95, with loss of both legs. Barbara Copp, 94 years, born without arms. Philip Gill, about 81, an Idiot. Mary Ridges, 79, afflicted with St. Vitus. “Among whom we have distributed your Thirty Pounds according to desire, and for which they are very grateful. JOHN GILLS, } SAM. RACKSTROW, } Overseers.” Such were the six bearers who were to carry Lady Lambert to the church, and who could as soon have carried the church to Lady Lambert. To crown all, I rashly listened to the advice of my thoughtless mutes, and in an evil hour deposited the body without troubling any parishioner, old or young, on the subject. The consequence is, the Executors demur to my bill, because I have not acted up to the letter of my instructions. I have had to stand treat for a large party on the road, to sustain all the charges of the black cavalry, and am besides minus thirty pounds in charity, without even the merit of a charitable intention! THE CARELESSE NURSE MAYD. I sawe a Mayd sitte on a Bank, Beguiled by Wooer fayne and fond; And whiles His flatterynge Vowes She drank, Her Nurselynge slipt within a Pond! All Even Tide they Talkde and Kist, For She was fayre and He was Kinde; The Sunne went down before She wist Another Sonne had sett behinde!