Page 32 - Graveyard

30 | G r av e y ar d H u m o r

39. On Lord Brougham.

It is said that this distinguished nobleman, once in a playful mood, wrote
the following epitaph for himself:—

Here, reader, turn your weeping eyes,
My fate a useful moral teaches;
The hole in which my body lies
Would not contain one half my speeches.

40. From a Montgomeryshire Churchyard.

In this churchyard there are some remarkably large yew trees; beneath one
of them is a gravestone with the following inscription:—

Under this yew-tree
Buried would I be,
For my father and me
Planted this yew-tree.

41. From Gloucester.

On a youth of the name of Calf, who was buried in Gloucester
Cathedral:—

Oh, cruel death, more subtle than the Fox,
To kill this Calf before he came an Ox!

The writer has an idea that there is a German epitaph similar to this, as
there certainly is one in French:—

Ci-git le jeune Jean le Veau
Sans devenir Bœuf ou Taureau.

Which may be rendered:—
John Calf, junior, lieth here,
Without becoming Ox or Steer.