Part 1 (1/2)

In Search Of Gravestones Old And Curious

by WT (William Thomas) Vincent

PREFACE

I a you to bear me company

This Book is not a Sermon It is a lure to decoy other Ra to ramble for It also provides a fresh object for study

Old-lore is an evergreen tree withshoot It is part of an old theme, but is itself new

Books about Tombs there are many, and volumes of Epitaphs by the hundred But of the Corotesque, headstones of the churchyard--there is no record

These gravestones belong to the past, and are hastening to decay In one or two centuries none will survive unless they be in Museums

To preserve the counterfeit presentment of some which remain seems a duty

Many may share the quest, but no one has yet coin an my Rambles, and pursue as I have pursued

WILLIAM THOMAS VINCENT

CHAPTER I

OLD GRAVESTONES

I was sauntering about the churchyard at Newhaven in Sussex, reading the inscriptions on the tombs, when my eyes fell upon a headstone soood preservation, and withoutall the details and sketching the subject in1

FIG 1--AT NEWHAVEN, SUSsex

The inscription below the design reads as follows:

”Here lyeth the remains of Andreho departed this life the 14th day of January 1768, aged 66 years Also of Mary his wife, who departed this life the 3d day of July 1802, aged 88 years”

This was the first tiravestone of a pronounced character

The subject scarcely needs to be interpreted, being obviously intended to illustrate the well-known passage in the Burial Service: ”For the trumpet shall sound, and the dead shall be raisedthen shall be brought to pass the saying that is written, Death is sed up in Victory O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?”

The reference in another ritual to the Lord of Life tra of Terrors beneath his feet seems also to be indicated, and it will be noticed that the artist has employed a rather emphatic smile to pourtray triumph

It was but natural to suppose that this as the production of soenius of the period, and I searched for other evidences of his skill Not far away I found the next design, very nearly of the same date

FIG 2--AT NEWHAVEN, SUSsex

The words beloere:

”To the memory of Thomas, the son of Thomas and Ann Alderton, who departed this life the 10th day of April 1767, in the 13th year of his age”