of the same city, and afterward high-sheriff of the county of Buckingham, and was the first purchaser of this manor of Ashby Legers, with the parsonage and vowson of the vicarage." It is indeed as difficult to see the merit of having purchased a vowson and a parsonage, as of having been a draper of London: yet we often find this good deed mentioned, and many a squire who little knows the iniquitous origin of the tenure is recorded on his tomb as an impropriator. But you shall find the trade of the departed not infrequently made the subject of coarse jest, and we are called upon to laugh over the sad memorials of unsanctified mortality. William Clark thus addresses us from the grave: "My sledge and hammer lie reclined, My bellows, too, have lost their wind; My nails are drove, my work is done:" And the grave writer himself, returning to his dust, finds an apt memorial: "Hic jacet Rob. Hudson de Leedes, lapicida (si quis alius) ingeniosus, geometriæ, sculpturæ, cœlaturæque peritissimus. Qui dum aliis nomen ære ac marmore duraturum quæsivit, sibi comparavit. Obiit Sep. A.D. MDCXCI. ætat. xxxv." We have descended so low, that unless we close the list altogether, we must needs take at least a little step upwards; but little it is to the following, which we give as a literary curiosity. It is a dialogue between the stone, and the visitor of the grave: AMICUS. "Anno 1640. LAPIDES. A. Necne loqui possunt lapides? L. Nos posse fatemur. A. Quos tegitis? L. Fratres; si fratres comprobat ortus, A. An puerive senes fuerant? L. Ah, neutrum et utrumque, 4. Quid nunc hi pueri? L. Cineres. A. Quid et amplius? L. Ossa. 4. Horum qui lacrymis decorarunt funera? L. Multi. Nos lacrymas urnis his quoque sæpe damus. 4. Solve, anima, in lacrymas, si vos lacrymare soletis, How degraded must have been the taste of an age in which even the slender latinity requisite for the composition of a few hexameters and pentameters could be commonly associated with such intolerabiles ineptic, and that on so sacred a subject as the religious memorials of departed saints. We had noted many other epitaphs, which, for their rudeness, * absurdity, false doctrine, impiety, presumption, conceit, or for language totally unfit to be seen in the Lord's house, might exemplify the wretched character of monumental inscriptions in the last ages; but, however instructive it may be, the accumulation of such painful absurdities is tedious, both to ourselves and our readers, and we rather turn from the dispraise of inscriptions to the commendation of the works whose titles we have placed at the head of this article. Mr. Paget's "Tract upon Tombstones " is a thoroughly practical essay upon the subject, and is calculated to do much good among the classes to whom it is addressed; those, that is, who are more likely to record the memory of their friends on a simple tomb in the churchyard than by an elaborate and expensive tablet, or monument, in the church. The faults which he exposes are touched with that playful satire which distinguishes Mr. Paget's writings; and the remedies which he proposes are all of them most worthy of attention. Two or three of his designs are very excellent, and to say that many more might be given, is only to say that a little tract might become a large and elaborately-illustrated volume with great advantage; but the increased price would take it out of the very field of usefulness to which it is so well adapted. "The Churches of Yorkshire" is among the most beautiful works of its class, and is conducted in a manner, and with an ecclesiastical spirit, which give it a value beyond the limits of the county to which its descriptions are confined. Little, in general, is done in such works, in the description of the greatest beauties of architecture, to recommend them to imitation, or to interest the reader in the spirit which they embody; and little in the notice of painful blemishes, to indicate where the blame falls, and why the defect is so intolerable: but "The Churches of Yorkshire" aims, and we think successfully, at something beyond this, and is really calculated to raise the tone of church architecture in the present day. We give an instance in which the usual method of simple description and stupid indiscriminate praise is justly departed from. After describing the monument of Ferdinand Lord Fairfax, before adduced, the author ob serves: "It would be wasting words to offer any formal proof that such a monumental inscription as this, on a tablet of cinque-cento design, destroying, not merely disfiguring, but actually breaking in upon, component parts of the church's structure, is worse, both in taste and religious feeling, than the * As, for instance, that of Judge Raynsford, which is a plain breach of the third commandment: " M. S. Ricardi Raynsford militis Nuper de Banco Regis capitalis Justiciarii Quantus vir, bone Deus!" &c. unobtrusive inscription or the figure harmonising with the design of the church, of ages which we are accustomed to call degraded in religion and in taste. Blame of course is not cast on individuals; but on the age which produced such perversions blame really should be cast. The truth is that a subtle spirit of paganism has embued the taste and feelings, and almost the religious creed of the mass of professing Christians during many generations; and in nothing has it been more painfully exemplified than in the sepulchral monuments of our immediate ancestors. They did not in fact desert the obsequies consecrated by our Lord's tomb; but while they buried their dead, they introduced the cinerary urn into the symbolical language of the monument, expressing the Christian's grief in language borrowed from heathen cremations: they did not actually invoke heathen deities in any religious service, nor promise to heroes and statesmen an immortality with Mars or Minerva; but they freely introduced mythological figures on the tombs of those whom they would immortalize; they did not actually worship the departed dead, nor celebrate their apotheosis; but such inscriptions as that we have just recorded, are, in their spirit, not very far removed from hero-worship. And sad it is to say, yet true, that the greater part of our most noble ecclesiastical edifices are partially paganised in character, by the obtrusive introduction of such sepulchral devices."P. 16. We have spoken hitherto only of the monumental inscription. May we be allowed to pass to the form of the tablet, and to put an important question to architects and architectural societies? What should be the design of a tablet to receive an epitaph in a Gothic church? The question is really important, and demands a better answer than it has yet received. There is a large class of persons who cannot afford the altar tomb, or the recumbent figure, who wish for, and will have, some other record than the stone in the churchyard, or the simple covering of the vault. The square tablet, with Grecian entablatures, &c., and with the usual proportion of urns and Death's heads, must take flight before something of more pretensions to harmony with the church in which they are erected; but what is to supply their place? The favourite plan at present is to magnify ad libitum some niche or piscina, and to suspend it, without any reference to propriety of place, just where the tablet may be best read. This contrivance has been adopted in a church which has attracted, and deservedly, much attention of late, on which very account we should be more cautious lest anything done there, merely because it is done there, should pass into a precedent. "The ancient cover of the piscina of the fourteenth century is placed in the south-east wall of the chancel, and is converted into a monument to Thoresby, the antiquary; and in the north-east corner of the chancel is a monument to the memory of the Rev. Richard Fawcett, M.A., the late respected vicar of the parish. Both these monuments show the superior effect of monuments in harmony with the building over the Vandal chimneypiece monuments, contrived at an enormous expense by modern marble masons. *Introduction to the Seven Sermons preached at the Consecration of the Parish Church of Leeds. Now the comparative praise here awarded may readily be granted; but it is not so fully admitted that by putting up anywhere a fragment of Gothic design, one gets a Gothic tablet in harmony with the church in which it is erected. The niche, the piscina, the sedile, had each a particular use, and a particular place in the Gothic church, and there each is beautiful and appropriate; but it might be as congruous to imitate an altar-tomb for a priest's seat, as to imitate a piscina for a monumental tablet. This is, indeed, to speak strongly; but to keep within limits: there are three places to which these fragments of Gothic design, or imitations of them, are likely to be promoted, as sepulchral memorials ;-to the surface of a pier, to the blank wall between two windows, and to the space above the capitals of pillars, and between the spring of the arches. Now all these places are above the eye, whereas the piscina was rather beneath it; and the niche for a figure could never occupy any such place, without destroying the general character of the church. Only take out your pencil and draw a mock piscina, of however beautiful proportions, and then arrange about it any part of any church you know likely to be fixed upon for an inscription, and you will at once perceive the want of harmony between the adopted design and everything around it. The real truth is that we must first recover the feeling which made inscriptions but slight accessories to a tomb; and which taught those who laid their dead in consecrated ground, awaiting the last day for their true greatness, to direct the eye downwards to the pavement for their meek memorials, and not upwards for their blazoned pretensions. Yet, in the meanwhile, something perhaps may be done to find an appropriate device for such tablets as are so frequently erected at the present day. We speak not as suggesting a remedy, but as longing to give due thanks and praise to any who shall find one. * We do not forget that at Malham, in Yorkshire, and one or two other churches in the same district, there are niches in the pillars; but they are so small as not to break in upon the perpendicular lines, and would not suffice to receive an inscribed tablet. 432 THE LIFE OF TORQUATO TASSO. PART II. FROM 1565 TO 1577. WHEN Tasso arrived at the court of Ferrara, he found every one so engrossed by the preparations for the approaching festivals, that he had some difficulty in obtaining an audience of the cardinal. At last, however, he was admitted to his presence, and was favourably received, the cardinal telling him that he should be entirely master of his time, and that he only wished for his attendance at court when his inclination might lead him thither. The ensuing month was almost entirely occupied by successive entertainments, and we may imagine the effect produced on the mind of the young student by the dazzling scene. Versed as he was in the annals of chivalry, and naturally disposed to delight in magnificence, the concourse of nobles, princes, and ambassadors from various states; the pomp with which the bride made her entrance to Ferrara; the banquet, the music, and, above all, the tournaments, in which a hundred illustrious Ferrarese entered the lists, and combated in presence of the duke and the whole court, realised all that he had read or imagined of days of old. The festivals were interrupted by the sudden death of Pius IV., and the cardinal departed for Rome, to assist at the conclave, leaving Tasso at Ferrara. Two sisters of the duke then adorned the court. Though not in the first bloom of youth, both were lovely and accomplished. Their mother, the princess Renée of France, had cultivated their taste for letters, for poetry, and music. The eldest, Lucretia d'Este, had shone in the recent galas. Indisposition had either prevented Leonora from appearing, or, as she had little taste for such amusements, had served as an excuse for her absence. Tasso was presented to the Princess Lucretia, and the favourable impression he made on her, led her to introduce him to her sister. He had celebrated them both in his Rinaldo, and he soon ingratiated himself with each. They recommended him to the notice of their brother, the Duke Alphonso, who paid him flattering attentions; and, knowing that he had commenced a poem on the subject of the conquest of Jerusalem, exhorted him to complete the undertaking. He accordingly resumed the work, which had been suspended for two years, and resolved to dedicate the poem to Alphonso, and to consecrate it to the glory of a family who showed so much disposition to befriend him. In a few months the first six cantos were completed; during the progress of their composition, he read them to the two princesses, and their applause excited and sustained his poetical ardour. He also addressed to them occasional poems, which, from their nature, often cease to interest when the circumstance that called them forth is gone by. Some that Tasso wrote at this time are, however, valuable, both for their intrinsic beauty, and because they throw some light on the nature of his attachment for the two sisters. It is well known that a great controversy exists on this subject, perhaps not more futile than many others which have occupied learned men. It cannot be unim |