JOHN ADAMS lies here, of the parish of Southwell,
A Carrier who carried his can to his mouth well:
He carried so much, and he carried so fast,
He could carry no more‑so was carried at last;
For, the liquor he drank, being too much for one,
He could not carry off,--so he's now carri-on.
HERE lies poor Ned Purdon, from misery freed,
Who long was a bookseller's hack;
He led such a damnable life in this world, --
I don't think he'll wish to come back.
IN sterner fight than Waterloo
He saved his hapless brothers;
Not by his own arm, it is true,
But by the arms of others.
Here lies a great and mighty King,
Whose promise none relied on;
He never said a foolish thing,
Nor ever did a wise one.
Ere Sin could blight or Sorrow fade,
Death came with friendly care;
The opening bud to Heaven conveyed,
And bade it blossom there.
JOHN, as he came, so went away,
Consuming capital and pay,
Holding superfluous riches cheap;
The trick of spending time he knew,
Dividing it in portions two,
For idling one, and one for sleep.
Here the shrewd physiognomist Eusthenes lies,
Who could tell all your thoughts by a glance at your eyes.
A stranger, with strangers his honoured bones rest;
They valued sweet song, and he gave them his best.
All the honours of death doth the poet possess:
If a small one, they mourned for him nevertheless.
Thou hast gone to the grave, and abandoned thy son
Yet a babe, thy own manhood but scarcely begun.
Thou art throned among gods: and thy country will take
Thy child to her heart, for his brave father's sake.
Man, husband existence: ne'er launch on the sea
Out of season: our tenure of life is but frai.
Think of poor Cleonicus: for Phasos sailed he
From the valleys of Syria, with many a bale:
With many a bale, ocean's tides he would stem
When the Pleiads were sinking; and he sank with them.
The babe Medeius to his Thracian nurse
This stone-inscribed To Cleita-reared in the midhighway.
Her modest virtues oft shall men rehearse;
Who doubts it? Is not 'Cleita's worth' a proverb to this day?
