afford no striking themes for the sculptor. Shakespeare and Addison have
statues erected to their memories; but the greater part have busts,
medallions, and sometimes mere inscriptions. Notwithstanding the
simplicity of these memorials, I have always observed that the visitors to
the abbey remained longest about them. A kinder and fonder feeling takes
the place of that cold curiosity or vague admiration with which they gaze
on the splendid monuments of the great and heroic. They linger about these
as about the tombs of friends and companions; for indeed there is
something of companionship between the author and the reader. Other men
are known to posterity only through the medium of history, which is
continually growing faint and obscure; but the intercourse between the
author and his fellow men is ever new, active and immediate.

From Poet's Corner I continued my stroll toward that part of the abbey
which contains the sepulchers of the kings. I wandered among what once
were chapels, but which are now occupied by the tombs and monuments of the
great. At every turn I met with some illustrious name; or the cognizance
of some powerful house renowned in history. As the eye darts into these
dusky chambers of death, it catches glimpses of quaint effigies; some
kneeling in niches, as if in devotion; others stretched upon the tombs,
with hands piously prest together; warriors in armor, as if reposing after
battle; prelates with croziers and miters; and nobles in robes and
coronets, lying, as it were, in state. In glancing over this scene, so
strangely populous, yet where every form is so still and silent, it seems
almost as if we were treading a mansion of that fabled city where
everything had been suddenly transmuted into stone.

In the opposite transept to Poet's Corner stands a monument which is among
the most renowned achievements of modern art, but which to me appears
horrible rather than sublime. It is the tomb of Mrs. Nightingale, by