The Annals of the Parish; or, the chronicle of Dalmailing during the ministry of the Rev. Micah Balwhidder by John Galt
page 27 of 206 (13%)
page 27 of 206 (13%)
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The coming of the laird's monumental stone had a great effect on me, then in a state of deep despondency for the loss of the first Mrs Balwhidder; and I thought I could not do a better thing, just by way of diversion in my heavy sorrow, than to get a well-shapen headstone made for her--which, as I have hinted at in the record of the last year, was done and set up. But a headstone without an epitaph, is no better than a body without the breath of life in't; and so it behoved me to make a poesy for the monument, the which I conned and pondered upon for many days. I thought as Mrs Balwhidder, worthy woman as she was, did not understand the Latin tongue, it would not do to put on what I had to say in that language, as the laird had done--nor indeed would it have been easy, as I found upon the experimenting, to tell what I had to tell in Latin, which is naturally a crabbed language, and very difficult to write properly. I therefore, after mentioning her age and the dates of her birth and departure, composed in sedate poetry the following epitaph, which may yet be seen on the tombstone. EPITAPH A lovely Christian, spouse, and friend, Pleasant in life, and at her end. - A pale consumption dealt the blow That laid her here, with dust below. Sore was the cough that shook her frame; That cough her patience did proclaim - And as she drew her latest breath, She said, "The Lord is sweet in death." |
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