abbey. During the service he sang the 20th Psalm with all the strength
and vivacity of youth. When his funeral sermon was preached the rector
alluded to this dying effort, and said that on the day of the great
service "Nature seemed to have reassumed her throne; and, as she knew it
was to be his last effort, was determined it should be his best." The
body of the good clerk, John Kent, rests in the abbey church which he
loved so well, in a spot marked by himself, and we hope that the
"restoration," somewhat drastic and severe, which has fallen upon the
grand old church, has not obscured his grave or destroyed the memorial
of this worthy and excellent clerk.



CHAPTER VII

THE CLERK IN EPITAPH

The virtues of many a parish clerk are recorded on numerous humble
tombstones in village churchyards. The gratitude felt by both rector and
people for many years of faithful service is thus set forth, sometimes
couched in homely verse, and occasionally marred by the misplaced humour
and jocular expressions and puns with which our forefathers thought fit
to honour the dead. In this they were not original, and but followed the
example of the Greeks and Romans, the Italians, Spaniards, and French.
This objectionable fashion of punning on gravestones was formerly much
in vogue in England, and such a prominent official as the clerk did not
escape the attention of the punsters. Happily the quaint fancies and
primitive humour, which delighted our grandsires in the production of
rebuses and such-like pleasantries, no longer find themselves displayed
upon the fabric of our churches, and the "merry jests" have ceased to