_Sham Epitaphs and Quotations_ (Vol. vi., p 340.).--Your correspondent A.
A. D. asks, in reference to a certain epitaph, "has it really a local
habitation, and where?" This is a Query full of grave suggestions. Are
there not hundreds of epitaphs in print which have no existence except as
printer's paragraphs, and which serve the same purpose as the immortal calf
with six legs, and the numberless gigantic gooseberries and plethoric
turnips. I have collected epitaphs for years past, and it is surprising how
many--and those some of the best in a literary sense--defy every attempt to
trace them to sepulchral sources. Besides epitaphs, I believe many sham
quotations are used by writers, such as couplets and queer phrases of their
own coining; but which are inclosed between inverted commas, either to rid
their authors of the responsibility of the sentiments they convey, or to
add weight to the argument they are introduced to illustrate. A short time
since, I contributed a tale to a journal; at the head of each chapter stood
a couplet of my own composing, which the printer and editor both mistook
for a series of quotations, and kindly affixed inverted commas to them;
and, as in that instance I did not receive proof slips to correct, the tale
was published, adorned with these sham quotations--the reader being
bamboozled without intention, and I robbed of the credit of my original
couplets. This is an important matter: for it is no pleasant affair to
spend a month or two in the endeavour to trace a quotation, and then to
become convinced that you have been hunting for a mare's nest.