When a bachelor is found wandering about, he cares not whither, your fair
readers (for doubtless such a "dealer in curiosities" as you are has many
of that sex who, however unjustly, have the credit of the "curious" bump)
will naturally exclaim "he must be in love," or "something horrible has
happened to him." Let us, however, disappoint them by assuring them we
shall keep our own counsel. If the former be the cause, green lanes and
meandering streams would suit his case better than Gracechurch Street,
London, with the thermometer five or six degrees below freezing point, and
the snow (!) the colour and consistency of chocolate. Such a situation,
however, was ours, when our friend the Incumbent of Holy Trinity, Minories,
accosted us. He was going to his church; would we accompany him? We would
have gone to New Zealand with him, if he had asked us, at that moment. The
_locale_ of the Minories was nearly as unknown to us as the aforesaid
flourishing colony. On entering the church (which will _not_ repay an
architectural zealot), while our friend was extracting a burial register,
our eye fell on an old monument or two. There was a goodly Sir John Pelham,
who had been cruelly cut down by the hand of death in 1580, looking gravely
at his sweet spouse, a dame of the noble house of Bletsoe. Behind him is
kneeling his little son and heir Oliver, whom, as the inscription informs
us, "Death enforced to follow fast" his papa, as he died in 1584.
And there was a stately monument of the first Lord Dartmouth, a magnanimous
hero, and Master of the Ordnance to Charles II. and his renegade brother.
We were informed that a gentlemen in the vestry had come for the
certificate of the burial of Viscount Lewisham, who died some thirty years
ago; that the Legge family were all buried here; that after having
dignified the aristocratic parish of St. George, Hanover Square, and the
_salons_ of May Fair, during life, they were content to lie quietly in the
Minories! Does not the _high blood_ of the "city merchant" of the present
clay, of the "gentleman" of the Stock Exchange, curdle at the thought? Yes,
there lie many a noble heart, many a once beautiful face but we must
now-a-days, forsooth, forget the City as soon as we have made our money in
its dirty alleys. To lie there after death! pooh, the thought is absurd.
(Thanks to Lord Palmerston, we have no option now.)
Well, we were then asked by the worthy Incumbent, "Would you not like to
see my head?" Did he take us for a Lavater or a Spurzheim? However, we were
not left in suspense long, for out of the muniment closet was produced a
tin box; we thought of Reading biscuits, but we were undeceived shortly.
Taken out carefully and gently, was produced a human head! No mere skull,
but a perfect human head! Alas! its wearer had lost it in an untimely hour.
Start not, fair reader! we often lose our heads and hearts too, but not, we
hope, in the mode our poor friend did. It was clear a choice had been given
to him, but it was a Hobson's choice. He had been _axed_ whether he would
or no! He had been decapitated! We were told that now ghastly head had once
been filled with many an anxious, and perhaps happy, thought. It had had
right royal ideas. It was said to be the head of Henry Grey, Duke of
Suffolk, the father of the sweet Lady Jane Grey. We could muse and
moralise; but Captain Cuttle cuts us short, "When found, make a Note of
it." We found it then there, Sir; will you make the Note? The good captain
does not like to be prolix. Has his esteemed old relative, Sylvanus Urban
(many happy new years to him!), made the note before?
We came away, shall we say better in mind? Yes, said we, a walk in the City
may be as instructive, and as good a cure for melancholy, as the charming
country. An old city church can tell its tale, and a good one too. We
thought of those quaint old monuments, handed down from older churches 'tis
true, but still over the slumbering ashes of our forefathers; and when the
thought of the destroying hand that hung over them arose amid many
associations, the Bard of Avon's fearful monumental denunciation came to
our aid:
"Blest be the man that spares these stones,
And curst be he that moves these bones."