'Behold the market-place, with poor o'erspread, The universality of his benevolence and thorough honesty of his character made him the referee in most disputes; and his leisure and good-nature gave him means of settling many a case which might else have involved much wrangling and expense in law-courts. To the sick he was also a doctor and attendant :— 'Despairing quacks with curses fled the place, He set his heart on the improvement of Ross; and its natural beauties and advantages were heightened by his taste and care. Previous to his time there was a want of trees about the town and in the plain below it. Kyrle felt this, and was a vigorous planter. It became ultimately his greatest enjoyment to plant, and water, and foster his sylvan children. The fine trees about the church and avenues in the Prospect-ground adjoining, were of his fostering. It was he Who hung with woods yon mountain's sultry brow,' and who called into existence many conveniences and beauties which Ross has still to show. Kyrle died at the age of eighty-four, full of years and honour; the real grief felt when a benefactor dies, was felt at Ross in 1724, when his remains were carried to the last resting-place on the hill-top where he had often walked and prayed. No stone marked his grave for fifty-two years, but kind hearts cherished the spot and remembered it. In 1776, the tomb shown in our engraving was placed on the wall of the chancel close to the communion-rails. Its history is told in this inscription which appears upon it: In virtue of a bequest under the will of Constantia, Viscountess Dupplin, great grand-daughter to Sir John Kyrle of Much Marcle in this county, Bart.; Lieut. Col. James Money of Much Marcle aforesaid, her executor and heir, erected this Monument in memory of his kinsman John Kyrle, A.D. 1776.' The tomb is a work of much elegance, it is of white and dove-coloured marbles edged with black. A medallion in Kyrle's Monument, the upper part exhibits a Immediately adjoining the churchyard is the Prospectground, as it is termed, consisting of a public walk extending for nearly a mile to He planted it with trees, the southward, and which was formed by Kyrle. and evidently intended it for the ornament of the town as well as for the health of its inhabitants; he constructed seats for the weary traveller, as described by Pope, and a summer-house at its termination. But his townsmen had not that thought for themselves, which he in his benevolence had for them. They neglected his gifts, and the Prospect ground became merely a field, instead of a cheerful garden or a parterre; the seats were broken, the summer-house decayed, and many of the trees were cut down. Worse than all, the land became partially alienated from the people; the walks have been declared 'not public;' and Kyrle's townsmen, by their own neglect, have been deprived of the advantages his benevolence designed for them. We cannot sympathise with those who had so little sympathy with the exertions made for their advantage by the Man of Ross;' to us everything * It is engraved in our initial letter. connected with his name is hallowed. We felt it a privilege to know how much could be done with small means towards, not ephemeral, but lasting good. We longed to show it to those who enrol a donation on a charity-list, and earn for themselves a great repute by what is, in fact, no sacrifice. There is a fashion in all things, and the cant of religious charity is as degrading as any other. John Kyrle acted upon the great ennobling precepts all who love to see how left us by St. Paul, and -the memory of the just Smells sweet and blossoms in the dust,' would be well rewarded by a pilgrimage to the resting-place of THe Man of Ross.' T THE TOMB OF WILLIAM HOGARTH. OGARTH, the great painter-teacher of his age and country, was born in the parish of St. Bartholomew the Great, in London, on the 10th of November, 1697,* and his trusty and sympathising biographer, Allan Cunningham, says, 'We have the authority of his own manuscripts for believing he was baptised on the 28th of the same month;' but the parish registers have been examined for confirmation with fruitless solicitude.' Cunningham gives December as the month of his birth; this is a mistake; so also is his notice of the painter's introduction of the Virago into his picture of the Modern Midnight Conversation.' No female figure appears in this subject. It is in the third plate of the 'Rake's Progress' the woman alluded to is introduced. A small critic might here find a fit subject for vituperation, and loudly condemn Cunningham as a writer who was too idle to examine the works he was describing; pouncing on his minute errors, and forgetting the totality of his generous labours. Much of this spirit infests literature; and merges the kindly exposition of error into the bitterness of personal attack. The His parents resided at the time of his birth in Ship Court, in the Old Bailey, where his father had kept a school, and obtained some slight literary employment. The locality at that time, as at present, had no refinement to boast of; but it must have brought young William early into contact with the hard-featured natures' he afterwards so ably delineated,-laying bare many of the coarser realities of life to the keen gaze of a shrewd boy. are. fallibility of human nature should teach us charity, and our own faults lead us to more gently scan our brother man,'—a thing too often unthought of by those who are nothing if not critical, and as frequently nothing when they The painter was descended from a Westmoreland family. Sprung from an industrious race of self-helping yeomen, whose hardy toil brought them health and contentment, Hogarth had an early advantage, derived from his father's love of letters, which eventually drew him away from field and wood to the great London mart. Like thousands of others, he was unsuccessful. Fortunately, in this instance, his want of success in literature stimulated the strong mind of his son to seek occupation of more certain profit; and those who feel interest in the whereabouts of celebrated men, may think upon the days when William Hogarth wrought in silver,* as the apprentice of Ellis Gamble, in Cranbourne Street, and speculate upon the change of circumstances, wrought by his own exertions, when, as a great painter, in after time, he occupied the house now known as the Sablonière Hotel, in Leicester Square.t Hogarth's character of mind, evidenced in his works and proved by his biography, is so perfectly honest, open, home-bred English, that we claim him with pride-as belonging exclusively to England. His originality is of English growth; his satire broad, bold, fair-play English. He was no screened assassin of character, either with pen or pencil; no journalist's hack to stab in secret-concealing his name or assuming a forged one; no masked caricaturist, responsible to none. His philosophy was of the straightforward, After Hogarth's fame had been fully established, and his death had attracted the attention of collectors to the many efforts of his graver, great industry was shown in obtaining worthless mementos of his early years when employed in the drudgery of engraving on salvers and silver mugs. Several have since been copied in fac-simile, and may be seen in the works of Ireland and others. Although there is little to admire in them, there is always a rough vigour and boldness of treatment which, however coarse, redeems them from common-place prettiness, the staple commodity of such works in general. The arms of the Duchess of Kendal, engraved by Hogarth on a silver salver, is perhaps one of the best of the artist's early works. This house, in which Hogarth lived many years, in which he died, and where his wife continued to vend his engravings afterwards, bore at that time the sign of The Golden Head.' It is scarcely necessary to remark that it has undergone changes to fit it to the necessities of a modern hotel. Its present aspect is as new as if it had not numbered twenty years since its erection. |