Part 2 (1/2)

[Illustration: FIG 12 HOO]

[Illustration: FIG 13 ERITH]

[Illustration: FIG 14 HIGH HALSTOW]

[Illustration: FIG 15 FRINDSBURY]

[Illustration: FIG 16 HIGHAM]

FIG 14--AT HIGH HALSTOW

”To Susan Barber” The date is buried, but there is a similar stone close by dated 1699

Nearer Rochester, at Frindsbury, there is the next illustration, still like aits purpose clear by the two bones, such as are nearly always employed in more recent productions

FIG 15--AT FRINDSBURY

”To William David Jones, died 1721”

There is, however, another at Higha a skull to be intended, the inspiration of the bones appears not to have caught the artist The portrait theory may possibly better fit this case

FIG 16--AT HIGHAM

”To Mr Wed 65”

That sos were meant for portraits cannot be denied, and, in order to shew thes off a few and present an untouched photograph of the 17) The whole of the originals are to be found in the neighbouring churchyards of Shorne and Chalk, two rural parishes on the Rochester Road, and exhibit with all the fidelity possible the craftse sculptors They will doubtless also excite so

My belief, as already expressed, is that the upper for the ideal; in other words, attempts to represent the emblem of death--the skull Nos 1 and 2 are from Shorne; Nos 3, 4, and 5 from the churchyard at Chalk

In No 1 we have, perhaps, the crudest conception extant of the skeleton head The lower bars are probably meant for teeth; what the radial lines on the crown are supposed to be is again conjecture

Perhaps a nimbus, perhaps hair or a cap, or merely an ornamental finish The inscription states that the stone was erected to the ed 63 years

No 2 has the inscription buried, but it is of about the sae feature in this case is the zig-zag ”toothing” which is employed to represent the jaws

Doubtless the artist thought that anything he ained in the picturesque

No 3, in which part of the inscription ”Here lyeth” intrudes into the arch belonging by right to the illustration, is equally primitive and artless The eyebrows, cheeks--in fact all the features--are evidently unassisted studies fro, not the dead, frontispiece of humanity; but what are the serifs, or projections, on either side?

Wondrous as it is, there can be only one answer They y commeed 47 years

No 4 is one of the rude efforts to imitate the skull and crossbones of which we find many examples It is dedicated to one Grinhill (probably a kinsed 56 years

Most strange of all is No 5, in which the ives us so which is evidently meant for a portrait of the departed The stone records that Mary, wife of Thoed 43 years It is one of the double tombstones frequently met with in Kent and some other counties

The second half, which is headed by a picture of two united hearts, records that the er Thoed 55 years

Upon a stone adjacent, to Mary London, who died in 1731, there has been another portrait of a lady with braided hair, but time has almost obliterated it I mention the circumstance to shew that this special department of obituary masonry, as all others, was prone to ient inhabitants and constant frequenters of these two churchyards have infor these stones they never observed any of their peculiarities It ought, however, to be said that these pris are not often conspicuous, and generally require so, in nearly every instance within the diminished curve of the most antiquated form of headstone (such as is shewn in the Frontispiece), and as a rule they are overgroith lichen, which has to be rubbed off before the lines are visible It may safely be averred, on the other hand, that the majority of the old stones when found of this shape contain or have contained these reures, and in some places, particularly in Kent, they literally swarm There is a numerous assortment of them at Meopham, a once remote hamlet, now a station on the London, Chatham, and Dover Railway I have copied only one--an early atte with outstretched wings upon a cloud, but there are a good many of the same order to keep it in countenance

FIG 18--AT MEOPHAM