by a
sad lack of skill in her physician. She is buried in the east cloisters
of Westminster Abbey. A black marble slab marks the spot. On it are
graven 'Mrs. Aphra Behn Dyed April, 16, A.D. 1689,' and two lines, 'made
by a very ingenious Gentleman tho' no Poet':--[51]

Here lies a Proof that Wit can never be
Defence enough against Mortality.[52]

[Footnote 50: The title page has 1689, but it was possibly published
late in 1688.]

[Footnote 51: Traditionally said to be John Hoyle.]

[Footnote 52: Sam Briscoe, the publisher, in his Dedicatory Epistle
to _Familiar Letters of Love, Gallantry, etc._ (2 vols., 1718),
says: 'Had the rough Days of K. _Charles_ II _newly recover'd from
the Confusion of a Civil War_, or the tempestuous Time of _James_
the Second, had the same _Sence of Wit_ as our _Gentlemen_ now
appear to have, the first Impressions of _Milton's Paradise Lost_
had never been sold for _Waste Paper_; the Inimitable _Hudibras_ had
never suffered the Miseries of a Neglected Cavalier; _Tom Brown_ the
merriest and most diverting'st man, had never expir'd so neglected;
Mr. _Dryden_'s Religion would never have lost him his _Pension_; or
Mrs. _Behn_ ever had but _two Lines_ upon her _Grave-stone_.']

'She was of a generous and open Temper, something passionate, very
serviceable to her Friends in all that was in her Power; and could
sooner forgive an Injury, than do one. She had Wit, Honour, Good-Humour,
and Judgment. She was Mistress of all the pleasing Arts of Conversation,
but us'd 'em not to any but those who love Plain-dealing.' So she comes
before us. A graceful, comely woman,[53] merry and buxom, with brown
hair and bright eyes, candid, sincere, a brilliant conversationalist in
days when conversation was no mere slipshod gabble of slang but cut and
thrust of poignant epigram and repartee; warm-hearted, perhaps too
warm-hearted, and ready to lend a helping hand even to the most
undeserving, a quality which gathered all Grub Street round her door. At
a period when any and every writer, mean or great, of whatsoever merit
or party, was continually assailed with vehement satire and acrid
lampoons, lacking both truth and decency, Aphra Behn does not come off
scot-free, nobody did; and upon occasion her name is amply vilified by
her foes. There are some eight ungenerous lines with a side reference to
the 'Conquests she had won' in Buckingham's _A Trial of the Poets for
the Bays_,