man slapped his hand upon the cover with a force that caused
a rattle among the bones inside--'he half broke my back when I took
his feet to lower en down the steps there. "Ah," saith I to John
there--didn't I, John?--"that ever one man's glory should be such a
weight upon another man!" But there, I liked my lord George sometimes.'

''Tis a strange thought,' said another, 'that while they be all here
under one roof, a snug united family o' Luxellians, they be really
scattered miles away from one another in the form of good sheep and
wicked goats, isn't it?'

'True; 'tis a thought to look at.'

'And that one, if he's gone upward, don't know what his wife is doing
no more than the man in the moon if she's gone downward. And that some
unfortunate one in the hot place is a-hollering across to a lucky one up
in the clouds, and quite forgetting their bodies be boxed close together
all the time.'

'Ay, 'tis a thought to look at, too, that I can say "Hullo!" close to
fiery Lord George, and 'a can't hear me.'

'And that I be eating my onion close to dainty Lady Jane's nose, and she
can't smell me.'

'What do 'em put all their heads one way for?' inquired a young man.

'Because 'tis churchyard law, you simple. The law of the living is, that
a man shall be upright and down-right, and the law of the dead is, that
a man shall be east and west. Every state of society have its laws.'

'We must break the law wi' a few of the poor souls, however. Come,
buckle to,' said the master-mason.

And they set to work anew.

The order of interment could be distinctly traced by observing the
appearance of the coffins as they lay piled around. On those which
had been standing there but a generation or two the trappings still
remained. Those of an earlier period showed bare wood, with a few
tattered rags dangling therefrom. Earlier still, the wood lay in
fragments on the floor of the niche, and the coffin consisted of naked
lead alone; whilst in the case of the very oldest, even the lead was
bulging and cracking in pieces, revealing to the curious eye a heap of
dust within. The shields upon many were quite loose, and removable by
the hand, their lustreless surfaces still indistinctly exhibiting the
name and title of the deceased.

Overhead the groins and concavities of the arches curved in all
directions, dropping low towards the walls, where the height was no more
than sufficient to enable a person to stand upright.

The body of Geor