!
Faith lends her aid to ease affliction's load;
The parent mourns his child upon the bier,
The Christian yields an angel to his God.

Of whimsical and satirical epitaphs--some actually inscribed on tombstones,
and others intended for pasquinades--a large collection might be made. We
have little taste for these anomalous compositions, nor do we consider it
creditable to the national character, that so many English churchyards can
be pointed out where they occur. But there are those who will make even
the tomb a subject of pleasant humors. The epitaph for the tomb of Sir
John Vanbrugh, distinguished as a dramatist and architect, and reflecting
on his achievements in the latter capacity, is as follows:

Lie heavy on him, Earth, for he
Laid many a heavy load on thee.

The original of the following is among the epigrams of Boileau:--

Here lies my wife; there let her lie;
She is at rest--and so am I.

We do not suppose that this was ever engraved on a tombstone, either in
French or English; but the following lines are said to have been copied
from a slab in an English church:--

Here lies the body of Sarah Sexton,
Who as a wife did never vex one;
We can't say that for her at the next stone.

The next specimen is also known to have appeared on a tomb in Essex:--

Here lies the man Richard,
And Mary his wife;
Their surname was Pritchard;
They lived without strife;
And the reason was plain;
They abounded in riches,
They no care had nor pain,
And the wife wore the breeches.

We will not multiply examples of these compositions. Lines of the
description we have quoted have often found their way into print, and we
have selected one or two of the least offensive as examples of
eccentricity.

THE GOOD OLD TIMES IN PARIS.

AN ADVENTURE WITH ROBBERS.

From Chamber's Edinburgh Journal.

The world, since it was a world at all, has ever been fond of singing the
praises of the good old times. It would seem a general rule, that so soon
as we get beyond a certain age, whatever that may be, we acquire a high
opinion of the past, and grumble at every thing new under the sun. One
cause of this may be, that distance lends enchantment to the view, and
that the history of the past, like a landscape travelled over, loses in
review all the rugged and wearisome annoyances that rendered it scarcely
bearable in the journey. But it is hardly worth