504
NOTES AND QUERIES. tn s. xn. DEC. 25, 1915.
physical strength and cunning have deserted
him. I fancied that Mr. A. G. Godley must
have written it, but I cannot find it among
those of his published writings which I
possess. It is, however, quite in his vein.
There are some 8 or 10 stanzas of 8 lines
each. I am certain that it was published
within the last 30 years, as I well recollect
the absurd proposal which is here satirized.
W. A. B. COOLIDGE,
Senior Fellow of Magdalen Coll., Oxford. Grindelwald.
LADY O'LOONEY'S EPITAPH:
MRS. JANE MOLONY. (US xii. 441, sub 'LadyO'Toole's Epitaph.')
THE real epitaph is that in memory of Mrs. Jane Molony. It is in the chapel of St. George's Burial-Ground in the Bayswater .Road. Unfortunately, it is so high upon the wall (south wall, inside) that it is illegible unless one mounts a ladder.
If MB. LEONARD C. PRICE will refer to a reply of mine (11 S. iii. 190), he will find the epitaph copied from ' Antiente Epitaphes,' collected by Thomas F. Raven- shaw, M.A., F.S.A., 1878. As it occupies nearly a column of ' N. & Q.,' a second reproduction of it would be too much to expect.
The heading ' Lady O'Looney ' appears generally with Pewsey as the place of her epitaph. It is important to notice that Ravenshaw dates his preface " Pewsey Rectory, Wilts, 1878," and that he heads the epitaph in question : " 1839, Mrs. Jane Molony ('Lady O'Looney')," and in a foot-note says : " In a very mutilated form this epitaph has long been current as that of ' Lady O'Looney,' and was said to be found at Pewsey, Wilts."
The short mutilated fragment beginning "Here lies the body of Lady O'Looney, great niece of Burke, commonly' called the Sublime," is given in Silvester Tissington's ' Collection of Epitaphs,' 1857, p. 385, and in W. Fairley's ' Epitaphiana,' 1873, p. 158, attributed in both books to Pewsey. There are other books in which the fiction is perpetuated. One editor or collector copies another.
Would it be possible to learn who in- vented " Lady O'Looney " ? Take M from Molony, you have Olony, which easily becomes O'Looney. The invention and the mutilation must have occurred 1839-57.
Probably " Lady Jones," who is not
mentioned in the original epitaph, was
invented by the same poor wag.
" Lady O'Toole " is new to me. If Mr- E. R. Suffling is correctly quoted (11 S. iii- 109), he makes several mistakes. He says that the slab in the chapel of St. George's Burial - Ground has been removed. It is there now, unless it has been taken away quite recently. He substitutes Maloney for Molony. He gives Lady Looney, whereas this fictitious person is named Lady O'Looney. He remarks : " How the lady could also be buried at Pewsey I cannot say." The answer is that the lady was not buried at Pewsey. Ravenshaw, dating from Pewsey Rectory, says, p. 183 :
" Many persons probably will be glad to be presented to the real ' Lady O'Looney,' with whom I myself became acquainted only in February, 1877, during a casual visit to her place of rest,"
i.e., the chapel in the Bayswater Road. ROBERT PIERPOINT.
This " epitaph," so called, is a burlesque founded on a real one in St. George's Burial-Ground, Bayswater Road (6 S. iL 334). The subject of it is usually " Lady O'Looney." The best version that I have met with was given me by a friend in 1863, and is :
" Here lies Lady O'Looney. She was Grand-niece of Burke, commonly called the Sublime. She was bland, passionate, and deeply religious. Also she painted in water colours. And of such is the king- dom of heaven."
In 1880 I sent two real epitaphs in a similar strain, but ten times the length, dated 1741 and 1780, that I had copied at Houghton- le- Spring about 1863 (6 S. ii. 404). It is stated of Madam Blake that " Her Form was lovely, yet lovely as it was She still stood more eminently distinguish'd in Human Nature for the nobler Endowments of the mind,'* &c. ;
and of Sir Francis Blake, that " He was a very close and acute Reasoner, Sparing of Words, not through want of them, but from an Aversion to Redundancy," &c. But these wonderful inscriptions should be perused in their entirety, at the above reference. J T. F.
Durham.
My note of this epitaph (made in 1862)
runs thus : " She was bland, passionate,
and deeply religious. She painted in water colours, and sent two pictures," &c. It purports to come from a Devonshire church- yard. EDWARD SMITH.
Wandsworth.
