goe downe my throat,’ says Aubrey, ‘but for those that can ’tis a most incomparable engine.’ And there is nothing that he takes more delight in than a funeral or an obituary monument. His descriptions of tombstones almost make you feel that it is worth the pains of dying to get so admirable a thing contrived in your honour. Of Selden he says:
He was magnificently buried in the Temple Church…. His grave was about ten foot deepe, or better, walled up a good way with bricks, of which also the bottome was paved, but the sides at the bottome for about two foot high were of black polished marble, wherein his coffin (covered with black bayes) lyeth, and upon that wall of marble was presently let downe a huge black marble stone of great thicknesse, with this inscription:
Heic jacet corpus Johannis Seldeni.
…Over this was turned an inch of brick… and upon that was throwne the earth, etc., and on the surface lieth another finer grave-stone of black marble with this inscription:
I Seldenus I. C. heic situs est.
…On the side of the wall above is a fine inscription of white marble: the epitaph he made himself.
This is merely one instance of Aubrey’s loving care for grave-stones and monuments. He recognized them perhaps as being among the best friends of the antiquary, and desired that they should receive all care and honour. Of Ben Jonson he says:
O Rare Ben Johnson,
which was donne at the chardge of Jack Young (after-
