THE EXTRAORDINARY EPITAPH.
(To THE EDITOR 07 THE " SPECTATOR.")
Fie,—Mr. Larden asks how Professor Clerk Maxwell's friend ran hare met with the grotesque epitaph, beginning:- " When terrestrial All, in chaos, shall exhibit effervescence, :Then celestial virtues in their most refulgent essence Shall, beaming beauteous radiance, through the ebullition shine Transcending to glorious regions, beatifical, divine."
The answer is easy : he may hare read it in print. It appeared in Notes and Queries of July 4th, 1855, and was there stated to have been published, forty years previously, in a local news- paper, as existing in some Shropshire churchyard. The place, the date, the name of the deceased person, were apparently not given even in the newspaper. The correspondent " G. L. F." who sent it to Notes and Queries asked: " Can any one identify it?" No one ever did, until Mr. Larden told us in your columns last week that it is to be seen at High Ercall, in
Downing College, Cambridge.
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