upon it is inscribed

CHARLES DICKENS.
BORN FEBRUARY THE SEVENTH 1812. DIED JUNE THE
NINTH 1870.

[Illustration]

The highest associations of both the arts he loved surround him where
he lies. Next to him is RICHARD CUMBERLAND. Mrs. PRITCHARD'S monument
looks down upon him, and immediately behind is DAVID GARRICK'S. Nor is
the actor's delightful art more worthily represented than the nobler
genius of the author. Facing the grave, and on its left and right, are
the monuments of CHAUCER, SHAKESPEARE, and DRYDEN, the three immortals
who did most to create and settle the language to which CHARLES DICKENS
has given another undying name.

FINIS.

FOOTNOTES:

[303] I desire to guard myself against any possible supposition that I
think these Readings might have been stopped by the exercise of medical
authority. I am convinced of the contrary. Dickens had pledged himself
to them; and the fact that others' interests were engaged rather than
his own supplied him with an overpowering motive for being determinedly
set on going through with them. At the sorrowful time in the preceding
year, when, yielding to the stern sentence passed by Sir Thomas Watson,
he had dismissed finally the staff employed on his country readings, he
had thus written to me. "I do believe" (3rd of May 1869) "that such
people as the Chappells are very rarely to be found in human affairs. To
say nothing of their noble and munificent manner of sweeping away into
space all the charges incurred uselessly, and all the immense
inconvenience and profitless work thrown upon their establishment, comes
a note this morning from the senior partner, to the effect that they
feel that my overwork has been 'indirectly caused by them, and by my
great and kind exertions to make their venture successful to the
extreme.' There is something so delicate and fine in this, that I feel
it deeply." That feeling led to his resolve to make the additional
exertion of these twelve last readings, and nothing would have turned
him from it as long as he could stand at the desk.

[304] I preserve also the closing words of the letter. "It is very
strange--you remember I suppose?--that the last time we spoke of him
together, you said that we should one day hear that the wayward life
into which he had fallen was over, and there an end of our knowledge of
it." The waywardness, which was merely the having latterly withdrawn
him