-law, Doctor John Hall, honored the great man and was bound he
should have a worthy resting-place; so at midnight, with the help of a
few trusted friends, he dug the grave and lowered the dust of England's
greatest son.

Then they hastily replaced the stones, and over the grave they placed the
slab that they had brought:

"Good friend, for Jesus' sake forbear,
To dig the dust enclosed here,
Blest be the man who spares these stones,
And cursed be he who moves my bones."

A threat from a ghost! Ah, no one dare molest that grave--besides they
didn't know who was buried there--neither are we quite sure. Long years
after the interment, some one set a bust of the poet, and a tablet, on
the wall over against the grave.

Under certain circumstances, if occasion demands, I might muster a
sublime conceit; but considering the fact that ten thousand Americans
visit Stratford every year, and all write descriptions of the place, I
dare not in the face of Baedeker do it. Further than that, in every
library there are Washington Irving, Hawthorne, and William Winter's
three lacrimose but charming volumes.

And I am glad to remember that the Columbus who discovered Stratford and
gave it to the people was an American: I am proud to think that Americans
have written so charmingly of Shakespeare: I am proud to know that at
Stratford no man besides the master is as honored as Irving, and while I
can not restrain a blush for our English cousins, I am proud that over
half the visitors at the birthplace are Americans, and prouder still am I
to remember that they all write letters to the newspapers at home about
Stratford-on-Avon.

* * * * *

In England poets are relegated to a "Corner." The earth
and the fulness thereof belongs to the men who can kill; on this rock
have the English State and Church been built.

As the tourist approaches the city of London for the first time, there
are four monuments that probably will attract his attention. They lift
themselves out of the fog and smoke and soot, and seem to struggle toward
the blue.

One of these monuments is to commemorate a calamity--the conflagration of
Sixteen Hundred Sixty-six--and the others are in honor of deeds of war.

The finest memorial in Saint Paul's is to a certain eminent Irishman,
Arthur Wellesley. The mines and quarries of earth have been called on for
their richest contributions; and talent and skill have given their