thy pale ghost, or grac'd thy mournful bier:
By harlots' hands thy dying eyes were clos'd;
By harlots' hands thy decent limbs compos'd;
By harlots' hands thy humble grave adorn'd;
By harlots honour'd, and by harlots mourn'd."

The adventures of our heroine are now concluded. She is no longer an
actor in her own tragedy; and there are those who have considered this
print as a farce at the end of it: but surely such was not the author's
intention.

The ingenious writer of Tristram Shandy begins the life of his hero
before he is born; the picturesque biographer of Mary Hackabout has
found an opportunity to convey admonition, and enforce his moral, after
her death. A wish usually prevails, even among those who are most
humbled by their own indiscretion, that some respect should be paid to
their remains; that their eyes should be closed by the tender hand of a
surviving friend, and the tear of sympathy and regret shed upon the sod
which covers their grave; that those who loved them living, should
attend their last sad obsequies; and a sacred character read over them
the awful service which our religion ordains, with the solemnity it
demands. The memory of this votary of prostitution meets with no such
marks of social attention, or pious respect. The preparations for her
funeral are as licentious as the progress of her life, and the contagion
of her example seems to reach all who surround her coffin. One of them
is engaged in the double trade of seduction and thievery; a second is
contemplating her own face in a mirror. The female who is gazing at the
corpse, displays some marks of concern, and feels a momentary
compunction at viewing the melancholy scene before her: but if any other
part of the company are in a degree affected, it is a mere maudlin
sorrow, kept up by glasses of strong liquor. The depraved priest does
not seem likely to feel for the dead that hope expressed in our liturgy.
The appearance and employment of almost every one present at this
mockery of woe, is such as must raise disgust in the breast of any
female who has the least tincture of delicacy, and excite a wish that
such an exhibition may not be displayed at her own funeral.

In this plate there are some local customs which mark the manners of the
times when it was engraved, but are now generally disused, except in
some of the provinces very distant from the capital; sprigs of rosemary
were then given to each of the mourners: to ap