to Miss Jane Barry, a recent convert
to Quakerism.

"We remained," says Boswell, writing with awe, like a man who has
survived an earthquake, "together till it was very late. Notwithstanding
occasional explosions of violence, we were all delighted upon the whole
with Johnson. I compared him at the time to a warm West Indian climate,
where you have a bright sun, quick vegetation, luxurious foliage,
luscious fruits, but where the same heat sometimes produces thunder,
lightning, and earthquakes in a terrible degree."

St. Mildred's Church, Poultry, is a rectory situate at the corner of
Scalding Alley. John de Asswell was collated thereto in the year 1325.
To this church anciently belonged the chapel of Corpus Christi and St.
Mary, at the end of Conyhoop Lane, or Grocers' Alley, in the Poultry.
The patronage of this church was in the prior and canons of St. Mary
Overie's in Southwark till their suppression. This church was consumed
in the Great Fire, anno 1666, and then rebuilt, the parish of St. Mary
Cole being thereunto annexed. Among the monumental inscriptions in this
church, Maitland gives the following on the well-known Thomas Tusser, of
Elizabeth's reign, who wrote a quaint poem on a farmer's life and
duties:--

"Here Thomas Tusser, clad in earth, doth lie,
That some time made the points of husbandrie.
By him then learne thou maist, here learne we must,
When all is done we sleep and turn to dust.
And yet through Christ to heaven we hope to goe,
Who reads his bookes shall find his faith was so.

Among the curious epitaphs in St. Mildred's, Stow mentions the
following, which is worth quoting here:--

"HERE LIES BURIED THOMAS YKEN, SKINNER.

"In Hodnet and London
God blessed my life,
Till forty and sixe yeeres,
With children and wife;
And God will raise me
Up to life againe,
Therefore have I thought
My death no paine."

[Illustration: JOHN WILKES. (_From an Authentic Portrait._)]

A fair monument of Queen Elizabeth had on the sides the following verses
inscribed:--

"If prayers or tears
Of subjects had prevailed,
To save a princesse
Through the world esteemed;
Then Atropos
In cutting here had fail'd,
And had not cut her thread,
But been redeem'd;
But pale-faced Death;
And cruel churlish Fate,
To prince and people
Brings the latest date.
Yet spight of Death and Fate,