Jonny Moorhead was a man of a kind heart and a pleasant fancy. He came hither from Belfast, in 1727. He became pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Long Lane, in 1730.—Tempora mutantur—Long Lane, and Jonny Moorhead, and the little, old, visible temple, and Presbyterianism itself, are like Rachel’s first born—they are not. But in 1744, the good people built a new church, for Jonny Moorhead; in due time, Long Lane became Federal Street; and, Jonny’s church bore the bell, which had rung so many peals, and the gilded tell-tale, which, for so many years, had done obeisance to all the winds of Heaven, upon the old Brattle Street Church. These, upon the demolition of that church, in 1774, were the gift of John Hancock. Jonny Moorhead had little comfort from that bell, for he died December 3, 1774, and could he have lived to see that Presbyterian weathercock go round, in after-times, it would have broken the tough, old strings of Jonny Moorhead’s Irish heart.

About one hundred years ago, Jonny Moorhead, upon a drowsy summer afternoon, gave out the one hundred and eighty-seventh psalm—the chief minstrel, with infinite embarrassment, suggested, that there were not so many in the Book—and tradition tells us, that Jonny replied—“Weel, then, sing as mony as there be.”

My recollection of this anecdote of Jonny Moorhead will be painfully revived, when I send forth the one hundredth number of these dealings with the dead. They have been prepared like patch-work, from such fragments, as my common-place book supplied, and at such broken hours of more than ordinary loneliness, as might otherwise have been snoozed, unconsciously away. I had cast all that I had written into a particular drawer; and great was my surprise, to find, that the hundredth was the last, and that, with that number, I shall have sung—“as mony as there be.”One hundred—thought I—is an even number—few individuals care to survive one hundred. When these dealings with the dead had reached the number of four-score, I had serious misgivings, that their strength, to my weary reader, might prove nothing better than labor and sorrow; notwithstanding the occasional tokens of approbation, from some exceedingly old-fashioned people, who were altogether behind the times.

Having attained this point d’appui, which appears well enough adapted for the long home of an old sexton, it occurred to me, that I could not possibly do a better thing, for myself, or a more acceptable thing for the public, than to gather up my tools, as snugly as possible, and quietly give up the ghost. But giving up the ghost, even in the sacristan sense of that awful phrase, is not particularly agreeable, after all. If I look upon each one of these hundred dealings, as a sepulchre of my own digging—I cannot deny, that the employment of my spade has been a particular solace to me. But there are other solaces—I know it—there are an hundred according to the exiled bard of Sulmo—

“——centum solatia curÆ
Et rus, et comites, et via longa dabunt.”

Other suggestions readily occur, and are as readily, discarded. Parents, occasionally, experiment upon the sensibility of their children, by fondly discoursing of the uncertainty of human existence, and mingling deep drawn sighs, with shadowy allusions to wills and codicils.

For three-and-thirty years, our veteran, maiden aunt, Jemima Wycherly, at the close of her annual visit, which seldom fell short of six weeks, in its duration, though it seemed much longer, took each of us by the hand, and, with many tears, commended us fervently to the protecting arm of an overruling Providence, and bade us an eternal farewell!

I have always contemplated the conduct of Charles V. in relation to the rehearsal of his funeral obsequies, as a piece of imperial foolery. “He ordered his tomb to be erected, in the chapel of the monastery. His domestics marched thither in funeral procession, with black tapers in their hands. He himself followed, in his shroud. He was laid in his coffin, with much solemnity. The service for the dead was chanted; and Charles joined in the prayers, which were offered for the rest of his soul, mingling his tears with those, which his attendants shed, as if they had been celebrating a real funeral. The ceremony closed, with sprinkling holy water on the coffin, in the usual form, and, all the assistants retiring, the doors of the chapel were shut. Then Charles rose out of the coffin, and withdrew to his apartment.” Such is the statement of Dr. Robertson.[1]

Notwithstanding this high authority, it is comforting, even at this late day, to believe, that a story, so discreditable to the memory of Charles, is without any substantial foundation. It has ever appeared remarkable, that Bayle should not have alluded to this curious anecdote. After bestowing the highest praise, on Richard Ford’s Hand Book, for Travellers in Spain, the London Quarterly Review[2] furnishes an extract from the work, in which, after giving a minute and interesting account of the convent of St. Yuste, the final retreat of Charles V., Mr. Ford says—“the story of his having had the funeral service said over himself, while alive, is untrue; no record, or tradition of the kind existed among the monks.”

There is something, in these drafts upon posterity, to be accepted and paid, by the present generation, for the honor of the drawer, resembling the conduct of a man, who encroaches on his principal, or who anticipates his revenues.

There is, undoubtedly, a species of luxury in leave-taking. We have delighted, to contemplate the edifying history of that gray-headed old rat, who, weary of the world, and determined to spend the remnant of his days, in pious meditation, took a final and affectionate leave of all his relatives and friends, and retired to a quiet hole—in the recesses of a Cheshire cheese.

However gratified we may be, to witness the second, or third coming of an able, ardent, and ambitious politician, it is not in the gravest nature to restrain a smile, while we contrast that vehemence, which no time can temper—that vis vivida vitÆ—ready for all things, in the forum or the field—that unquenchable fire, brightly burning, beneath the frost of more than seventy winters—with those sad infirmities of ace—those silver hairs—that one foot in the grave—the necessity of turning from all sublunary things, and making way for Heaven, under the pale rays of life’s parting sun—those senatorial adieus—and long, last farewells—those solemn prayers and fervent hopes for the happiness of his associates, whom he should meet no more, on this side of the eternal world—those esto perpetuas for his country! How touching these things would be, but for their frequency! What more natural, or more excusable, having enjoyed the luxury of leave-taking, than a desire—after a reasonable interval—to repeat the process, which afforded so much pleasure, and inflicted so little pain!

As to my own comparatively humble relation to the public—parvis componere magna—I am of opinion, that I should gain nothing, by affecting to retire, or by pretending to be dead. As to the former, it may be as truly averred of sextons, as it was, by Mr. Jefferson, of office-holders—“few die and none resign;” and, in respect to the latter, I not only despise the idea of such an imposition upon the public, but have some little fear, that the affectation might be too suddenly followed, by the reality, as Dr. Robertson, rightly or wrongly, affirms it to have been, in the case of Charles the Fifth.

I am now fairly committed, for the first number, at least, of another hundred, but for nothing more. I pretend not to look deeper into futurity, than six feet, which is the depth of a well-made grave. When I shall have completed the second hundred, and commenced upon a third, I shall be well nigh ready to exclaim, in the words of Ovid—

“Vixi
Annos bis centum: nunc tertia vivitur Ætas.”

A relation of liberty and equality is decidedly the best, for my reader and for me—I am not constrained to write, nor he to read—if he cannot lie cozily, in a grave of my digging—I do not propose to detain him there—to bury him alive. Dealing with the dead has not hardened my heart. I am a sexton of very considerable sensibility; and have, occasionally, mingled my tears with the earth, as I shovelled it in.

In less figurative phrase, it is my desire to write, for my amusement, till one of us, the reader or myself, gives in, or gives out, and cries enough. I have a perfect respect for the old proverb, de gustibus, and by no means anticipate the pleasure of pleasing every body—

Men’ moveat cimex Pantilius? aut cruciet, quod
Vellicet absentem Demetrius? aut quod ineptus
Fannius Hermogenis lÆdat conviva Tigelli?There are some readers, for example, who seem to look upon a classical quotation, as a personal affront. I conceive this objection to be scarcely equitable, from those, whose hybrid English, it is quite as hard to bear.

There are mortals—offenders in some sort—whom it is difficult to please, like the culprit who cried higher and lower, under the lash, till the Irish drummer’s patience was perfectly exhausted, and he exclaimed—“By Jasus, there’s no plasing ye, strike where I will.”