For all the village came to him
When they had need to call;
His counsel free to all was given,
For he was kind to all.

Ring on, ring’ on, sweet Sabbath bell,
Still kind to me thy matins swell,
And when from earthly things I part,
Sigh o’er my grave and lull my heart.

These last four lines strike a sweet note, and are far superior to the usual class of monumental poetry.  I will not guarantee the correct copying of the third and fourth lines.  Various copyists have produced various versions.  One version runs: 

     Bob majors and trebles with ease he could bang,
     Till Death called a bob which brought the last clang.

In Staple-next-Wingham, Kent, there is a stone to the memory of the parish clerk who died in 1820, aged eighty-six years, and thus inscribed: 

     He was honest and just, in friendship sincere,
     And Clerk of this Parish for sixty-seven years.

At Worth Church, Sussex, near the south entrance is a headstone, inscribed thus: 

     In memory of John Alcorn, Clerk and Sexton of this parish,
     who died Dec. 13:  1868 in the 81st year of his age.

          Thine honoured friend for fifty three full years,
          He saw each bridal’s joy, each Burial’s tears;
          Within the walls, by Saxons reared of old,
          By the stone sculptured font of antique mould,
          Under the massive arches in the glow,
          Tinged by dyed sun-beams passing to and fro,
          A sentient portion of the sacred place,
          A worthy presence with a well-worn face. 
          The lich-gate’s shadow, o’er his pall at last
          Bids kind adieu as poor old John goes past. 
          Unseen the path, the trees, the old oak door,
          No more his foot-falls touch the tomb-paved floor,
          His silvery head is hid, his service done
          Of all these Sabbaths absent only one. 
          And now amidst the graves he delved around,
          He rests and sleeps, beneath the hallowed ground.

     Keep Innocency, and take heed unto the thing that is right,
     For that shall bring a man peace at the last.  Psalm XXXVII.
     38.

There is an interesting memorial of an aged parish clerk in Cropthorne Church, Worcestershire, an edifice of considerable note.  It consists of a small painted-glass window in the tower, containing a full-length portrait of the deceased official, duly apparelled in a cassock.

There is in the King’s Norton parish churchyard an old gravestone the existence of which I dare say a good many people had forgotten until recently, owing to the inscription having become almost illegible.  Within the past few weeks it has been renovated, and thus a record has been prevented from dropping out of public memory.  The stone sets forth that it was erected to the memory of Isaac Ford, a shoemaker,