462 MRS. HESTER MILNER. beautiful engraving of the Resurrection of a pious family, she exclaimed, after minutely noticing it, "I do not like that picture-there is the old man with his grey hairs and wrinkles; I have no idea we shall rise with any of the deformities of age at the resurrection." A cold brought on an illness which terminated her quiet and peaceful life. She was not even one day confined to her chamber, though her indisposition was severe. Medical assistance, however skilful, came too late to prove of any avail. She was found dead in her bed, the clothes unruffled-her features not in the least distorted, and with every appearance of tranquil dissolution. She had slept the sleep of death! The very day before, she lamented to a female friend, that having gone thus far through the winter-this calamity should now befall her. But the inevitable hour which awaits every son and daughter of Adam had arrived. Not even patriarchal longevity exempts from the ravages of the last foe. Methuselah lived nine hundred and sixty nine years, and HE DIED. "An end must in time, (says Dr. Johnson,) be put to every thing great as to every thing little-to LIFE must come its last hour, and to this SYSTEM of being its last day! Her property, which was very considerable, was devised in a well-written will of her own composition, to relatives, friends, and charitable institutions. She bequeathed handsome sums to those excellent establishments-the Orphan School City Road, the Presbyterian Fund, and the Fund for re MAIDSTONE CHURCH-YARD. 463 lieving the Widows of Protestant Dissenting Ministers. Nor has she forgotten two faithful female servants, who, liberally remunerated, are made comfortable during the remainder of their lives. Indeed her legacies have been numerous and liberal: and the writer must in justice add, that on the only two occasions he ever applied in behalf of the sacred cause of charity-the one the case of the French Protestants, the other an instance of individual distress, she gave to an extent that does honour to her memory. The Church-yard of Maidstone is crowded with graves. Here, my friend, I have sauntered and mused upon mortality and immortality! Is this, said I, the end of man? Are his powers, and his passions, and his prospects, to be swallowed up by the grave? Is such an extinction of being consistent either with the wisdom or with the goodness of the Supreme Creator? Shall we be left abandoned in the dust, When fate, relenting, lets the flow'rs revive? With disappointment, penury, and pain? No; Heaven's IMMORTAL SPRING shall yet arrive, And man's majestic beauty bloom again Bright thro' th' eternal year of LOVE's triumphant reign! ВЕАТТІБ. There is also a building in Maidstone formerly known by the name of St. Faith's Church. It was for years used by the Dutch or Walloons, who, by the favour of Queen Elizabeth, settled in this town. They fled from the Duke of Alva's persecution, bringing the linen manufacture along with them, as they did that of silk at Canterbury, and of flannel at Sandwich, in this county. It is remarkable, that the manufactures introduced into Kent by these foreigners are migrated to other parts of the kingdom. But there was lately a manufactory of cloth at Sandling, in the vicinity of Maidstone. So great was the trade in this article formerly, that at Cranbrook several persons obtained their livelihood by card-making-the last of them was Mr. C. Titford, a worthy character, well known in that part of the county. In saying, therefore, in my Tour to the West of England, that Frome supplied the island with cards, Cranbrook, and other parts, ought to have been specified as having had a share in the distribution. The dissenters of Maidstone are numerous, and of respectability. The Presbyterians, Independents, and Baptists, have each of them a place of worship. The meeting in Earl-street, belonging to the Presbyterians, is a neat building, and was erected in 1736; they have a charity-school, which educates and clothes twelve girls and twelve boys, an institution which does honour to their liberality. Its former master, Mr. R. Allchin (now of the Insurance Office), has drawn up and published a neat Epitome of the Evidences of Christianity. Maidstone has a bridge over the Medway of seven arches, built by the Archbishop of Canter bury. In this town, also, is THE GAOL for the county, large, strong, and of modern erection. A shocking scene took place within its walls, between thirty and forty years ago, by which the inhabitants were terrified. A set of villains, under sentence of death (the two most notorious being Italians) were passing from one part of the gaol to the other, to attend the clergyman who came to read prayers to them. Their way lay through the kitchen, where they seized some arms hanging there, stabbed the gaoler to the heart, and liberated the prisoners. They, however, kept possession of the prison for some hours, while soldiers were sent for to Chatham, and shot some of the inhabitants. The clergyman (the Rev. Mr. Denn), affrighted beyond measure, escaped through a hole in the wall, and in the evening the wretches themselves left the gaol, armed with implements of destruction. They got unmolested as far as the wood in the neighbourhood of Seven Oaks, where, some days after, they were taken; but the seizure was attended with a dreadful struggle, for the Italians, resolving not to be taken alive, had both their legs shot off, fought on their stumps, and after having repeatedly loaded their blunderbusses, even with their half-pence, fell lifeless to the ground! Those taken alive were executed. A gentleman residing in the town obligingly introduced me to the late Mr. Watson, the keeper of the prison." Virtue," says Dr. Johnson, "is undoubtedly most laudable in that state which makes it most difficult, aud therefore the humanity of a GAOLER certainly deserves public attestation. The man whose heart has not been hardened by such an employment may be proposed as a pattern of benevolence." By permission we went over the prison. On the debtor's side we observed a court, where they are allowed to range, the sides of whose walls were chequered by the rough figures of a race-horse. They were drawn, we were told, by a blacksmith, who being confined here for twelve months, thus beguiled the hours of his imprisonment. He reminded me of the man in the Bastile, who either by picking up pins, which he had scattered over the floor, or in reckoning the nails with which the door of his cell was studded,, backwards and forwards in every direction, found a neverfailing source of amusement. The felon's side was somewhat crowded, being on the eve of the assizes -a period to which the prisoners must have been looking forward with anxiety. There are two dungeons, one for the men, the other for the women, into which we descend. by eleven steps: Inclusi tenebris et coco carcere! VIRG. These are small dark rooms, with an iron ring in the centre, to which the poor wretches are fastened, when destined to fall a sacrifice to the laws of their country. With what emotions of grief must the victim enter this abode! With what agonizing sensations is he dragged forth, and consigned over, with every circumstance of ignominy, to the awful realities of eternity! Guard, my young friend! O-guard against the first ap |