MONUMENT TO NAPOLEON!
On the removal of Napoleon's remains, I prepared the above design for a monument; but it was not sent, because it was not wanted. There is this disadvantage about a design for his monument;—it will suit nobody else. This could not, therefore, be converted into a tribute to the memory of the late distinguished philosopher, Muggeridge, head master of the grammar-school at Birchley; nor into an embellishment for the mausoleum of the departed hero Fitz-Hogg, of the Pipeclays. It very often happens, however, that when a monument to a great man turns out to be a misfit, it will, after a while, be found to suit some other great man as well as if his measure had been taken for it. Just add a few grains to the intellectual qualities, subtract a scruple or so from the moral attributes—let out the philanthropy a little and take in the learning a bit—clip the public devotion, and throw an additional handful of virtues into the domestic scale—qualify the squint, in short, or turn the aquiline into a snub—these slight modifications observed, and any hero or philosopher may be fitted to a hair with a second-hand monumental design. The standing tribute "We ne'er shall look upon his like again," is of course applicable in every case of greatness.
"Is this the man of thousand thrones,
Who strew'd our earth with hostile bones!
And can he thus survive!"