The learned schoolmaster, whose years have reached a respectable longevity, is surprised in the midst of his tasks, while training the minds of the youths around him, to discover the grim skeleton Death, mors pulsat, concerning whose approach he is well stored with classic instances, seated astride of the terrestrial globe, to the consternation of the scared and flying scholars. The well-read pedagogue is inclined to give his visitor a lesson from Horace in good manners.
That he at least should knock, and wait
Till some one opes th' unwilling gate.
To which Death retorts in reply:—
Doctor, this dart will neither speak
In Hebrew, Latin, or in Greek,
But has a certain language known
In ev'ry age as in our own.
The pale spectre proceeds to remind his charge of the prolonged allowance of life which has been allotted to the pedagogue, although he finds his years have proved too short to allow him to complete the legacy of learning it was his fond ambition to leave behind him.
The doctor, who seems a kindly preceptor, and one whose self-composure it is difficult to disturb, while resigning his mind to his own fate, is interceding for his pupils.
'But you'll at least these urchins spare,
They are my last, my only care.'
'I'll hurt them not, I'll only scare 'em:
So die, and Mors est finis rerum,
Which, for your scholars, I'll translate,
Death strikes the learn'd, the little, and the great!'
Plate 21. The Coquette.
I'll lead you to the splendid crowd:
But your next dress will be a shroud.