The multitude of great events which took place during the lifetime of this man are truly wonderful and astonishing. He lived under the rule of nine sovereigns of England—Henry VII., Henry VIII., Edward VI., Mary, Elizabeth, James I., Charles I., Oliver Cromwell, and Charles II. He was born when the Roman Catholic religion was established by law. He saw the dissolution of the monasteries, and the faith of the nation changed; Popery established a second time by Queen Mary; Protestantism restored by Elizabeth; the Civil War between Charles and the Parliament begun and ended; Monarchy abolished; the young Republic of England, arbiter of the destinies of Europe; and the restoration of Monarchy under the libertine Charles II. During his time, England was invaded by the Scotch; a Scottish King was slain, and a Scottish Queen beheaded in England; a King of Spain and a King of Scotland were Kings in England; three Queens and one King were beheaded in England in his days; and fire and plague alike desolated London. His lifetime time appears like that of a nation, more than an individual, so long was it extended and so crowded was it with such great events.

The foregoing many incidents remind us of the well-known Scottish epitaph on Margery Scott, who died February 26th, 1728, at Dunkeld, at the extreme age of one hundred years. According to Chambers’s “Domestic Annals of Scotland,” the following epitaph was composed for her by Alexander Pennecuik, but never inscribed, and it has been preserved by the reverend statist of the parish, as a whimsical statement of historical facts comprehended within the life of an individual:—

Stop, passenger, until my life you read,
The living may get knowledge from the dead.
Five times five years I led a virgin life,
Five times five years I was a virtuous wife;
Ten times five years I lived a widow chaste,
Now tired of this mortal life I rest.
Betwixt my cradle and my grave hath been
Eight mighty kings of Scotland and a queen.
Full twice five years the Commonwealth I saw,
Ten times the subjects rise against the law;
And, which is worse than any civil war,
A king arraigned before the subject’s bar.
Swarms of sectarians, hot with hellish rage,
Cut off his royal head upon the stage.
Twice did I see old prelacy pulled down,
And twice the cloak did sink beneath the gown.
I saw the Stuart race thrust out; nay, more,
I saw our country sold for English ore;
Our numerous nobles, who have famous been,
Sunk to the lowly number of sixteen.
Such desolation in my days have been,
I have an end of all perfection seen!

A footnote states: “The minister’s version is here corrected from one of the Gentleman’s Magazines for January, 1733; but both are incorrect, there having been during 1728 and the one hundred preceding years no more than six kings of Scotland.”

Rowland Deakin died in 1791, aged 95, and was buried in Astley churchyard, near Shrewsbury. His epitaph is as follows:—

Many years I’ve seen, and
Many things I have known,
Five Kings, two Queens,
And a Usurper on the throne;
But now lie sleeping in the dust
As you, dear reader, shortly must.

In Scott’s “Tales of a Grandfather,” there is an account of the Battle of Lillyard’s Edge, which was fought in 1545. The spot on which the battle occurred is so called from an Amazonian Scottish woman, who is reported, by tradition, to have distinguished herself in the fight. An inscription which was placed on her tombstone was legible within the present century, and is said to have run thus:—

Fair Maiden Lillyard lies under this stane,
Little was her stature, but great was her fame;
Upon the English louns she laid mony thumps,
And when her legs were cutted off, she fought upon her stumps.

The tradition says that a beautiful young lady, called Lillyard, followed her lover from the little village of Maxton, and when she saw him fall in battle, rushed herself into the heat of the fight, and was killed, after slaying several of the English.

In Bolton churchyard, Lancashire, is a gravestone of considerable historical interest. It has been incorrectly printed in several books and magazines, but we are able to give a literal copy drawn from a carefully compiled “History of Bolton,” by John D. Briscoe:—