Translated thus:
The gift of the most beloved and most distinguished author, Henry Purcell, Priest of the Muses, who in the year of our Lord 1695, the day before the feast of St. Cecilia, died with many tears, to none more tearfully than to his friend and admirer, Jacob Talbot.
Jacob Talbot was a Fellow of Trinity College, Cambridge, and the author of the words of an "Ode for the Consert at York Buildings, upon the death of Mr. Purcell," which will be found in the Orpheus Britannicus, 1698.
Purcell was buried on the 26th of November in Westminster Abbey, beneath the organ which had so often responded to his skilful touch. The anthems he had composed for Queen Mary's funeral only a few months before were again performed, so that Purcell had rehearsed and inaugurated his own dirge. Doubtless the remembrance of this would bring home to the mourners the intense pathos of the music with double force.
On the grave-stone the following lines were inscribed:
Plaudite, felices superi, tanto hospite; nostris
Præfuerat, vestris additur ille choris:
Invida nec vobis Purcellum terra reposcat,
Questa decus sedi deliciasque breves.
Tam cito decessisse, modos cui singula debet