224 LIFE OF SIR JOHN LUBBOCK 



OH. 



induced the Lord Mayor to call a general meeting 

 of London shopkeepers, expecting to carry a 

 resolution against any such measure as he had 

 proposed. Sir John attended and asked for a 

 hearing. Having explained how matters stood, 

 he moved an amendment in favour of his Bill 

 and quoted, as illustrating the hard lives of shop 

 assistants, and especially of women, the Norfolk 

 epitaph : 



Here lies a poor woman, who always was tired, 

 For she lived in a world where too much was required. 

 Weep not for me, friends, she said, for I'm going 

 Where there'll neither be cooking nor washing nor sewing. 



I go where the loud Hallelujahs are ringing, 

 But I shall not take any part in the singing. 

 Then weep not for me, friends, if death do us sever, 

 For I'm going to do nothing for ever and ever. 



" This quotation," he observes, " carried the 

 meeting and the amendment." Variant readings 

 of this epitaph are extant, but the gist of it is 

 the same in all. 



Sir John was much pleased by the high 

 appreciation of Mr. Ruskin of the merit of 

 the illustrations of foliage in his book on the 

 " Shape of Leaves " : 



" Dear Sir John," Mr. Ruskin writes, " I only 

 waited to answer till the book came. You know how 

 glad Lady Lubbock would make me in coming too, only 

 I cannot be sure that Mrs. Severn is here to see she is 

 comfortable — she's sure to be here anyhow by the time 

 you would care to come. We shan't have a flower for 

 you for weeks, though the bees were out a week ago — 

 now there's 8 inches of snow. The delightful book did 

 come this morning through snow and all. The leaf 

 drawings are quite the best I ever saw in their kind, and 

 I'm ever so jealous — and eager to read — but I'm dread- 





