244 LONDON PARKS & GARDENS 



the footpads, armed with cutlasses, made ofF through 

 the churchyard. It was of this then lonely, rural church- 

 yard that it was said the dead would rest " as secure 

 against the day of resurrection as . . . in stately Paules"; 

 but, alas for modern exigencies, the Midland Railway 

 now spans the sacred ground by a viaduct, and the 

 would-be improvers, in turning what remained into a 

 garden, have moved the tombstones, levelled the un- 

 dulating ground, and heaped the head-stones into 

 terrible rocky mounds, or pushed them in rows along 

 the wall. Numerous were the interesting monuments it 

 contained ; many a courtly French emigre here found 

 a resting-place, such as the Comte de Front, on whose 

 tomb was the line, " A foreign land preserves his ashes 

 with respect." Although a monumental tablet put up 

 to record the opening, and the names of the designers 

 of the garden, proclaims it to be " a boon to the living, 

 a grace to the dead " ; it is doubtful how that respect 

 to the dead was shown. The lines go on to say it was 

 " not for the culture of health only, but also of 

 thought." Surely health and thought could have been 

 equally well stimulated by making pretty paths, lined 

 with trees and flowers, wind reverently in and out 

 among the tombs, and up and down the undulating 

 ground, with seats in shade or sun, arranged with peeps 

 of the old church ; and there might even have been 

 room for the fine sun-dial (the gift of Baroness 

 Burdett-Coutts) without levelling the whole area and 

 laying it out with geometrically straight asphalt walks. 

 The asphalt paths are in themselves a necessity in 

 most cases, as the expense of keeping gravel in order 

 is too great, and the majority of the renovated dis- 

 used burial-grounds suffer from this fact. 



