AND TEE DUKES OF RICHMOND. 223 



Still further to perpetuate the glories of the 

 Charlton Hunt and the memory of the redoubtable 

 huntsman (" Thomas Johnson "), there exists in 

 Singleton Church (the parish in which Charlton is 

 situated), near the vestry door, a tablet bearing the 

 following inscription : — 



" Near this place lies interred 



THOMAS JOHNSON, 



Who departed this life at Charlton, 

 December 20th, 1774. 



" From his early inclination to fox-hounds, he soon 

 became an experienced huntsman. His knowledge in his 

 profession, wherein he had no superior, hardly an equal, 

 joined to his honesty in every other particular, recom- 

 mended him to the service, and gained him the appro- 

 bation of several of the nobility and gentry, among them 

 being the Lord Conway, Earl of Cardigan, the Lord 

 GowEE, the Duke of Marlborough, the Hon. M. 

 Spencer. The last master whom he served, in whose 

 service he died, was Charles, the third Duke of Rich- 

 mond, Lennox, and Aubigny, who erected this monument 

 in memory of a good and faithful servant, as a reward to 

 the deceased, and an incitement to the living. ' Go, and 

 do thou likewise ' (St. Luke x. 37). 



" Here Johnson lies ; what human can deny 

 Old Honest Tom the tribute of a sigh ? 

 Deaf is that ear which caught the opening sound ; 

 Dunt that tongue which cheer'd the hills around. 

 Unpleasing truth : Death hunts us from our birth 

 In view, and men, like foxes, take to earth." 



