night, and drowned herself in the pond. She had requested to be buried beside her mother, and so she was brought in a hearse. She was followed by some very decent-looking men on horseback, her sister—Thomas Fleming's wife—in a chaise, and some others with her, and a cart full of women. Molly says folks thinks o' their mothers. Poor body, she has been little thought of by any body else. We did a little of Lessing. I attempted a fable, but my head ached; my bones were sore with the cold of the day before, and I was downright stupid. We went to bed, but not till Wm. had tired himself.
Wednesday, 10th.—A very snowy morning. . . . I was writing out the poem, as we hoped for a final writing. . . . We read the first part and were delighted with it, but Wm. afterwards got to some ugly place, and went to bed tired out. A wild, moonlight night.
Thursday, 11th.— . . . Wm. sadly tired and working at The Pedlar. . . . We made up a good fire after dinner, and Wm. brought his mattress out, and lay down on the floor. I read to him the life of Ben Jonson, and some short poems of his, which were too interesting for him, and would not let him go to sleep. I had begun with Fletcher, but he was too dull for me. Fuller says, in his Life of Jonson (speaking of his plays), "If his latter be not so spriteful and vigorous as his first pieces, all that are old, and all who desire to be old, should excuse him therein." He says he "beheld" wit-combats between Shakespeare and Jonson, and compares Shakespeare to an English man-of-war, Jonson to a great Spanish galleon. There is one affecting line in Jonson's epitaph on his first daughter—
Mary the daughter of their youth.
At six months' end she parted hence,
In safety of her innocence.
Two beggars to-day. I continued to read to Wm.
