For how to starve Death we had laid a plot
Against his Price — but Death was in the Pot.
29 He made them pay his Price, alackaday!
He knew both Law and Gospel better than they.
O that I ne'er had seen that William Blake,
Or could from Death Assassinette wake !
33 We thought — Alas, that such a thought could be ! —
That Blake would Etch for him and draw for me.
For 'twas a kind of Bargain Screwmuch made
That Blake's designs should be by us display 'd,
37 Because he makes designs so very cheap.
Then Screwmuch at Blake's soul took a long leap.
'Twas not a Mouse. Twas death in a disguise.
And I, alas ! live to weep out my Eyes.
41 And Death sits laughing on their Monuments
On which he 's written ' Received the Contents.'
But I have writ — so sorrowful my thought is —
His epitaph ; for my tears are aquafortis.
45 'Come, Artists, knock your head against this stone,
For sorrow that our friend Bob Screwmuch 's gone.'
And now the Muses upon me smile and laugh
I'll also write my own dear epitaph,
49 And I'll be buried near a dyke
That my friends may weep as much as they like:
' Here lies Stewhard the Friend of all &c.'
27 how] now EY.31 ne'er] never EY. that] EY omit.36 designs] design EY.43-4 But . . . aquafortis] But I have writ with tears, as aqua-fortis, This Epitaph—so sorrowful my thought is MS. Book 1st rdg. del.47 upon] in EY. 51 Stewhard] Stothard EY, who finish the couplet : —
' . . . the Friend of all Mankind
Who has not left one enemy behind,'
explaining that ' a later page of the notebook completes the epitaph, changing the name to John Trot.' Here again, however, they misinterpret the force of Blake's ' &c.' which is always a reference to a passage already written. See Ixxxviii.
