[ Scott / "Epitaph for Caesar" ]
John Scott, the 1st Earl of Eldon (1751 -1838) was an English lawyer and jurist who was Lord High Chancellor — the leader of the House of Lords and the head of the country's judiciary — for much of the first two decades of the 19th Century.
Scott composed an epitaph for his beloved Newfoundland, Caesar, as reported in The Public and Private Life of Lord Chancellor Eldon, with Selections from His Correspondence, by Horace Twiss, first published in 1844. The text here is taken from the 3rd edition of 1846 (London: John Murray). Twiss is writng, at this point in his book, about the year 1835 in Lord Eldon's life, though there is no specific information about Caesar's birth or death dates:
One more inscription, from the pen of Lord Eldon, humble as its subject may be thought, deserves to be added, for its great simplicity and beauty. It was designed by him for the grave-stone of a Newfoundland dog, named Cæsar, who was buried at Encombe; but the stone was never actually erected.
You, who wander hither,
Pass not unheeded
The spot where poor Cæsar
Is deposited.
He was born of Newfoundland parents.
His vigilance, during many years,
Was the safeguard of Encombe House:
His talents and manners were long
The amusement and delight
Of those who resorted to it.
Of his unshaken fidelity,
Of his cordial attachment
To his master and his family,
A just conception cannot
Be conveyed by language,
Or formed, but by those
Who intimately knew him.
To his rank among created beings,
The power of reasoning is denied.
Cæsar manifested joy,
For days before his master
Arrived at Encombe:
Cæsar manifested grief,
For days before his master left it.
What name shall be given
To that faculty,
Which thus made expectation
A source of joy,
Which thus made expectation
A source of grief?”
Newfoundlands are mentioned one other time in Twiss' account of his subject's life when Twiss quotes a letter written by Lord Eldon to Lady F. J. Banks, dated March 31, 1823:
Lord Eldon to Lady F. J. Bankes.—(Extracts.)
March 31st, 1823. "I saw a Newfoundland dog at Brighton, such and so much superior to all others that I had ever seen, that I don't know what I would not have given for him. He first attracted my notice by coming behind me to take my glove, which I was dangling in my hand, into his mouth. I fell in love with him, and his master, an officer, came up to me and gave me his history, particularly his exploits in bringing drowning men out of the sea. I never saw so amiable a creature — vastly large. If you had him at Cambridge, he would have had a diploma degree." (79)
Apparently that Newf made enough of an impression on Lord Elgin that he was motivated to get one of his own.
Compare this Newf-related epitaph to that for "Bungy," (the earliest Newfoundland epitaph I am aware of); for Lord Grenville's "Tippo" (discussed here at The Cultured Newf); and of course the most famous Newf epitaph, the one for Lord Byron's "Boatswain" (treated here at The Cultured Newf.)