The Recreations of a Country Parson

hich is quite unconnected with any personal associations with it. A great deal depends upon habit; and a great deals turns, too, on whether the churchyard which we know best i

penings and runs chiming over the warm stones, and when the beautiful hills that surround the quiet spot at a little distance are flecked with summer light and shade; but in winter too, when the bare branches look sharp against the frosty sky, and the graves look like wavelets on a sea of snow. Now, if I were anxious to pass myself off upon my readers as a great and thoughtful man, I might here give an account of the profound thoughts which I think in my daily musings in my pretty churchyard. But, being an essentially commonplace person (as I have no doubt about nine hundred and ninety-nine out of every thousand of my readers also are), I must here confess that generally I walk about the churchyard, thinking and feeling nothing very particular. I do not believe that ordinary people, when worried by some little care, or pressed down by some little sorrow, have only to go and muse in a churchyard in order to feel how trivial and transient such cares and sorrows are, and how very little they ought to vex us. To commo

the Dead; or, Urn-Sepulture Religiously, Socially, and Generally considered; with Suggestions for a Revival of the Practice, as a Sanitary Measure. The choice lies between burning and burying: and the latter being universally accepted in Britain, it remains that it be carried out in the way most decorous as regards the deceased, and most soothing to the feelings of surviving friends. Every one has seen burying-places of all conceivable kinds, and every one knows how prominent a feature they form in the English landscape. There is the dismal corner in the great city, surrounded by blackened walls, where scarce a blade of grass will grow, and where the whole thing is foul and pestilential. There is the ideal country churchyard, like that described by Gray, where the old elms and yews keep watch over the graves where successive generations of simple rustics have found their last resting-place, and where in the twilight the owls hoot from the tower of the ivy-covered church. There is the bare enclosure, surrounded by four walls, and without a tree, far up the lonely Highland hill-side; and more lonely still, the little gray stone, rising above the purple heather, where rude letters, touched up by Old Mortality's hands, tell that one, probably two or three, rest beneath, who were done to death for what they firmly believed was their Redeemer's cause, by Claverhouse or Dalyell. There is the churchyard by the bleak sea-shore, where coffins have been laid bare by the encroaching

ezy hill that s

grassy turf

d there a vi

, or fountain's

ing sun shine sw

ever been more deeply impressed than by certain lines which I cut out of an old newspaper when I was a boy, and which set out a choice fa

re, not

ook, that ye

I of the blu

that floweth

g boughs, and

good friend

hurchyard, wh

d black, and wh

same sun doth

aped-up houses

ounds are the vo

of wheels as t

he rain, or the w

tramp of t

f the bell on

ds, let it

y friends-I

nd five-and

on the hill-

years, con

the home where

e dark street

th love them; I

pavement, and

d corner. Goo

comely and

d faces-each

own, that doth

rry, as i

nt old book o

when this wear

I lay me to

y midst;-ful

ever be ear

ep softly-I

ngs I loved

me still-s

me looketh all

ds, let it

im that he is an uncommonly silly person; but it does not prevent my thinking him one. It is a mistake to imagine that the soul is the entire man. Human nature, alike here and hereafter, consists of soul and body in union; and the body is therefore justly entitled to its own degree of thought and care. But the point, indeed, is not one to be argued; it is, as it appears to me, a matter of intuitive judgment and instinctive feeling; and I apprehend that thi

to us at that season, therefore left me to do as I pleased; but that, in a black purse in her cabinet, I would find money sufficient to do it, which she had kept by her for that use, th

tain well-known lines written by a man not commonly regarded as weak-minded or prejudiced; and engraved by

for Jesus'

dust encl

an that spares

he that mov

is contained in the concluding sentences of Mr. Melvill's noble sermon on the

of a Christian to seem unmindful of this. He may, therefore, as he departs, speak of the place where he would wish to be laid. 'Let me sleep,' he may say, 'with my father and my mother, with my wife and my children; lay me not here, in this distant land, where my dust cannot mingle with its kindred. I would he chimed to my grave by my own village bell, and have my requiem sung where I was baptized into Chri

the maintenance of decent propriety about the church and churchyard. I am not, at present, concerned with that part of the tract which relates to churches; but I may remark, in passing, that Mr. Hill's views upon that subject appear to me distinguished by great good sense, moderation, and taste. He does not discourage country clergymen, who have but limited means with which to set about ordering and beautifying their churches, by suggesting arrangements on too grand and expensive a scale: on the contrary,

urchyards. He laments that churchyards should ever be found where long, rank grass, bri

, and painful aspect. A few sheep occasionally (or better still, the scythe and shears now and then employed), with a trifling attention to the walks, once properly for

h tirs in the hedge-rows or boundary fences, would be unobjectionable; while wooden baskets, or boxes, placed by the sides of the walks, and filled in summer with the fuchsia or scarlet geranium, would give our churchyards an exceedingly pretty, and perhaps not unsuitable appearance. Little clumps of snowdrops and primroses might also be planted here and there; for flowers may fitly spring up, bloom, and fade away, in a spot which so impressively tells us o

e lines, who knows in his conscience that his churchyard-walks are grown up with weeds, and the graves covered with nettles, upon sight hereof let him summon his man-servant, or get a labourer if he have no man-servant. Let him provide a reaping-hook and a large new spade. These implements will suffice in the meantime. Proceed to the churchyard: do not get disheartened at its neglected look, and turn away. Begin at the entrance-gate. Let all the nettles and long grass for six feet on. either side of the path be carefully cut down and gathered into heaps. Then mark out with a line the boundaries of the first ten yards of the walk. Fall to work and cut the edges with the spade; clear away the

unconscious remains of a departed friend? But after reading the essay, I feel that the author has a great deal to say in defence of his views. I am obliged to acknowledge that in many cases important benefits would follow the adoption of urn-sepulture. The question to be considered is, what is the best way to dispose of the mortal part of man when the soul has left it? A first suggestion might be to endeavour to preserve it in the form and features of life; and, accordingly, in many countries and ages, embalming in its various modifications has been resorted to. But all attempts to prevent the human frame from obeying the Creator's law of returning to the elements have miserably failed. And surely it is better a thousand times to 'bury the dead from our sight,' than to preserve a hideous

by the revival of burning. Four thousand human beings die every hour; and only by that swift and certain method can the vast mass of decaying matter which, while decaying, gives off the most subtle and searching poisons, be resolved with the elements without injury or risk to any one. So convinced has the French Government become of the evils of burial that it has patronized and encouraged one M. Bonneau, who proposes that instead of a great city having its neighbouring cemeteries, it should be provided with a building called The Sarcophagus, occupying an elevated situation, to which the bodies of rich and poor should be conveyed, and there reduced to ashes by a powerful furnace. And then M. Bonneau, Frenchman all over, suggests that the ashes of our friends might be preserved in a tasteful manner; the funeral urn, containing these ashes, 'replacing on our consoles and mantelpieces the ornaments of bronze clocks and china vases now found there.' Our author, having shown that burning would save us from the dangers of burying, concludes his treatise by a careful description of the manner in which he would carry out the burning process. And certainly his plan contains as little to shock one as may be, in car

ty in our old cathedrals, the openings being filled with prepared plate glass. Within this-a sufficient space intervening-is an inner shrine covered with bright non-radiating metal, and within this again is a covered sarcophagus of tempered fire-clay, with one or more longitudinal slits near the top, extending its whole length. As soon as the body is deposited therein, sheets of flame at an immensely high temperature rush through the long apertures from end to end, and acting as a combination of a modified oxy-hydrogen blowpipe, with the reverbera

er end of the sarcophagus, with a corresponding opening in the inner and outer shrine, is exactly opposite a slab of marble on which the coffin is deposited when brought into the chapel. The funeral service then commences according; to any form decided on. At an appointed signal the e

tes, or even seconds, and without any perceptible noise or commotion, all is over, and nothing but a few pounds or ounces of light ash remains. This is carefully collected by the attendants of the adjoining chamber: a door commun

, and be told that there was all that was mortal of the departed friend. No doubt it may be weakness and prejudice, but I think that few could divest themselves of the feeling of sacrilegious violence. Better far to lay the brother or sister, tenderly as though still they felt, in the last resting-place, so soft and trim. It soo

e thing wi

he Almighty to accomplish that great end in the case of burning as in that of burial. And, indeed, the doctrine of the Resurrection is one that it is not wise to scrutinize too minutely-I mean as regards its rationale. It is best to simply hold by the great truth, that 'this corruptible shall put on incorruption, and this mortal shall put on immortality.' I presume that it has been shown beyond doubt that the material particles which make up o

that

but a handful

mber in

spoiled in the latest editions of his works, has suggested to us whither the mortal vesti

u dust benea

hat once ha

ow many mo

mall hill

t scoops with

terrane

she plows a

s among

'er she turn

red ear

y atom of

thed, and f

is hillock's c

warm life

e origina

thy rui

inds and flo

n, earth,

ere, the fr

ring mill

d temples cru

us wreck

s mournfu

poor mol

dust yet heave

sand pul

this small h

y morta

good man's wont. And in these days of the misty and spasmodic school, I owe my readers an a

ate such by giving them to the earth, but retain a number of sacred dogs to devour them. Not less strange was the fancy of that Englishwoman, a century or two back, who had her husband burnt t

in the churchyard, to the sad desecration of the place. It appears, however, that worse

mysusithe the churche-yard, for hogis do wrote up graves, and besse lie in the porche, and ther the pavements he broke up

e des marts was a highly ornamented chapel, built in a circular form, like the Church of the Holy Sepulchre at Jerusalem, in which the dead lay exposed to view in the days which preceded their interment: sometimes it was merely a hollow column, ascended by a

in the spice.' Even in the seventeenth century mummy was an important article of commerce, and was sold at a great price. One Eastern traveller brought to the Turkey Company six hundred weight of mummy broken into pieces. Adulteration came into play in a manner which would have gratified the Lancet commission: the Jews collecting the bodies of executed criminals, filling them with common asphaltum, which cost little, and then drying them in the sun, when they became u

Egypt lend out her ancients unto chirurgeons and apothecaries, and Cheops and Psammeticus be weighed unto us for drugs? Shall we eat of Chamnes and Amasis in electuaries and pills, and be cured

he great physician's way of thinking, and that mummy

on the one side, and profane and irreverent jesting on the other, our epitaphs, for the most part, would be better away. It was well said by Addison of the inscriptions in Westminster Abbey,-'Some epitaphs are so extravagant that the dead person would blush; and others so excessively modest that they deliver the character of the pers

estion of the child, who wonderingly inquired where they buried the bad people. Mrs. Stone, however, quot

ie the

ond and Mar

ate, chaste, a

u

, peevish, an

tionate wife and

u

and child, w

ntenance without a

tors whom she despised

as discreet tow

u

t in her

t was influenced

u

by ill

other (the author of the inscription) has thus made upon the poor dead woman. If you cannot honestly say good of a human being on his grave-stone, then say nothing at all. There are some cases in which an exception may justly be made; and such a one, I think, was th

ntinuet

of Franci

n inflexibl

n

uniformit

sis

f age and

ice of every

odigality an

ble avarice

the f

ess impude

co

he more

viating pra

nn

succe

mulatin

t trade or

ust of pub

t bribewor

or more pro

terial

only person

heat withou

ne

s primeva

ed of ten th

ily deserved

he

condemned

d no

ignant

s life usele

ived at his exe

to aft

ous proof

estimation

al

sight

towing it

thy o

rt

rbuthnot has succeeded in his laudable intention. The character is justly drawn; and with the change of a very few words, it mig

t a word; and I believe most people who visit the spot feel that Bernadotte judged well. The rude mass of masonry, standing in the solitary waste, that marks where Howard the philanthropist sleeps, is likewise nameless. And when John Kyrle died in 1724, he was buried in the chancel of the church of Ross in Herefordshire, 'without so

onument, inscr

orm, his name a

hurch to God,

rk the marble

here, where to

poor make al

rtue filled the

ends of being

's Moral Essays

Ben Jonson are well known. One

this marb

ubject of

ster, Pembr

thou hast s

fair, and

throw a d

epitaph of a certai

u hear what

tle?-rea

this ston

eauty as

ife did ha

rtue than

l she ha

uried in t

e was E

et it sleep

ere it die

lived at al

no date, but the single word MISERRIMUS. The lines, written by herself, which are inscribed on the gravestone of Mrs. Hemans, in St. Anne's Church at Dublin, are very beaut

cription on the tomb

t departed,-for th

Scott, and inscribed on the stone which covers the grave of a humble heroine whose name his genius has mad

one was

uthor of

e mem

n Wa

the year o

mble in

ed in r

vi

fiction h

ginary

ie D

he slighte

ver

e the life

rthless

s and f

from the sever

se of person

me rendered

tive was

he grave

ned with l

ar aff

correct in the combination described in the closing sentence-the combination of poverty, an outward condition, with truthfulness and affection, two inward characteristics. The only parallel phrase which I remember in literature is one which was used by Mr. Stiggins when he was explaining to Sam Well

which I am quite sure hardly any of my readers ever heard of before. The following, which may be read on a tombstone in a country churchyard in Ayrshire, ap

that's l

d, ye nee

n, is t

but I'm

ot unknown to me in my youth, for a rival poet, one Syme, who h

this t

ne, and

Goudie's k

oet

ll to

eware!) a

ot at

flew h

body death

ike hi

the T

orth the sp

ntion, for the benefi

, means asking

ry, and that the inscription upon it should be the joint composition of four of his surviving colleagues in the magistracy. They met to prepare the epitaph; and after much consideration it was resolv

derson, Prov

, but leaving room for subsequent amplification. The second magistrate perceived this, and felt

Him, her

gistrate, whose turn had now arrived, felt that the foundation had thus been substantially laid down, and that the time had come to erect upon it a superstructure of refle

jah, Ha

ng to that which needed and in truth admitted nothing more? Still the stanza must he completed. What should he do? He would fall back on t

. D. E.

ings of the Town Council, which bestowed a vote of thanks upon their authors, and caused the stanza to be

bearing the legend, He sang the Song of the Shirt. You may discover in what he drew, as well as in what he wrote, many indications of the humourist's perverted taste: and no doubt the knowledge that mortal disease was for years doing its work within, led his thoughts oftentimes to what was awaiting

vague, pro

h by cer

fore-orda

hose rug

d living for

ow house

rtyr Robert Southwell tells us how hard he found it, while in buoyant life, to rightly consider his end. But in perfect cheerfulness and healthfulness of spirit, the human being who knows (so far as man can know) where he is to rest at last, may oftentimes visit that peaceful spot. It will do him good: it can do him no harm. The hard-wrought man may fitly look upon the soft green turf, some day to be opened for him; a

hy eternal r

re alone; nor c

nificent. Thou

of the infant wo

the earth, the

d hoary seers

ghty sepulchr

ancient as the

pensive quie

e woods; riv

and the comp

dows green; and,

ray and melan

solemn dec

reat Tom