The assistant will be found ready to assist in placing the casket in the hearse, as before mentioned, and will also have the carriages move up in the right order, open and close the carriage doors, while the undertaker ushers the occupants into the vehicles.

The undertaker may also require the services of an assistant at the grave, but this will depend in great measure upon the nature of the funeral itself, whether it be of a certain magnitude, or if it be one of less importance.

This brief elucidation of the duties of an undertaker in the discharge of his functions is not given as a general rule to be strictly adhered to without any exception, but merely as a ground plan to work upon, and to be subject to different modifications, as circumstances may require.

One undisputable fact is, that in the general management of a funeral pageant, and for the better and more systematic working of the details, especially if the funeral is one on a large scale, the services of a well trained assistant will be found almost indispensable to the undertaker, and will be conducive of the happiest results in securing perfect system, dispatch; and also in preventing delays and mistakes, which might otherwise happen where the responsibility and the smooth working of the whole rests upon one man.

The laying out, washing, dressing, etc., of a corpse, under any and every circumstance, ought to be so systematized and arranged, that either the undertaker or his assistant may be able to perform these duties alone and singly, with ease and promptness, should circumstances so require.

As the undertaker is supposed to understand the wants required by different cases, it will be his duty, so soon as he is acquainted with the nature of the cause of death, to take such steps as his experience will suggest, as regards the safety of those who may trust him with the care of properly disposing of the remains.

Should the disease be of a contagious or infectious character, it will be incumbent upon the undertaker to see that perfect ventilation be established in the chamber where the body lies; that all cloths which are removed from the corpse be disposed of in a cautious manner; that the bed-clothes be either carried immediately out of the room and exposed outside to the light and heat of the sun, or be burned up, if the character of the disease be so dangerous as to require it.

He will see that proper means of disinfecting the house be used, so as to a great extent neutralize, if not completely destroy, the germ of the epidemic.

A good preparation to combat noxious and poisonous miasma, besides the other disinfecting liquids which have been enumerated in previous chapters, consists of the following:

Nitrate of potash (saltpetre),6 ounces.
Water,2 quarts.
Sulphuric acid,4 ounces.