If they invite you to their frugal repasts, if they offer you any presents, let not the fear of occasioning them expense, induce you to refuse with warmth, and with obstinacy; you would wound them deeply. Accept them, and seek an opportunity of repaying with interest, these proofs of their politeness. Do not speak to them first of their sad situation; but if they introduce the subject themselves, receive their confidence with a respectful and affectionate attention. Show how much you are affected with that which grieves them, and without forgetting discretion, endeavor, in appearance at least, to render them confidence for confidence.
SECTION II.
Of Funerals and Mourning.
When we lose any one of our family, we should give intelligence of it to all persons who have had [p209] relations of business or friendship with the deceased. This letter of announcement usually contains an invitation to assist at the service and burial.
On receiving this invitation, we should go to the house of the deceased, and follow the body as far as the church. We are excused from accompanying it to the burying-ground, unless it be a relation, a friend, or a superior. If we go as far as the burying-ground, we must give the first carriages to the relations or most intimate friends of the deceased. We should walk with the head uncovered, silently, and with a sad and thoughtful mien. Relations ought not, from considerations of propriety, to give themselves up too much to their grief. You will owe a visit to persons who have invited you, if you have not been able to accept their invitation. If you have attended the ceremony, then they are the ones that owe the visit.
At an interment or funeral service, the members of the family are entitled to the first places; they are nearest to the coffin, whether in the procession, or in the church. The nearest relations go in a full mourning dress. It is not customary at Paris for women to follow the procession; and, nowhere do they go quite to the grave, unless they are of a low class. A widower or a widow, a father or mother, are not present at the interment, or funeral service of [p210] those whom they have lost. The first are presumed not to be able to support the afflicting ceremony; the second ought not to show this mark of deference.
There are two kinds of mourning, the full and the half mourning. The full mourning is worn for a father, mother, grandfather, grandmother, husband, wife, brother and sister. It is divided into three periods.[22] For the first six weeks, we wear only woollen garments; in the six weeks following, we wear silk, and the three last months, we mingle white with the black.
Half mourning is worn for uncles, aunts, cousins, and second cousins. The first fortnight we wear black silk, and the last week, white mixed with black.
Custom requires that a woman should wear mourning for her husband a year and six weeks, while that of a widower is only six months. This difference, which may appear singular, is founded upon reasons of convenience and social relations.
In the three first months of mourning for her husband, a woman wears only woollen garments; the six first weeks, her head dress and neck-kerchief are black crape or gauze; in the six following [p211] weeks, they are white crape or linen. The next six months, she dresses in black silk; in winter, gros de Naples; in summer, taffetas. Head dress, white crape. The three last months, she wears black and white, and the six last weeks, white only.
The mourning on the death of a wife, is a black cloth coat without buttons,[23] dark shoes, woollen hose, black buckles, and a sword-knot of crape, if the person carries one. At the end of six weeks, we may wear a black coat with buttons, black silk hose, silver buckles, and a black ribband upon the sword. The half mourning of the three last months is a black coat, a sword and silver buckles, white silk stockings, and a sword-knot of black and white.