The burning of the catafalque by the Tho calls to mind a curious burial rite observed in some places in France. When a Savoyard dies his relations put on gloves, fasten an armlet on their sleeves, and themselves carry the coffin to the cemetery. Before the earth is returned to the grave they throw these gloves and armlets into the bier and take back the pall to the curé, who burns it. If this custom is originally due to the fear of contagion from anything which has come into contact with the coffin it can hardly be disputed that we are face to face with a true prophylactic rite.
Among the Meo, when a man dies the relatives tie a lacquer dog to the end of a string, which is put in his hand. The reason for this is the belief that the animal will lead its master through the tangled by-paths of his new domain. The corpse is taken to the tomb seated in a chair. A plank is laid at the bottom of the grave and the body lowered on to it.
A similar custom is found among the Indians of British Columbia, who believe that the dead warrior must never be put in his coffin in the house, lest the relatives should lose their souls which would be attracted by the bier and try to get into it. They also follow the practice I have described above of taking the corpse out through the roof or a hole made in the walls.
[ Funeral Rites: The Body in a Coffin made from the Hollowed Trunk of a Tree. ]
[ Funeral Rites: the Body by its weight has indicated its wish to be buried in this Spot. ]
Another custom popular in Tong-King is for the mourners, as soon as the funeral rites are accomplished, to walk through a narrow passage made between trees or bushes set very close together. By rubbing themselves against these obstacles they shake off any Spirit which might have attached itself to them during the interment.
The direction in which the corpse faces is everywhere considered a matter of the utmost importance. Certain races of the Congo, for example the Bongo, have one rule for the men and another for the women, the former facing north, the latter south.
The Moï cemeteries vary greatly in different regions. Some tribes favour a kind of family burial hut, on the floor of which the coffins are laid in rows. The interstices of the coffin are then carefully filled up with cement made of clay and pulped leaves. This mausoleum is always in the middle of a rice or maize field at a convenient distance from the village. As a rule the edifice has no distinct decorative features, but is usually surrounded by a wooden palisade carved with rough figures. A circular ditch, a yard wide and two yards deep, is dug round the cemetery. The earth thus removed is accumulated on one spot and gradually forms a conical mound. I have occasionally seen such a mound surrounded by a palisade of which each post had received individual artistic treatment.