The danger of premature interment

by Joseph Taylor

The Jews, after having washed the body, and anointed it with aromatic substances of a more or less agreeable odour, according to the rank and riches of the deceased, bind it round afterwards with bandages of linen, and cover the head with a handkerchief.

In the primitive church the dead were washed and then anointed; the body was wrapped up in linen, or clothed in a dress of more or less value, according to circumstances, and it was not interred till after being exposed, and kept some days in the house. The custom of clothing the dead is preserved in France only for princes and ecclesiastics.

In other countries, more or less care is taken to prevent sudden interments. At Geneva, there are people appointed to inspect all dead bodies. Their duty consists in examining whether the person be really dead, and whether they died naturally, or by violence. In the North, as well as at Genoa, it is usual not to bury the dead till three days have expired. In Holland people carry their precautions much farther, and delay the funerals longer. In Spain, the dead are generally clothed in the dresses of the religious. And in Germany they are dressed in clothes more or less splendid, with their faces uncovered, and are generally laid in that apartment, which is nearest the door.

In England, the poorest people keep their dead four or five days, and sometimes longer and the nearest relations are invited to see them exposed. If they happen to be buried sooner, this precipitation excites suspicions among the neighbours, who never fail to address themselves to the magistrates, and to take the body from the grave, that they may examine whether it bears any traces of violence.

It is not only in Europe that precautions are taken against precipitate burials. In Asia, when an inhabitant of the kingdom of Boutain dies, the body is kept in the house three days all of which are spent in singing and prayers.

If we instead of following the example of those people, have forgotten that respect which the ancients entertained for the dead, it is owing to the prejudices of our education imbibed in infancy. In that early age nurses and ignorant servants instil into children those absurdities which they themselves have adopted, and such prejudices are the most difficult to be overcome. Scarcely has one ceased to live, when he becomes an object of horror.

The body is abandoned to a set of mercenary people, who begin by dragging it from a warm bed to place it on some cold straw. Soon after devotion, or the desire of gain, draws together the undertakers, who first cover the head and face with a kind of cap, in the shape of a bag. Sometimes they put cotton into the mouth, the ears, and even into the fundament, if the last precaution has not been taken before their arrival. This cotton is placed there to prevent the body from staining the linen in which it is wrapped up. They then bind the breast and arms round with a bandage, and make another pass round the lower part of the belly; the latter comprehends the arms from the elbows, and serves also to enclose the feet: after this the undertakers wrap up the whole body in a sheet, which they fix at both the extremities, and either sew or fasten it with pins, observing always to confine the body as closely as they can. It is thus that a man is prepared for his coffin; but it would be difficult to pursue a more pernicious method, even if one had an intention of accelerating death, or of rendering it impossible for a person to return to life.

The cold to which a dying man is exposed, that he may not dirty himself, is attended with the greatest danger, for while the sphincter remains in contraction, there exists within us some remains of irritability, and consequently of life. The discharge of the intestinal matter, is the Ultimum vitæ. Thus whilst a child has not yet voided the mecronium, the man midwife, notwithstanding the most dismal symptoms, still hopes to recal it to life. On the contrary, the appearance of this excrement, is considered by him as a certain sign of death. The stopping of the anus, is attended with no less inconvenience, as it prevents the action of the parts in which life still subsists; for the Abbé Spalanzani has proved, that digestion continues for some time after a person’s death. If these parts could afterwards recover force, and irritability enough to reanimate the other organs, the closing the anus would necessarily become an obstacle to their salutary action. The different situations given to a body, is sufficient when it has arrived at the last degree of weakness, to cause or to accelerate death. Of this, however, people are not sufficiently aware, when they take away the pillow from a dying person, which is after done, and place the body upon a straw mattrass. Besides, during life, there exhales continually from the cavities of the head, from the breast, and from the belly, a vapour, which is always absorbed by the vessels; but if this vapour be condensed by the cold, it thickens into drops as may be seen by breathing upon a glass, and then an expansion takes place, which interrupts the action of the vessels, and opposes the return of life. Humanity protests against such a detestable mode of procedure; it tells us that we ought to allow sick people to expire in a good warm bed, and to remove all those causes which may shorten the period of their lives.

People are buried sometimes five or six hours after their apparent death, yet how many examples have we seen of the principle of life existing a long time after the motion of the heart and arteries has ceased. We knew that the heart generally weakens by degrees, that its power ends by not being any longer in a condition to force the blood into the arteries, that this blood flows towards the large vessels and that the circulation ceases; but if the tonic motion still subsists, the circulation may be re-established, and it is above all in the exterior part of the body, that it may be put in play to act upon the blood. Being therefore excited by frictions upon the skin, and by insufflation into the intestines, according to the practice of the Acadians, it has often brought to life people taken from the water, who to all appearance were dead. But when the body is buried, the exterior parts are cold, and in a state of compression; besides it is not sufficient that this tonic motion should be excited: one must also remove those obstacles which prevent it from spreading, and giving play to the organs of the pulse, and of respiration; but the pressure made upon the breast and upon the belly, while the mouth is shut, and sometimes stuffed with cotton, becomes an object almost insurmountable. The pressure upon the belly is attended with this great disadvantage, that it opposes the sinking of the diaphragm, thus preventing respiration, and besides compressing the intestines, which are generally the last part in which the vital principle subsists. It results then from this precipitate custom, either that the remains of life are sometimes extinguished, or that they are oppressed for a time, so that no one never revives, but amidst the horrors of the grave.

The difference between the end of a weak life, and the commencement of death, is so small, and the uncertainty of the signs of the latter is so well established, both by ancient and modern authors, who have turned their attention to that important object, that we can scarcely suppose undertakers capable of distinguishing an apparent from a real death. Animals which sleep during winter, shew no signs of life; in this case, circulation is only suspended; but were it annihilated, the vital spark does not so easily lose its action, as the other fluids of the body: and the principle of life, which long survives the appearance of death, may reanimate a body, in which the action of all the organs seem to be at an end. But how difficult is it to determine, whether this principle may not be revived? It has been found impossible to recal to life some animals suffocated by mephitic vapours, though they appeared less affected than others who have revived. Coldness, heaviness of the body, a leaden livid colour, with a yellowness in the visage, are all very uncertain signs. Mr. Zimmerman observed them all upon the body of a criminal, who fainted through the dread of that punishment which he had merited. He was shaken, dragged about, and turned in the same manner as dead bodies without the least signs of resistance, and yet at the end of twenty four hours, he was recalled to life by means of volatile alkali.