THE SHORTEST AND PLEASANTEST WAY FROM DONCASTER TO JEDDAH, WITH MANY MORE, TOO LONG.
Πόνος πόνῳ πόνον φέρει
Πᾶ πᾶ γὰρ οὐκ ἔβαν ἐγώ.
SOPHOCLES.
We have got from the West Riding of Yorkshire, to the Eastern shore of the Red Sea, without the assistance of mail-coach, steam-packet, or air-balloon, the magical carpet, the wishing-cap, the shoes of swiftness, or the seven-leagued boots. From Mr. Bacon's vicarage we have got to Eve's grave, not per saltum, by any sudden, or violent transition; but by following the stream of thought. We shall get back in the same easy manner to that vicarage, and to the quiet churchyard wherein the remains of one of the sweetest and for the few latter years of her short life, one of the happiest of Eve's daughters, were deposited in sure and certain hope. If you are in the mood for a Chapter upon Churchyards, go reader to those which Caroline Bowles has written;—you will find in them every thing that can touch the heart, every thing that can sanctify the affections, unalloyed by anything that can offend a pure taste and a masculine judgement.
But before we find our way back we must tarry awhile among the tombs, and converse with the fablers of old.
A young and lovely Frenchwoman after visiting the Columbarium near the Villa Albani, expressed her feeling strongly upon our custom of interring the dead, as compared with the non-burial of the ancients, usage odieux, said she, qui rend la mort horrible! Si les anciens en avaient moins d'effroi, c'est que la coutume de brûler les corps dérobait au trépas tout ce qu'il a de hideux. Qu'il était consolant et doux de pouvoir pleurer sur des cendres chéries! Qu'il est épouvantable et déchirant aujourd'hui de penser que celui qu'on a tant aimé n'offre plus qu'une image affreuse et décharnée dont on ne pourrait supporter la vue.
The lady in whose journal these lines were written lies buried in the Campo Santo at Milan, with the following inscription on her tomb; Priez pour une jeune Française que la mort a frappée à vingt ans, comme elle allait, après un voyage de huit mois avec un epoux chéri, revoir son enfant, son pere et sa mere, qui venaient joyeux au-devant d'elle. Her husband wished to have her remains burnt, in conformity to her own opinion respecting the disposal of the dead, and to his own feelings at the time, that he might have carried her ashes to his own country, and piously have preserved them there, to weep over them, and bequeath them to his son; mais les amis qui m'entouraient, he says, combatterent mon desir, comme une inspiration insensée de la douleur.
There can be no doubt that our ghastly personification of Death has been derived from the practice of interment; and that of all modes in which the dead have ever been disposed of, cremation is in some respects the best. But this mode, were it generally practicable, would in common use be accompanied with more revolting circumstances than that which has now become the Christian usage. Some abominations however it would have prevented, and though in place of those superstitions which it precluded others would undoubtedly have arisen, they would have been of a less loathsome character.
The Moors say that the dead are disturbed if their graves be trodden on by Christian feet; the Rabbis that they feel the worms devouring them.