In Belgium no practical results have as yet been arrived at; still cremation is affirmatively upheld by very many persons. In a small country like this, where the cemeteries alone occupy over 18,000 acres, the useless waste of land alone would in due time insure the adoption of burning.
The home-produced literature of cremation in Belgium is small in extent, but reprints of Italian and other authors are common. The admirable work of Dr. Polli, for instance, was translated and published in 1873.[154] Another translation appeared in the 'Presse Médicale Belge' during the same year. The 'Gazette de Bruxelles' of March 1873 also contained articles upon the subject.[155] During the year 1874, a séance was held at Brussels through the exertions of M. Adolphe Prins, an avocat of that city, and the manner in which the subject was received by the artistic and literary élite augurs well for the future of cremation in that country.[156]
The exhibition of Professor Brunetti's examples of cremation at the International Exposition of Vienna gave perhaps the first strong impulse to a study of this subject in Austria, and the unsatisfactory state of the cemeteries in Vienna has convinced a great number of the desirability of resorting to cremation. In February 1874 the Municipal Council of Vienna unanimously passed a proposition to the effect that the superior administration be asked to provide for the immediate carrying out of the system of cremation, now that the question of a new cemetery had been mooted. One of the council, M. Geissler, was mainly instrumental in bringing forward the motion. At the same time the Imperial Academy of Medicine are making an appeal to the professors of hygiene and chemistry in the Empire for a complete report upon the subject. The cremation committee is formed of five persons, Drs. Hoser, Gauster, Novak, Haschek, and Steniger.[157]
The municipality of Vienna—the annual mortality of which place is about 20,000—acting upon the advice given by the Board of Health in that city, has now decided that cremation shall be carried out by those who prefer it, upon the plan inaugurated at Leipzig. The cemeteries of Vienna are not only well filled with dead, but they are unpleasantly near to the city. A plot of ground has therefore lately been acquired by the municipality, about five miles from the centre of the city. This new cemetery was opened in November 1874, and on the same day the five Catholic churchyards were closed against all further interments. With the poor, however, the removal of the body from the mortuary chamber to the mortuary building of the district, and then next morning to a distant cemetery, is a serious matter.
Nothing can apparently look more charming than a cemetery sparsely dotted with monuments, as, for instance, the Necropolis at Woking, seen from the railway station; but they speedily, far too speedily, fill. The cost of conveying bodies to these distant cemeteries must also be taken into account. In Vienna, where the city burial-grounds are 'more than full,' the question of conveyance to the new cemetery has provoked a great deal of angry discussion, and has been the means of bringing into notice several schemes for the transportation of the bodies to the site of burial. Mr. von Felbinger, engineer, and Mr. Hubetz, architect, there, have submitted a scheme of pneumatic burial to the municipal council. They propose to erect in the city a central temple, from which a subterranean passage would lead to the cemetery. A line of rails would be laid down in this passage, and an iron car with its freight of coffins would be propelled through it by means of a blast of compressed air. The tubular passage would be five feet in diameter, and by the aid of a 150 H.P. engine they would undertake to convey the car some 15,000 feet in ten minutes. The funeral ceremony would be performed at the central chapel, and it would be optional with the mourners as to witnessing the actual interment at the cemetery terminus. The temple would be built with three distinct compartments, so to speak; one for the accommodation of the Roman Catholics, one for Protestants, and one for the use of the Jews.
The question of burning the dead has therefore come to the front, and a society called the 'Urne' has been constituted to realise the idea. Several meetings have been held, the persons present giving their most cordial support to the movement. Hitherto little or no opposition has been met with from clerical parties.[158] It has been stated, moreover, that a donation of 30,000 florins has been presented to the society by a wealthy lady, in order to help on the practice.
Cremation has met with the greatest enthusiasm in various parts of Germany, as might have been expected from so practical a people. The authorities in the town of Dresden, in Saxony, offered to make it conditionally legal, provided that its advantages were thoroughly made manifest by the promoters, which must have been duly done inasmuch as the Presse of Dresden informs the world that the first corpse was reduced to ashes in the Whitsuntide of 1874.[159] When the ashes were withdrawn, the funeral ceremony was celebrated in the usual manner. Several other cremations have also taken place there.
The best German apparatus for cremation is that constructed by Professor Reclam and Mr. Friedrich Siemens, C.E., and was first tested upon the lower animals on June 2, 1874, in the presence of Drs. Fleck, Küchenmeister, Roth, and other medical celebrities.[160] Mr. Steinmann, of Dresden, also made some improvement upon the Siemens apparatus as at first produced.
In Berlin an apparatus is also in course of construction, and a pamphlet has lately been issued by the Association for Burning the Dead there, which is intended to combat any prejudices that may exist against the adoption of the practice. At a recent meeting of the council representing the Jewish congregations of Berlin, a motion was brought forward and adopted by a large majority, to take immediate steps for the introduction of cremation in one of the Jewish cemeteries.[161] The wholesome practice is also being warmly taken up in other large towns.