CLOSING THE EYES.
For the Table Book.
A GIPSY’S FUNERAL.
Epping Forest.
It was considered a mark of the strongest affection by the ancients, that a son, when his father was dying, should lean over him and receive his last gasp,
“and kiss his spirit into happy rest.”
The Jews, Greeks, and Romans, esteemed it a high privilege for the nearest relative to close the eyes of the deceased body; as in Genesis, when Jacob’s sun was setting, “Joseph shall put his hands upon thine eyes.” And in another place,—“The memory of the father is preserved in the son.” Again, (contra) “I have no son to keep my name in remembrance.” And in Homer, “Let not the glory of his eyes depart, without the tender hand to move it silently to peace.” Ovid says, “Ille meos oculos comprimat, ille tuos.” The performing this ceremony was so valued, that to die without friends to the due observance of this affectionate and last testimony, was thought an irreparable affliction.
The sudden death of a man was attributed to Apollo; of a woman, to Diana. If any relation were present, a vessel of brass was procured, and beaten loudly in the ears of the deceased to determine the point. The ringing of bells by the Romans, and others to this day is practised. The Irish wake partakes also of this usage. When the moon was in eclipse, she was thought asleep, and bells were rung to wake her: the eclipse having past, and the moon recovered her light, faith in this noisy custom became strengthened. Euripides says, when Hyppolitus was dying, he called on his father to close his eyes, cover his face with a cloth, and put a shroud over the corpse. Cassandra, desirous of proving the Trojan cause better than that of the Greeks, eulogizes their happy condition in dying at home, where the obsequies might be performed for them by their nearest relatives. Medea tells her children she once hoped they would have performed the duty for her, but she must do it for them. If a father, or the mother died a widow, the children attended to it: if the husband died, the wife performed it; which the Greeks lamented could not be done if they died at Troy. The duty devolved on the sister if her brother died; which caused Orestes to exclaim, when he was to suffer death so far from his home—“Alas! how shall my sister shroud me now?”