OPPOSITE CORNELIUS VANDERBILT’S plot at Central and Poplar avenues, is that of William H. Appleton, joined by that of A. H. Borney. A little further along is a beautiful mausoleum of Westerly granite, built by Christian Hester, of Hester Brothers. Mr. H. H. Cook, the millionaire of Seventy-Eighth street and Fifth avenue, paid $20,000 for a plot sometime ago, and is building a mausoleum which will cost $40,000 more. A large plot on Beachlawn, conspicuous for a large figure of Hope eight feet high, mounted on a pedestal rising thirty feet high, from a base nine feet square, marks the burial plot of William H. Havemeyer. H. M. Flagler, of the Standard oil company, has a beautiful tomb built on a hill not far from that wherein rest the remains of Marshall O. Roberts, whose sarcophagus marks the same appreciation of art that characterized his life.
COLLIS P. HUNTINGTON, president of the Central Pacific railway, and one of the best known of the magnates of Wall street, has laid some curious plans for his grave. He intends that his remains shall be laid to rest at Woodlawn, in a mausoleum more pretentious and more costly and of greater proportions than any yet built. The stones that will be used in its construction he proposes shall each be of such enormous weight that no ordinary railroad car can carry them. They will be brought as near as possible to the cemetery by boat, and then rolled on immense rollers over the country roads to the site of the tomb. If they have to cross over bridges, they will be strengthened by new abutments.
JAY GOULD has made elaborate provision for the disposition of his body after death; but nothing for his soul. He has erected on Central avenue, in Woodhaven cemetery a costly and imposing structure. It occupies the highest elevation of the grounds, and commands a view of the 400 acres given up to tenements of the dead. The ground on which the mausoleum stands is 250 feet across, and is circular in form. It cost $60,000. The mausoleum, the exterior of which is modeled after one of the most famous buildings that once stood on the Acropolis in Athens—the Parthenon cost $50,000. More than 800 tons of Westerly granite was used in its construction. The building is 37 feet long and 19 feet wide, and is surrounded by Doric pillars, thirty in number. Five pieces of solid granite compose the roof, each piece being 30 feet long and 6 feet wide. The door is solid bronze and cost $3,000. Within the mausoleum are twelve shelves or catacombs, divided by an aisle 10 feet wide, at the end of which is an ornate stained glass window, representing the heavenly choir. Each of the catacombs is 8 feet long and 2½ feet deep. A heavy slab of polished marble constitutes the face of each, and will doubtless contain the name and so on of the person whose body is deposited therein. Imbedded in each stone is a heavy bronze handle. No name will appear on the outside of the mausoleum to show who lies buried within. Many more rich business men of New York and other parts of this country have made like preparation for their bodies when they die.
LELAND STANFORD of California, is preparing a mausoleum of far greater pretensions than any other American; when finished, it will cost $100,000. The site selected is a beautiful four acre plot in the Senator’s grounds just outside San Francisco. The structure will be in the form of a temple, and will be twenty-five feet square. There will be a double row of massive granite columns supporting the roof of the portico at the front. On each side of the entrance will be a majestic sphynx carved from a single block of granite. Heavy bronze gates close the entrance, and within are solid doors of polished granite. The stone used is from Barre, Vermont. It will be finished inside with polished marble from Italy. Here will rest the millionaire, wife and son, and here will end their history.
CHARLEMAGNE, that in the eighth century, made Europe tremble by his political power, gave direction that when his body should be laid in the dust, it should not be like common mortals. He was therefore, arrayed in a royal mantle, and placed in a kingly chair. A crown crested with jewels, rested on his lifeless brow; his favorite sword, Joyuse, was by his side, and the open scroll of the gospels on his knees; and thus the mighty conqueror was left alone in his sealed tomb for one hundred and eighty years. Then it came into the mind one day of his successors to open this tomb and see how it fared with the great Emperor, and what had become of the riches of his grand mausoleum. So King Otho ordered the sealed tomb to be opened, and with curious eye he entered this vault of death, CHARLEMAGNE sat there still! But Oh, what a ghastly sight! The royal robes were dropping away from the skeleton form. The crown had sunk over the skeleton brow, and this was the only mark of royalty left. Otho called, but the great Emperor was silent. He approached and touched the Monarch, but in an instant it collapsed into dust. No matter how great or prosperous our lives may have been here, all must end at last. Even a King’s riches cannot bribe death and the mouldering graves.
How much better it would have been, had these millionaires consecrated their lives, their wealth, their influence, to Jesus Christ. They might have secured to themselves robes of royalty, and crowns, all immortal, that would not have crumbled at the touch of time, but grown brighter and brighter to all eternity. They bartered all for earth’s gilded toys, O, think, of what they might have had, the unspeakable gift—a life in Christ.
ETERNITY!—
“What is Eternity? Can aught
Paint its duration to the thought?
Tell every beam the sun emits,