Sketcher.

Alexandra Herald and Central Otago Gazette, Issue 364, 30 April 1903, Page 7

Sketcher.

I Chinese Corpses and Coffins. (Gruesome hut Original )'. IOKEGARDING Chinese burials and Sl*3w ' removala »' a ew words may be JfaSEk said. Pnor to a portion of whafc is known as the 'General Cemc* tery' in Sydney (set aside for nonprofessing Christians and others whose creed is not known) being given to the Chinese for the interment of their dead, these aliens were buried in some one of the other cemeteries—mostly in the Church of England portion. By degrees the bodies were removed-»-not to re-inter in the general cemetery, but for the parpose of sending to China, The modus operandi was this: An order was issued at the head offico in Philip. street to permit the re-opsniag of grave, numbered so and so, in such a section, and the removal of the body, the fee being JB2. Per this the cemetery employees would re-open ; the grave, lift the oof&a, and convey it to a pool of water in an unused portion of the gn und, where the Chinese friends ~- would take charge—generally dismissing the cemetery men with a ' tip.' The coffin lid was then prised off with a pick and the body exposed in an excellent state of preservation—even after an inter* meat of several years It is not a nice job, but the Chinese tackle it manfully j and with the stimulating influence of a drop of good brandy or whiskey, and the liberal use of carbolic, they get through it. The coffin having been removed from the body by breaking it up, the remains of their departed countryman is then placed upon a sheet of iron, and the flesh removed from the bones by hand. Every one of the 208 bones belonging to the human body is caref ally cleansed, and aa carefully laid out in pairs or Bets, each set by itself—as, for instance, the thigh, the forearm, the pelvis, the arm; and so on. When thoroughly cleaned and bleached—and they certainly look clean enough for anything, or a place anywhere —they are carefully counted and wrapped up in leaves, each set separately, and then, all together, put in a camphor wood chest, which is locked, and tightly lashed with new manilla rope. When bones are bo treated they surely cannot be considered offensive—and being packed, as they are, in neat, polished chests, but few persons would know that they were the bones of a human being, or bones of any kind. As Mr Johnson, Sydney's most learned Chinaman, says, in regard to the complaint lately made in New Zealand about these alleged 'corpses,";as they were only dry bones they eould not prove any more offensive than so much crockery.' He is wrong, however, when he says: 'lf a grave is opened, and it is found that the flesh has not all disappeared from the bones, the remains aria buried again. They wouldn't be bothered scraping the bones.' The writer has seen them doing this, and has never heard of the remains being ' buried again 'when, once exhumed. In the eyes of our own people there may be. something gruesome about this ' reopening' and bbne-wasbing business j but it must be confessed that all this care of the bones of their dead, and their desire that they shall finally rest in their own land, should give us a bettor opinion of the Chinese than we can possibly have of those of our own people, who, after a floiid display of pomp and vanity on the day of mtermeat, forget their dead and allow their burial places to become wildernesses,—Cecrops.

POINTS ABOUT TOW-ROPES. A strong reliable rope is i very thing, in deep-sea towing. In very heavy weather the tow rope is frequently subjected to a strain b afore which an ordinary cable, as thick as a man's wrist, Bay, would snap like a piece of cotton. Ropes used for towing big ships are the best and strongest that men can make and money can buy., Formerly they used to be made of either manilla, coir, or hemp. Hawsers fabricated from the two former materials have their good qualities, inasmuch as they are strong and have a large and desirable amount of ' give' in them; but so much internal friction results when the rope is stretched to its full capacity trafc the inner fibres get tired, and the rope soon has to be discarded. Hawsers made of hemp last much longer than manilla ones, for while they possess quite an astonishing amount of elasticity, they are not so subject to internal friction. Of late years, however, steel wire ropes have to a large extent ousted those made of fibrous materials, and their popularity with nautical folk continues to increase, albeit many tugboatmen efthe old school still pin their faith to the hempen hawser, declaring that there is more play in hemp, and that the new fangled wire tears things to shreds when the tow is rolling and pitch' ing about in a seaway. In the opinion of the majority of tugboat people, hemp ropes, are clumsy, easily injured, ana very costly. Good steel wire rope, on the other hand, is said to combine the maximum of strength with the minimum of weight. It is necessary to take great care in tVe latter's mode of attachment. The mast is usually considered to be the best place to make a wire fast to on board the tow.

Various lengths of rope are used, the rule being to employ a short length in smooth water, and a long one when the conditions are less favourable. In very violent weather as much as 00 fathoms of tow-rope may have to bo paid out for zaf ety's sake. Pull Tua, Pull Tow. If by any means a constant tension could be maintained on the rope, towing in the open sea would be an easy instead of a difficult and risky operation, As it | happens, there is no towing gear which | can induce the rope to keep to the re- f quired degres of tautaess, and the consequence is that one moment it is hanging quite loose, while a minute later it is stretched almost to breaking point. It is a welLknown fact that a vessel in a seaway does not travel at a uniform rate of speed. Its speed diminishes when on the crest of a long wave and increases when in the trough, and this is why towing amid wavea '.s such hazardous work. The two vessels—the tftg and the tow—do not synchronise in their movements ; in other words, they cannot act I together owing to their different position . in the wave formations. Consequently, when the tug is oa the crest of one great wave, and the tow in the trough of anotaer some distance to the rear, the two vessels pull against each other, and the tow-rope that connects them ia probably subjected to a severe stress.