CREMATORIUM FOR DOGS

Evening Star, Issue 20140, 3 April 1929, Page 11

CREMATORIUM FOR DOGS

A crematorium for aristocratic dogs is now being erected in Paris. It will be part of the magnificent dog cemetery that is one of the most curious sights of the French capital, and that in its own way compares favourably with any of the other cemeteries of the city. “ The reason we are building this crematorium is that there is an increasing demand or fashion, if you wish to call it, among owners to keep the ashes of their pets near them,’’ explained an official of the cemetery. “They love their dogs so much that fhey don’t even like to be separated from them in death. As yon see by the inscriptions on several of the tombstones, some women declare that flic only true friendship they ever enjoyed on this earth was that.of their dog. “ Until now i'o was impossible for these owners to have their pots cremated, as the crematoriums refused to accept animals, and we had so many requests of this sort that we 'inatl;. decided to build our own ui a corner of the cemetery, and it is now almost completed.” The most interesting thing m the cemetery is a monument in memory of Barry, a famous St. Bernard, that laces the entrance. This dog, which belonged to the St. Bernard Hospice in the Alps, saved the lives of .forty persons, but was killed by the forty-first, a crazed Italian, who was lost in a snowstorm, and believed that a wild beast was attacking him. He was the best dog the monks ever possessed, and his stuffed body now stands in the Swiss State Museum at Berne. The most faithful dog of every generation is now called Barry. The cemetery is divided into sections, which have been named after wellknown dog lovers. The first on the right is the Henry Bataille section, where all the dogs of the great dramatist are sleeping their last sleep. A little further on is the tomb of Kronmir, the favourite cal of the writer Henry Rochefort, “died of chagrin ten davs 'after her master—July 10, 1913.” On a nearby tomb was the inscription- ‘ Step 'softly near this tomb. Billet Ic. my treasure, is not dead but sleeps since F«b. 5. 1921, aged 11 ’years. His iucousplablc mother .Z’