BLACK JOBS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IX, Issue 279, 25 November 1874, Page 2

BLACK JOBS.

{Australasian ) It was the remark of Thomas Hood that the words, " A Furnisher aud Performer in the funeral line, suggest a solemn stalkiog parodj of grief to the fancy;" and there is really nothing one whit more absurd in the undertaker's children, in Martin CJutzzleioit " playing at berryins down in the shop, and follertn' the order-book to its long home in tbe iron safe," than in the solemnly-grotesque pageants into which the funerals of the dead have been gradually transforms 1. We. have allowed a sort of trade-guild to spring up and to impose sumptuary laws upon as, which are not merely oppressive iv their operation, but impoyerisbiGg in their reault.= We have suffered a class of traders iv woe to step into our houses at the very time when we are least qualified to resist their invasion or dispute their authority, and to dictate to us how we should bury our dead in the. manner most conducive . to the interests of those who perform the ceremony. According to the under-takers-view of iha matter, grief is purely a matter of haberdashery, upholstery, and theatrical display; °and the sense of bereavement is to be measured by the profusa paraphernalia of what the French appropriately designate une pompe fanebre. The " furnisher " brings out his black cavalry, his elaborately carved and decorated hearses, his rausty-fusiy mourniog coachve, his velvet horseclpths aud nodding plumes, his melancholic mutes and decorous coffin-bearers, bis silk hat-bands, and his five-shilling gloves, organises a dismal procession, and as it wends its way to the cemetery he mentally tots up the items of his bill in petto, and reflects with a grim satisfaction on the lucrative nature of the absurd custom which he and bis craft have succeeded in imposing on, society. Common aenso and common decency would suggest that, inasmuch as our mortal tenements begiu to decompose the moment they are vacated by, the animating mind, we should put these dissolving habitation out of Bight as soon and as unobstrusively as possible.' But the undertaker steps in and says, "No. The usages of the community —usages which we have introduced and extended — proscribe that this deposition of the body underground should be made the occasion of a sombre raree show, got up for our particular benefit and advantage. The funeral display cannot in any way affect the corpse itself, nor influence the. destiny of that which has passed away from it. Nevertheless, this is our opportunity, and we make the most of ir." As, to do them justice, they have done. In the humorous language of the writer previously quoted, "whatever they undertake they perform ;" and the (.For continuation see fourth page.)

character of that performance is not more dismal than tfie feelings of the aurvivors when they are presented with the inevitable bill. It is a legacy tax from which there has been hitherto no escape; and it presses with peculiar hardship, and with painful severity, upon persons in middling and straitened circumstances. It not (infrequently swallows op the small stock of ready money available for the immediate support cf the bereaved widow and orphaned . children j and in any and every ease it is a foolish and reprehensible outlay ; while the gloomy pageant itself is. inconsistent with the expression of true sorrow. 'Ihia shrinks from the obtrusive exhibition of its feelingsgand revolts against a preconcerted parade of mental suffering. Eeal anguish of mind manifests itsejf after the manner so toucbingly described hy Sbakipeare in the wail of bitterness .which arises from Queen Constance under the privation of her | son: — M Grief fills the room up of my absent .child , Lies in bis>ed, walks up and down with me, Patt on his pretty .looks, repeats his words, Remembers me of allJiLi gracious parts. Stuffs oat bit mant garment* withliia form." It does oot-ftxbibijt itself in & dreary, dusty cavalcade ; is ** the trappings and the suits of woe;" in a prodigal display 'o&'Aingy white or rusty black ostrich feathers; in ,*; profusion of 4< coffift /uroitaro," Aud in the other ridiculous adjuocts of a "flret-claas foneral." From the undertaker's point of view, fljeae things are not only highly interesting, but altogether indispeosible to the satisfactory interment of the dead ; b«t to the eye of the philosophical ob■•n* |W; *»P«t appear as so many miserable shams and costly make-* bejiefes. invented and perpetuated for the benefit of a class. Th^ is evidently the conclusion arrived at by the people of Adelaide, who have taken up the question of Funeral Beform with«n earnestness bordering oa entbosiaflm; and the contagion of whose commendable example has extended itself to New South Wales, and wiU^no doubt, «ako4teelf felt m Victbrfa; A similar movemeot orfginated in France cfuriog the first decade of the present century, and led to the Government of the First Napoleon taking tha wbofe business of the pompet funebrea oat of the bands of the jures-erieurs who bad previously monopolised it, and placing it under tbe control of the state, which instituted" six classes of funeral ceremonies, the cost of wbicb ranged from 12s 6d up to £170, according to tbe circumstances, the vanity, and tbe folly of the relations and friends of the deceased. At tbe present time, Parisian funerals are divided into nine classes; the highest costing about £280, and tbe lowest 16s. But such a system, while it prevents exorbitant demands being made, leaves tbe main evil untouched. What should be aimed at is to strip all funerals of their foolish, unmeaning and expensive pageantry; and not to waste upon the interment of the dead money which can be more advantageously employed for ■the benefit of • tbe living. Let the ceremony—if ceremony there most be —be conducted with sober simplicity; aod let us refrain from indulging in immoderate "shows of grief" when a relation or friend has been translated, as most persons are disposed to believe, to a realm of unspeakable and neverending happiness. Io proportion to the sincerity of our Christaio faith should be the strength of our aversion to any theatrical display at tbe burial of tbe dead.