THE MIKADO’S FUNERAL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIV, Issue 69, 14 November 1912, Page 7

THE MIKADO’S FUNERAL.

Descriptions to hand by mail of the Mikado’s funeral show that it was a pageant of extraordinary impressiveness. The Morning Post’s correspondent says that “all language fails to portray any adequate impression” of a scene so simple and severe, yet so imposing, so appropriate, and so unique.” While the Oriental love of colour and mystery was emphasised, “of lavish pomp and pagan grotesquery there was none.”

The description sent by cable gave a good general idea of the pageant, but naturally some interesting details had to be omitted. The huge funeral car was constructed by a Kyoto family of carpenters, who for centuries have made similar cars for their Emperors. It was mentioned in the cable message that the wheels were so constructed as to make seven distinct creaking sounds as they revolved, but not* that the production of this peculiar effect was the exclusive secret of this family of hcred : tary undertakers. The five oxen that drew the car had been specially chosen' to accord with the colours associated from . ancient times with Imperial obsequies, the shaft-ox being black and white with white forelegs, and the others being in pairs of brown and black and black and white. According to ancient custom the Junior Fifth grade of Court rank should have been bestowed on the beasts, but this was not done, though the animals were to be pensioned off arid Maintained in the Imperial pastures until their death.

The late Emperor’s grave is on the summit of a hill on one of the Imperial estates. The hill has been regarded as the abode of gods, and the enormous fir trees on it have not been touched for centuries. The fifty yards between the specially built funeral shrine and the grave was so steep that a wire cable railway was constructed to pull the coffin to the top. In pursuance of an old custom, there were placed in the four corners of the grave clay figures, about eighteen inches in height, known as “God Generals,” which were clad in miniature suits of ancient armour, the whole being enclosed in boxes of hinoki wood. Directly after the burial the palanquin on which the coffin was borne was burned, and next day there was a special service at which the ashes were buried within the mausoleum competing. The ox-car used in Tokio was also burned, and the ashes buried in the Palace precincts. Even the mortuary carriage of the funeral train was dismantled and everything except the metal-work burned.