FUNERALS.

Westport Times, Volume IV, Issue 742, 26 November 1870, Page 3

FUNERALS.

(From the Pall Mall Gazette )

The undertakers have seldom received such a severe blow as that dealt to them by Mr Dicken's will. •' I emphatically direct that I be buried in an inexpensive, unostentatious, and strictly private manner, that no public announcement be made of the time or place of my burial, that at the utmost not more than three plain mourning coaches be employed, and that those who attend my funeral wear no scarf, cloak, black bow, long hatband, or other such revolting absurdity." This is plain speaking, and the grim ravens who hover round the house of mourning with the view of turning tears into cash will be all in a nutter when they read this expression of opinion with regard to their trade, uttered by one whose voice has none the less influence because, it proceeds from the grave. Lord Derby, Lord Clarendon, and Mr Dickens have all set an example, which the vulgar and ignorant will do well to follow, of simplicity in their funerals. The day will come when we, or rather our descendants, will wonder that undertakers were ever permitted to trade upon our sorrows in the present disgraceful fashion. In nine cases out of ten, when the head of a family dies, every sixpence is of value, and nothing more lamentable can be conceived than that the hard-earned savings intended to provide for the necessities of a wife and children should be squandered on black kid gloves and silk hatbands for second cousins, doctors, servants, and others who are mere puppets in the hands of the undertaker to help him to plunder the family of the deceased. If one or two dukes and duchesses would have the kindness to direct that their remains were to be deposited in the ground without having a brick vault specially made to receive them, the middle classes would at once consent to be buried in a similar manner; and this would cut off the bricklayer, who, with the haberdasher, joins the undertaker in the work of extortion. Brick vaults are but attempts to fight with nature, | who, ( in the | long run, will be victorious. We have much to learn and much to unlearn on this subject; but the , day will come when we shall conquer our prejudices and not be afraid to say to j the portly undertaker, as he solemnly ; stalks through the street, in front of the hearse, with a long hatband and a longer face, that he is not a necessity but a " revolting absurdity.":