The Stourbridge Observer, Cradley Heath, Halesowen & District Chronicle.
Stourbridge, West Midlands, England, 1873-02-01 00:00:00

FUNERAL "OF LORD LYTTON.

The remairs of Lord Lytton WOA interred in West-
minster Alth-y on Saturday (Jan. '2.5 amid every sign
of respect due ta the memory of that distimmished
man. The I e+.ll, were read by Archdeacon Jennings,
and the noisiest service was' rendered by the Abbe,
choir. Mr. Gluistone, Chief Justice Cockburn, Lord
Chelmsford, Mr. John Forster, Mr. Stwasfeld, Mr.
Childers, and Mr. Vernon Harcourt were amongst
those who gathered mood the coffin Wit was lowered
Into the ground.

Iho ionowin: are extracts from a graphic account of the
fuller-din the Doily raejraph
Shrouded in a winter fog, the walls of Weateniuster
Abbey, on Saturday at noon, could but just be made
cut from beyond the boundary-railings of that disused
graveyard—paved with memorial stones. from which
the memories, indeed, have lor,t betn effaced by the
aeaceles.3 tramp of the living. Within, the e•litice was
idled as with a "frosted breath," And ufailAsel ware
Hors and hooded ladies on the tombs seemed eerily to
freeze.....

Among the Congregation °assembled in the choir some
time before the chimes of the half hour t Id that the
funeral proceed Sn might be momentarily rape tad.
were men fitly representativo of stateswauship, of
lettem of a dence, of every nrt that can tee railed an
art, sad of tome which have almost lived from their
claim to the title. So various were the ranks of labour
in which the dead min had shone, that it was well to
see each one personified. Lord Lytton was • legis-
lator, a poet, a nebular, an orator, a novelist,
and a writer of plays. To remind us' in turn
that he was each of these, it was but necessary
to look round at the faces raN,etel on either cite
the screened ch;:il&lef the Abbey. At the body
was carried to the choir, along a strip of
Hack carpet bier,e el with white, on either side
of which spectators stood as silent and motionless as
statues, the white-robed choristers who were in front
sang, "I am the Resurrection and the Life, Faith the
Lord." How often the incident which has now to be
noticed will Fe remembered as having occurred at
funera', in Westminster Abbey, let those who have
been present at mine than two or three of these Nolen n
rorvis's declare. Many will call to mind how. when
I .ord Paltuerston was buried in the transept, the bright
sun, streaming forth suddenly after long and seeming
settled gloom, glinted on the coronet as it repo/red r
the coffin-lid. No darker sky than that of Saturday
has gathered over London this winter. Few rd the
most hopeful could have looked for anything else
thin fog for the remainder of the slay, seeing that
the thick atmospheric pall had gathe red ita folds more
closely when noon had parsed. Yet, as the oak coffin
came in view of these within the choir, a sudden light
from alrave penetrated the darknese, and, looking op,
one saw the slanting sunbeams piercing the val-our
that now seemed like a cloud of silvery dust. Patches
of light, shaped by the square panes of the south cleres-
tories, fell on the opposite wall. On came the coffin,
and all rose front their seats as it appeared. In front
of it were carried, each on a eer mate cushion, the
Baron's coronet and theorders of the deceased. There
werendeo three large coronala of white flosses and
when the coffin woe placed on a bier, hung with black
velvet, the coronet was laid en the head of the coffin,
the orders at the feet, and the wreaths between the
two crimson cushions.
No need to ask who was that nearest mourner fel--
owing the coffin. The likeness of the elchst son to the
father was so striking, that none who has seen so much
as an engraving or a photograph pourtray log the
author. ef "Rienzi "and of "Devereux," if " Ernest
Maltravers" and of "Night and Morumg," of "The
Cantons " and of "My Novel," could have failed to
recognise the second Baran Lytton, known to readers
rif high imaginative verse, at once powerful and sweet,
by his nom de plume of "Owen Meredith." The
other mourners were Colonel Edward Bulwer, Mr.
William Bulwer, Mr, Henry Locke, Mr. Ernest Vil-
liers, Mr. .Tohn Foreter—whom, as a distinguished
man of letters no less than as an old friend and
ally of the deceased, we have already named—
Mr. Pearson, Mr. Lambert, and Mr. Sydney Geeige.
With these closely followed Mr. Gladstone who, pro-
ceeding to the right hand of the choir stood a little in
the rear .-f the mourners on that side of the coffin,
The tenantry from Knebworth filled what places had
been left vacant on the benches' and two servants in
black livery, wearing hair-powder in the old style,
were admitted to a prominent poeiticn in the choir,
and subsequently in St. Edmund's Chat el. Dean
Stanley, Canon Jennings, Canon Conway, and the full
choir, who had met the body at the entrance.,
took part in the service. Whea the Lesson had
been read by the Dean, the coffin was b nom
through the gates of the south transept, and then
eastward again to the shrine on the rirht band eledi.
catel to the martyr-King Edmund. It is at the side
of the Communion, and not many 'devil from Poeta'
Corner. The way had hail been carpeted with black
cloth, precisely in the Fame manner as the centeal path
along the nave; and se, too, was it partly overlooked
by spectators seated behind a barrier in th e transept. On
its short remaining journey to the grave, the coffin was
again preceded by the coronet and insignia, as well as
by the wreaths of tamelliss. Led by Mr. William
Basting and the officials of the Abbey, the truce-sion
moved to the narrow gate of St. Edmund's Chapel,
the mourners being followed by the cengregation within
the choir—a select body, but still too numerous to find
room within the small recess. The entrance was kept
by Superintendent Mott, of the Metropolitan Police;
and so excellent was the conduct of the crowd that, al-
though an anxiety to be within the ehrine was pardon-
able, the one experienced guaroian of order was able
single-handed to regulate the admissions, ladies being
most heedfully conducted to the front.

Beside the tomb of Sir Humphrey Buarchier—a
knight slain, as in fmpposed, by the mace of the Earl
of Warwick, at the Battle of Barnet Field—Lord
Lytton takes his long and well earned rest. . . .
_ . _ _

There are no "vaults," so-called, in this part of the
Abbey, an I gravea are dug in the earth, never very
deep. Lord Lytton's is cettaMly not more ti an ME
feet below the surface, if s much. A covering of
black cloth, white edged, 80 174 t mark, sa on a
plan, the outline of neighbotAng grave; in front of the
Gothic altar-tomb of Sir Bernard Emcee, hid the up-
turned ground, and draped the s:des of the °peeing into
which the coffin of Lord Lytton was presently to
be lowered. We shall not pause here to note all
the woeful disfigurements and spoliation of this once
splendid shrine. Where all was, in the ancient time,
geld and rich heraldic colour., there is no tint now but
a dismal blackened grey; there is no figure that is not
mutilated, no cunning handiwork of architectural
tracery that is not marred, so that few can even guess
what it hoe been. In anticipation of cantinunl dark.
nen on Saturday, candles and lanterns had been lit,
and placed in niches and corners of the ruined shrine;
Lot daylight had fully soserted Beall before the
°din had been carried in, and Dean Stanley had
taken his place on the hl4h ground just beyond
the open grave, and close against the chapel-shaped
tomb of Broca., right at the back. Here, with a cha-
racteristic kin Ines., the Dean had helped up two or
thrie young lade, strangers apparently to him, awl had
placed them in front of him anti at his side. They were
in company that must make the solemn scene to them
an ever memorable chapter in the history of their lives.
Close to them stood Mr. Gladstone and Lord Chelms-
ford • and what they saw, and what all saw, when the
coffin was lowered, and the Dean real the glorioe
consolatory, most pathetic and most hopeful word.
beginning, " Forasmuch as it has pl-seed Almighty'
God," was a sight never to be obliterated or forgotten.
A lady very thickly veiled, but not so hidden by the
crape which made her seem one black figure from top
to toe, as that her agonising grief could not he too
plainly dis:erned by all around her, stood on the farther
side of the grave, into which flowers fell softly from
her hand. Flowers in great plenty were, indeed,
strewn upon the coffin, till they almost bid the
circle of the coronet which bad been taken from
the velvet cap and placed train on the oaken lid.
The young Lady Bawer, wits had held a basket
of amaranths and violets till the fitting moment, cast
them into the grave. The flowers dropped and
nattered on the ground were reverently gathered up
by persons standing near, and thrown down upon the
c. tin. Then, as the "Dead March" went nioanieg
through the aisles, all who had been at the grave-side
in the little chapel began to mingle with the crowd in
the Abbcy--and so' with the general mass, moved out
into the cold air and the wintry sunshine.