The Sun.
London, England, 1853-12-15 00:00:00

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LONDON, THURSDAY, DECEMBER 15, 1853.

G. A. WALKER may now exult in the know-
edge that his labours as a sanitary reformer have
not been all in vain—that his assiduous and ener-
getic agitation of the Dead-Man's Question during
fifteen years, namely from 1838 to 1853, have
not been fruitless of extraordinary good to the
community—that, thanks to his untiring perti-
nacity and indomitable perseverance, the inhabi-
tants of the metropolis are no longer to be atmo-
spherically poisoned by that most loathsome, and
destructive malaria hitherto engendered by the
system of intramural interments. The good
work may at length, in real earnest, be said
to have commenced. We may at last re-

joice with some reason over the closing of
the most notorious and detestable of the

evil-graveyards of London and Westminster.
Scarcely a single vault now remains under any of
our chapels or churches which is not at this mo-
ment actually closed, or under order for closing,
against the right of further sepulture. Scarcely
one church or chapel remains within which addi-
tional burials have not been prohibited from this
time henceforth. Parochial and private burial-

grounds to the number of one hundred and eighty
one in the aggregate, are now closed, or are under
order for closing immediately. Added to the
foregoing there are sixty-onc burial-grounds, pri-
vate or parochial, now under notice or order for
closing within a given interval, and that interval,
it is gratifying to know, one of very restricted du-
ration. Besides which, sixteen other burial-grounds
have been closed partially—that is to say, all
further interments, excepting interments in private
vaults and graves, have been therein forbidden
peremptorily. Thirteen others, moreover, are
known to be shut up under certain condi-
tions having reference to the preservation of
the health of the surrounding population. Finally,
almost all the remaining burial-grounds -within
the circuit of the metropolitan districts are now
undergoing an official and searching investigation.
A considerable portion of this modern Augeali
stable may consequently be described as already
cleansed by the stream of changes flooded through
it by the strong arm of that Hercules of the
nowadays—the Practical Reformer. Not the
Reformer in theory, not the secret borrower
from other men's propositions, not any mere
brain-washer who may happen to be installed
by Ministerial caprice in some snug office-chamber
in Gwydyr House, dozing away his time over
dog's-eared blue-books, and affording another and
a more comprehensive illustration than was ever
dreamt of by THOMAS HOOD, another and a more
terrible illustration of the • truth of his poet-
dictum, that--

Evil is wrought
By want of thought
As well as want of heart :

the happy transformation we are now speaking
of has not been effected, we say, by one of these
pseudo-benefactors and mock philanthropists,
but by a man of a very different character—by
an. Original and Practical Reformer.
Mediately, -the abolition of intramural inter-
ments, the triumph of the Dead-Man's Question,
the closing of the London graveyards, are attri-
butable
°wing to Mr. WALKER—immediately, they are
to Lord PALMERSTON. Between those
two
and aivi
the ui s' between the Champion
consummator of the long-desired im-
provement, the
honour of these memorable in-
novations will be
impartialitysharedand
by every observer gifted
Tenth intelligence. It must be
recognised by the conscience of the whole com-
munity, that while the one was the first to sug-
gest that beneficent
Change I.n the social system
of the metropolis, the other was the first to
ee re-
cognise the necessity of boldly
and energetically
carrying out the proposed improvements.
Dur-
ing the fifteen years which have elapsed
since
e
the commencement of his difficult but admirable
labours in 1838, Mr.
WALKER has persisted
nobly, in spite of every perverse and sometimes
elaborately-organised opposition, in demanding
the abolition of the system of intramural sepul-
ture from the humanity of the Legislature and
the providence of the Government. Ultimately
the good time arrived, so that the unFainiei
advocate of the change has lived to witness the
realisation of his day-dream in the vigorous and
comprehensive measures upon which, since his
fortunate installation in the Home Department,
Lord PALMERSTON has sagaciously and chivalrously
adventured.
Aiready we have directed attention to the mea-
sures adopted by the Home Secretary in reference
to the intramural graveyards. We would now
urgently call the notice of the community to the