Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1876-11-15

Irish Wakes.
There is no doubt that the custom
of waking or watching originated with
the Irish in an affectionate feeling
toward their dead relatives, whom
their natural kindness prompted them
not to desert. as it were, nor to leave
to the attacks of evil spirits, who
hover in their fancy round the body to
do it an injury. Hence the lights and
holy water. The same idea, in almost
the identical form, prevailed in Cleve-
land, in Yorkshire, where indeed it is
only just extinct. "The Lyke Wake,
or Late Wake" was maintained
sometimes for few days after the
body was laid in the grave, and there
were more superstitious practices than
in Ireland. In addition to the light
and the holy water a plate Of salt was
put on the breast; these were held to
be efiicacious for the watcher as well
as the dead. Above all, the door was
always either wide open or carefully
closed, lest some fearful apparition
should enter. The reader of "Guy
Mannering' will remember Meg Mer-
rifles opening the door wide when she
was busy in her CHASTITY ministrations
about the smuggler's corpse. She also
chanted some dismal verse. something
similar to the "Lyke Wake dirge
which is sung in Yorkshire, but prop
erly belongs to Cleveland
This Re night this ae night,
Every nigh! and ale.
A fire and leet and candelight
And Christie receive Iny sale"
In parts of the north of Ireland there
was at one time, some forty or fifty
years ago, a rather romantic custom,
that when a very young unmarried
woman died, her coffin should be car
ried by young girls only to the grave
yard. AS this was situated perhaps
fifteen or twenty miles from where she
lived, it followed that the bearers
should be changed every second mile,
and on these occasions there was gem
orally an escort of running volunteers,
who in this way often did their thirty
miles in the day. This custom was
called {" shifting the coffin" and agood
many marriages were the result of
these excursions; but the idea was
nevertheless pretty and pastoral. The
Irish peasantry have an Unborn taste
for funerals, and in the amount of
honor done to the departed they lose
sight of the actual loss they have suf-
fered.
"Och, sure. thin, it was a fine Der
ryin' there was sight of people and
a power of cars is as great a eulo-
GUM as can be accorded any man, and
will quite console the survivors. And
the reverse, "Och. thin, he did not
leave enough as would bury him da-
cent" in fact, they think far more of
how they are to be buried than Of
keeping life itself. The poorest and
the most improvident lays by some
thing for his or her own wake, and
have myself known cases of paupers in
the hospital who We're accommodating
under their pillows a little store to
save the disgrace Of parish coffin, that
being the greatest and last misfortune
that could befall them. Douglas Jer-
rod was much struck by this phase of
the Irish character. and it is he,
think, who tells an affecting story of
IA young girl whom he found in a cab
in busy at her needle. Il see you
take in plain sewing; this is some bri-
dial GRANDEUR" he said, taking up
what looked like an elaborate night
dress.
Its no wedding grandeur" re-
piled the girl, proudly. "Shure IT'S
my own snroud let life bring what ii
may, place God I'll have dacent
wake. - Dublin University Magazine.