Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1876-12-08

From the Dublin University Magazine,


There is no doubt that tie custom Of wax
ing and watching originated with the Irish
IN an afectiCnate 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 Cleveland, in Yorkshire. where,
indeed, 1t Is only Just extinct. The Lyke
Wake, or Lake 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 placed on the breast, these
were held to be efhcacious for the watch
er 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 Merrilies opening the
door wide when she was busy in her ghastly
minisuations about the smuggler's corpse.
She also chanted some dismal verse, some
thing similar to the "Lyke Wake dirge
which Is sung in Yorkshire, but properly
belongs TO Cleyeleland -
Thle ae L ght this ae night,
Every Il .ht and ale.
fire ana leet and candleliS Sht,
And Christie receive thy sale.
In parts Of the north OF Ireland there was
at one time, some forty OF fifty years ago,
rather romantic custom, that when a very
young unmarried woman died her coffin
should be carried by Young girls only to the
graveyard. As this was situated perhaps
some fifteen OF twenty miles from where she
lived, it followed that the bearers should be
changed every second mile, and on these oc-
casions there was generally an escort Of run
ming volunteers, who in this way often did
their thirty miles in the day. This custom
was called shifting the coffin, and good
many marriages was the result OF these ex-
cursions but the idea was nevertheless pret-
ty and pastoral. The Irish peasantry have
an inborn taste for funerals, and in the
amount of honor done to the departed they
lose sight Of the actual loss they have suffer
ed.
"Och, sure, thin, it was fine burryin'
there was a sight OF people and power OF
cars Is as great a eulogium as can be ac-
corded any man, and will quite console the
survivors. And the reverse, "Oeh, thin, he
did not leave enough ss would bury him
decent in fact, they think more OF how
they are to be buried than OF keeping life it.
self. The poorest and the most lmprovident
lays by something for his or her wake, and
| have myself known cases of paupers IN the
hospital who were accumulating under their
pillows little store TO save the disgrace OF
parish coffin, that being the greatest and
last misfortune that could befall them.
Douglass Jerrold WAS much struck by this
phase OF the Irish character, and it is he, |
think, who tellsan affecting story OF young
girl whom he found in a cabin busy at her
needle. Il see you take in plain sewing
this is some bridal grandeur he said, taking
up what looked like an elaborate night
dre-s.
IT'S no wedding grandeur" replied the
girl, proudly. "Sure It's my own shroud !,
let life bring what it may, PLACE God Il
have a dacent wake.