Litchfield enquirer., 1876-12-28
day seems almost an impert

lO+0hy GCtkAO A4lkOS6 3u 1k4RCEg Assrs How quickly and with what serene ftIss the new grave is absorbed by the aver s sal antiquity of the placel The bl ss marblh over Keats does not appear 2 day fresk han the neigh hbofing yramid of Caius 0A9sias. Oddly enough we saw no funsfal in Rome. h almost evety 0ther large city it was cur forGune either as we entered or departed, to meet funeral cortege. Every one stands uncovered as the train crawls by, the vehicles come to a halt at the cnrbstone, the children stop their play, heads are bowed, golden locks and gray, on every side. As I have said, though in different sense, they they
 make much of their dead abroad. I was struck by the contrast the day we reached home. Driving from the steamer, we en- countered hearse ss~aggling down
 Broadway. It attracted as much rever- ential attention as would be paid to an
 ice cart.
 happened to witness picturesque fn-
 neral in Venice. 1t was that of chorus
 boy h q church On one of the snaall Ter ca- na1s somewhere west of the Rialto.
 stumbled on the church accidentally that
 forenoon, and was not able to find 1t
 again the next day,-a circumstance to
 which the incident perhaps owes the fairy
 like atmosphere that envelops it for me. The building had disappeared, like Alad.
 din's palace, in the night.
 They were performing a mass as I en-
 tered. The great rose window behind the
 organ and he chancel windows were dark
 ened with draperies, and the colossal can-
 dles were burning. The coffin, covered
 with heavily embroidered pail, stood
 on an elevated platform in front of the
 magnificent altar, The inlaid columns
 glistening in the candle-light, the smoke
 of the incense curling lazily up to the
 frescoed dome, the priests in elaborate
 robes kneeling around the bier. r.-it was
 like masterly composed picture. When
 the ceremonies were concluded, the coffin
 was lifted. from the platform by six young
 friars and borne to gondola in waiting
 at the steps near the portals. The priests, carrying hugh golden crucifx and seve- ral tall gilt torches, unlighted, crowded
 into the bow and stern of the floating
 hearse, which was attached by long rope to another gondola occupied by oarsmen. Following these were two or three covered gondolaswhose connection with the obsequies were not clear to me, as they appeared to be empty. Slowly down the narrow canal, in that dead still. ness which reigns in Venice. swept the the somber hotilla, bearing its uncon- scious burden to the Campo Santo. The air was full of vagrant spring scents, and the sky that arched over all was carved of one vast, unclouded turquoise In the de- ing up the dripping of the wax candles ha kol except time is wasted in Italy.
 saw more picturesque though not so agreeable funeral in Florence. The night of our arrival was one of those un- earthly moonlight nights which belong to Italy. The Arno, changed to a stream of quicksilver, flowed swiftly throrgh the stone arches of the Ponte Vecchio under our windows, and lured me with it's beau- ty out-of-doors, though @ great clock somewhere near by had just changed elev- en By an engraving had seen in boy hood recognized the bridge of Taddeo Gaddi, with it's goldsmith shops on either side. They were closed now, of course. strolled across the bridge and back again once or twice, and then wandered of into a network of dingy streets, traversed by one street so very narrow that you saw only hands breadth of sapphire sky be- tween the tops of tue tall buildings. Standing in the middle of the thorough fare. could almost touch the shutters of theshops right and left. At the upper end of the street, which was at least three quarters of a mile in length, the overhang- ing fronts of the lofty houses seemed to meet and shut out the dense moonlight. In the desperate struggle which took place there between the moon and the gloom, hundred fantastic shadows sllp- ped from coigne and cornice and fell into the street below, like besiegers flung from the ramparts of some old castle. Not human being nor light was anywhere visible. Suddenly saw what, for an in- stant, took to be fallen star in the ex treme distance. It was moving. It ap- preached in zigzag course. It broke in- to several stars: these grew larger; then 1 discovered they were torches. A low mo- notonous chant, like the distant chorus of demons-in an opera, reached my ear. The chant momently increased in distinctness, and as the torches drew nearer 1 saw they were carried by fifteen or twenty persons in square, in the middle of which was bier supported by a number of ghostly figures. The procession was sweeping doan on me at the rate of six miles an hour; the trailing pail Tapping in the wind caused by the velocity of the march. When the cortege was within twenty or thirty yards of me, noticed that the bier carriers and the persons who held the hambeaux were shrouded from forehead to foot in white sheets with holes pierced for the eyes. never beheld any thing more devilish On they came, oc- cupying the whole width of the narrow street. I had barely time to crowd my self into 8 projecting doorway, when they swept by with rhythmical, swinging gait, to the measure of their awful threnody. waited until the mufied cnant melted into the dlstance,-and then made bee line for the hotel.
 In Italy the hour of interment IS grad uated by the worldly position of the de- ceased. The poorsare buried in the day time; thus the expense of torches is avoid ed. Illuminated night funerals are re- served for the wealthy and persons of rank. At least, believe that such is the though the reverse of this or der may be the case. At Naples, know, the interments' in Camposanto Vecchio take place a little before sunset. Shelley sdlu OI tue 1EOLGSCauL DuTy yAuS OFOuuu Ut Rome that the spot was lovely enough to make one in love with death. Nobody would dream of saying that about the Camposanto at Naples,-a parallelogram of several hundred feet, inclosed on three sides by high wall and on the fourth by an arcade. In this dreary space, ap- preached through dismal avenue of cy- presses, are three hundred and sixty-six deep pits, one of which is opened each evening to receive the dead of that day, and then sealed up,-one pit for each day of the year. fancy that the extra pit must be for leap-year. Only the poorest persons, paupers and waifs, are buried here, if it can be called buried. The body
 Is usually left unattended at the arcade, to await its turn. d as3 :!
 There is curious burial customeat Mu- nich. The law requires that every man, and child ~ho dies within city limits shall lie in state for three days in ,he Leichenhaus (dead house) of the Got 5esacker, the southern cemetery, outside the Sending Gate This is to prevent any chance of premature burial. an in- stance of which many years ago gave rise to the present provision The Leichen.