Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1880-02-09
PRIVATE FUNERALS,

| Nc modern innovation on long. .estab.
lshed social customs has met with such
marked favor from the best and most re-
fined people, both in England and America,
as the innovation which dispenses with all
ostentatious funeral professions. 1t is a
custom under which society has long
groaned, that the house of mourning must
be invaded by strangers; that the details
of the last sad ceremony must be given
over to those wholly uninterested except
in the business advantages that shall accrue
to them from their part in the OCCASION
The gathering of crowds of strangers to see
'the remains, and, above all, the custom
of having the weeping friends .'take
leave" of the departed before the eyes of
gathered spectators-all these long estab-
lished customs are simply narrowing to
sensitive, bereaved hearts. The long pro-
cession of carriages to the grave is fire.
quently more than half filed by those who
merely go for the sake of the ride: and
unseemly mirth and unworthy gossip are
too often the concomitants of funeral
procession.
The reform which has been inaugurated
in many places by the very best and most
earnest people, is that of having the final
ve-taking, and the removal Of the body
to the grave, entirely private. If desira-
BILE, or if the departed has many friends
who would like an opportunity to pay the
last token of respect, funeral services are
announced to be held at certain hour
The friends gather; services are held (;
words of respect are spoken; and then the
assemblage is respectfully dismissed. There
are no carriages IN waiting, nor any further
intrusion OF mere acquaintance ON the sa-
credness of grief. After these ceremonies
the family can have their dead to them
selves 70" the last sad farewells. They can
clasp the hand and kiss the lips, and utter
uprestrained all the sorrowing words that
nature dictates. They can bid the long
farewell, and close the coffin-lid. Then, it
may be, as the evening shadows lengthen,
the pall-bearers alone carry forth the dead,
and they and the family mourners alone
follow the dear remains to the place of in
terment. How infinitely more congenial
to sorrowing hearts is such a mode of pro-
cedure than the ostentatious, confusing,
tedious ceremonies that have so long OBJ
tained at funerals
Motives of mere delicacy and PERSONAL
feeling and a sense of the sacredness of
grief and of the true proprieties of life,
dictate these reforms in the mode of fu-
neral services. There is another motive
which all sensible people should consider,
and that is, the great expense often forced
upon families i'll able to bear it by osten-
tatious funerals. It is certainly no allevi-
alton, but rather an aggravation of the grief
of bereaved families, to have added the
anxiety and distress of planning to meet
heavy bills of being necesstated to deny
themselves necessary clothing and food,
as many are obliged to do, to pay for the
hollow display of the burial day. And
inasmuch as many people in limited cir
cumstances hesitate to inaugurate this re-
form lest they should be regarded as want
ing in respect to their dead, we trust that
we shall see it more and more adopted by
the wealthy and influential. By thus set
ting the example, the following of which
will tighten the burden of their poorer
neighbors, they may cause even their grief
to bless and benefit their fellow men
Western Magazine.