The true northerner., 1882-05-12
fean Francisco Post.l

He was q jolly looking man with
rourd corporation, a burgundy-tinted
nose, and the general exterior OF con-
tented mind, and as he entered the edl-
torial den he offered us a good cigar, lit
another, and said:
"How about this local cremation
scheme?"
"Well, how yourself?"
"The fact is," said the stranger, re-
flectively, Il had pretty tough expert
ence with one of these cadaver roasting
concerns once, and / thought mebbe you
might like to make an item of the fact SO
US to warn the people here in time.
Fire away"
"Well, you see, it was in New Orleans.
NY wife died there, and as a cremation
company was having a good deal OF
boom there just then, she made me prom
Use to have her spirit sent up through
their hue, as it were. Said she thought
il would be nice and melancholy for me
to carry her ashes around with me where
ever l went-in vase, you understand.
"And you complied?"
"Why, yes. 1t was her last wish, you
know, and besides l thought it might be
usefnl in kinder preparing her for the
here-but never mind that now. L sent
the remains aroundto the Company's of
flee in push-cart, got receipt, saw
Maria touched off. so to speak. and two
days after that they returned me beal-
tiful maiolica jar full of ashes, scented
with forget. .me-not, and the stopper tied
in with pink ribbon"
THAT was pretty"
eyes, l was very much pleased at first,
but had to keep that bottle out of sight
after while, though, because people
were all the time opening the jar, under
the impression that itcontained it preserved
ginger or chow-chow, or something.
'rhat must have been unpleasant"
Unpleasant-well,I 1 should smile-I
mean l should weep. Why, actually,
one day while was living in New York,
came home and found q new servant
girl polishing the knives with the re-
mains-just think of it. ;"
Terrible, sir, terriblei"
'But what 1 was going to say, was
this. About year after my wife was
kindled-I mean cremated-I was In New
Orleans again, and l happened to meet
the superintendent of the refractory ore
I should say the corpse burning fur
nace-at a banquet, and he got so full
that L had to see him home. On the
way we stopped in place or two for
steadier-you know how it is-and the
result was that he got very communica-
tive about his company-in fact, he
just went to work and gave the whole
business away"
"Did, eh?"
eyes, sir; he squarely owned up that
they didn't burn the bodies at all. He
said they just dropped 'em through hole
in the bottom of the furnace, took 'em
out the back way at night, and cold 'em
to the medical students.
"Gracious! and the ashes?"
"Mule ashes, sir! nothing but mule
ashes. They would just cut up some
oldmule carcass, the superintendent said,
pitch in enough to MAX. bad smell and
then sell the ashes to the grief-stricken
relatives at S25 bottle-terrible cheeky
now, wasn't it?"
"And all this time you had"
Had been carrying that old jar of
mule ashes all over the country. Just
imagine how mean / felt"
"You threw it away then?"
"Well, no." said the wiaower. as he
winked tear out of his left eye; 1.-THE
more studied over the matter the more
/ concluded that mule ashes weren't so
much out of the way after all. You see,
poor Maria was an awful stubborn wo-
man-t-r-e-m-e-n-d-o-u-s stubborn-and
yes, 1 kinder thought mule ashes
would do mighty near as well, all things
considered.
And heaving the resigned sigh of one
who had succeeded in bracing up under
great sorrow, the anti cremationist lit
another cigar and walked out