Democratic messenger., 1894-12-29

va tiiht S'tIt ttlktRtu
in worship. Who knows but that be-
yond the light of the sun on which he
gazes he may catch u glimpse of the
God who is light and ''in whom there
is no dar xness at all:'
The Tower Of silence.
We passed on up through gates into
the garden that surrounds the place
where the Parsees dispose of their dead
This garden was given by Jamshidji
Jijibhai and is beautiful with flowers
of all hue and foliage of all styles Of
vein and notch and stature There Is
on all sides great opulence of fern and
cypress. The garden is 100 feet above
the level of the sea. Not far from the
entrance is u building where the mourn
ers Of the fur eral procession 90 in to
pray. \ light as here kept burning year
i'll and year out.
We ascend the garden by some eight
stone steps. The body of n deceased
aged woman was being carried in to-
ward the chief ''tower of silence. :"
There are five of these towers. Several
of them have not been used for long
while. Four persons, whose business it
is To do this, carry the corpse. They
are followed by two men with long
boards The tower of silence to which
they come cost 81 80, 900 and is % feet
high and go feet around and without
a roof Tho four carriers of the dead
and the two bearded men come To the
door of the tower, enter and leave the
dead. There are three rows of places
for the dead-the outer row for the
men. the middle row for the women, the
inside row for the children. The life
less bodies are left exposed as far down
as the waist As soon as the employees
retire from the tower of silence the
vultures, now one, now two, now many.
swoOp upon the lifeless form. These
vultureS fill the air with their discord-
ant voices. We saw them in long rows
on the top of the whitewashed wall Of
the tower of silence. In few minutes
they have taken the last particle of
flesh from the bones. There had evil
IDENTIFY been other opportunities for
them that day. and some flew away, as
though surfeited. They sometimes carry
away with them parts of n body, and it
is no unusual thing for the gentlemen
in their country seats to have dropped
into their dooryards bone from the
tower of silence
In the center of this tower is well,
into which the bones are thrown after
they are bleached The hot sun and the
rainy season and charcoal do their work
of disintegration and disinfection. and
then there are siuices that carry into the
sea what remains of the dead The
wealthy people of Malabar hill have
made strenuous efforts TO have these
strange towers removed as nuisance,
but they remain and will no doubt for
ages remain.
Food For vultures.
talked with learned Parsec about
these mortuary customs. He said: Il
suppose you consider them very pecul-
lar, but the fact is we Parsees rever-
ence the elements of nature and cannot
consent to defilc them. We reverence
the fire. and therefore will not ask it
to burn our dead. We reverence the
water and do not ask it To suhmerge
our dead. We reverence the earth and
will not ask it to bury our dead. And
so we let the vultures take them away"
He confirmed me i'll the theory that the
Parsees act on the principle that the
dead are unclean. No one must touch
such body The carriers of this tomb
of silence must not put their hands on
the form of the departed. They wear
gloves lest somehow they should be con-
taminated. When the bones are to be re-
moved from the sides of the tower and
put in the we'll at the center, they are
touched carefully by tongs Then these
people besides have very decided theo-
ries about the democracy of the tomb
No such thing as caste among the dead.
Philosopher and boor, the aftiuent and
the destitute must 20 through the same
''towcr of silence" lie down side by
side with other occupants. have their
bodies dropped into the same abyss and
be carried out through the same canal
and float away OH tho same sea. No
splendor of Metropolis. No sculpturing
of mausoleum. No pomp of dome or
obelisk. Zoroaster's teaching resulted
in these towers of silence. He wrote,
NAKED you came into tho world. and
naked you must go out.
As stood at the close of day in this
garden on Malabar hill and heard the
flap of the vultures' wings coming from
their repast, the funeral custom Of the
Parsce seemed horrible beyond compare,
and yet the dissolution of the human
body by any mode is awful. and the
beaks of these fowl are probably no
more repulsivc than the worms of the
body devouring the sacred human form
i'll cemeteries. Nothing but the resur-
rection day can undo the awful work Of
death, whether it now be put out Of
sight by cutting spade or flying wing.
4 Parsee Wedding.
Starting homewarG, we soon were in
the heart of the city and saw II building
all aflash with lights and resounding
with merry voices. 1t was u Parsee
wedding in building erected especial
ly for the marriage ceremony. We came
to the door and proposed to 70 in, but
at first We're not permitted. They saw
we Were not Parsees, and that we We're
not even natives. So, very politely, they
halted us on the doorsteps. This temple
of nuptials was chiefly occupied by
women, their ears and necks and
hands afiamo with jewels or limitations
of jewels. BY pantomimc and ges-
ture, rs we had no use of their vo-
cabIlary, we told them we were stran-
gers and We're curious to sec by what
process Parsees We're married Gradual
ly we worked our way inside the door.
The building and the surroundings
We're illumined by hundreds of candles
i'll glasses and lanterns, i'll unique and
grotcsque holdings. Conversation ran
high. and lan',hter bubbled over, and all
was gay. Then there was u sound Of an
advancing band of music, but tine in
struments for the most part were strange
to our ears and eyes Louder and louder
lra Wct,nnra nrntntnaur rc. a