The evening times., 1899-02-24
BURIALS IN THE OCEAN.
Grim Tales OF Funerals on sea-GO-
ing ships.
From the Cincinnati Enouirer.)

From the Cincinnati EnquiTeT.)
There is no place where death is more
unwelcome than on board passenger
steamer; and between the death and burial
of a sea traveller the melancholy influence
of the event extends to everyone on board
The limitations of space are very likely
responsible in part for this for there is the
feeling that until the body has been cast
into the arms of the sea there is no get
ting away from il.
Sailors dread death on board their YES
Sci as much as anything, and when one oc-
ours they are all anxiety 10 render the
body the last seryicei and this fact is fire.
quently responsible for the haste and scant
consideration with which burials at sea
are too often conducted. But the days of
such ceremonies are fast dying and efforts
are now being made which will permit of
body being carried for; the remainder Of
the journey after death and prop riy
buried on land. aa
Even now it is generally only sailors
and steerage passengers who are buried at
sea, and frequently these are cast TO the
waves without so much as the vessel being
slowed down, and within an hour or two
of their death.
Often enough a death occurs in a vessel
without the fact becoming known to more
than one or two of 1the crew or steerage
passengers. Everybeffort is made to keep
the event secreth and in the stiffness of
night, when better. class passengers are
comfortably curled up in their hunks, Il
little band of men. moving like shadows
across the deck. bear body from below
and while the vessel is plowing the sea the
mortal remains, wrapped in canvas or in
closed in a crudely made box are quietly
slipped over the ships side into the mys-
terious deep.
The presence of a dead body on board
has sometimes not even been suspected
by the passengers until some one has
noticed the sharks that are following: for
it is no mere sailors story that sharks
know when a ship contains corpse. y
vessel carrying dead body and passing
through waters frequented by sharks IS
almost sure to be followed by one or more
of those fishes if it does not outspeed
them.
Rather thar bury corpse while sharks
are following a vessel, the captain will
sometimes have the body placed in the ice
chamber and full steam put-on the engines
until the hungry fishes have dropped
astern completely.
In one case at least a body was actually
cremated on board by the captains orders
because of the sharks. But sharks are not
often obstacles TO prompt burial, and. gen.
orally speaking, when death occurs at sea
the body is slipped into the water at night
with none to witness the proceeding but a
couple of the crew and the captain, who
reads an abridgment of the service from
the prayer book.
The manner of burial, of course, depends
greatly upon the captains own feelings in
respect to the dead. and it must be ac-
knowledged that these feelings are in some
cases all that they should be. Some cap
tains have the greatest objection to dump
ing dead body into the sea, and when it
is unavoidable will do their uttermost to
conduct the ceremony with all possible
reverence, and respect.
For all that, there is always the feeling