The Montgomery advertiser. [volume] (Montgomery, Ala.) 1885-1982, 1902-05-14
PETRIFIED OR BURNED
A New Method of Disposing OF the
Body After Death.
Philadelphia Record.

Philadelphia Record
1t still appears to be one purpose OF
science to bring into the world OF realities
the dreams of men of fancy-of literary
men whose flashes of inspiration reveal
strange possibilities of nature which the
scientists may scorn, but which long
course of experiments or an accident OF
the laboratory forces him to accept. Thus
Goethe's Imagination gave birth to the
fundamental principle of the science OF
comparative anatomy. as the fancy of
Emerson presented the theory of evolu-
ton before Darwin had gathered his
proofs. Thus Poe, also, forecast by near
ly century the discovery of a new ele-
ment of the atmosphere. How Jules
Verne anticipated the invention of the
submarine boat and the electric light and
motor is known to the schoolboy. Surely
some writer must have thought of light
which could penetrate opaque substances
and expose the contents of locked and
sealed caskets-such a light as accident
revealed in the laboratory of Roentgen.
The dramatic possibilities of such llgnt
are immense, and it is strange If they
have never been utilized.
Now comes another realization of
writer's fancy. In his Woman in White"
the late Wilkie Collins described that re-
markable Italian, Count Fosco. as one
of the first experimental chemists living
wonderful inventions, "a means of petri-
| flying the body after death so to pre-
serve it as hard as marble to the end of
time" An undertaken at Battle Creek,
Mich, who processes to have compre-
| hensiVe knownelge of chemistry, (but
| whose name was not given in the dispatch
| to The Record, is said to have made a
| discovery in embalmng which virtually
! realizes that which was credited to Count
| Fosto. Six months ago the body of John
| Leek, a colored man, was turned over to
| this undertaken for a test of the new en-
balming fluid, which had produced aston
| fishing results when used on the bodies of
| animals. After six months the body has
| the consistency of vulcanized rubber and
might readily pass for a statue of black
| marble as the petrified flesh is hard
| enough to take polish. There is not the
| slightest trace of decomposition or vast
| ing.
| Accepting this report as veracious, the
| burial problem is solved. Great as has
| been the advance of cremation, the ma
| jority of civilized people still decline tn
| be burnt. One woman has urged as a rt a
| son that her husbands second wife might
subject her ashes to indignities-might
| scatter them on the icy pavement to pre-
vent pers ons from slipping. Probably the
process Of pet flying the body will event
ually prove less expensive than burning,
| and the storage of the dead would be an
easy problem. 1t required the art OF
PraXiteles to preserve in enduring marble
| the peerless features and rounded limbs
of Phryne. but under the use of THIS
embalming Aud Ito the discoverer OF
which the ancient Egyptians would have
given palaces and millions of seste.tia)
the beautiful woman who shall die in her
perfection may become a statue such as
no modern sculptor could shape. We
| boat .
to value the process as highly as people
in some other ages would have done, bu
as the solution of a problem which ha
long disturbed the public sanitarians i
will be welcomed when it shall success
fully endure the tests Of science.