Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1902-12-13
DISPOSAL OF THE DEAD IN CITIES
Burial Near Populous Towns Should
Be Prohibited.
From Municipal Affairs.


From Municipal Affairs.
Our barbarous custom OF burial was ini-
tiated by the belief in the resurrection OF
the living body. The consequent natural
desire to save 1t from destruction was
strengthened by a prejudice OF early Chris
tians against the Roman pyre But even the
wonderful ingenuity and lavish expenditure
of the Egyptians have been unavsiling to
preserve mummies eternally, and IL We
could, 1t Is questionable whether We would
make the dross we leave behind after a
slow death the permanent habitation OF
our immortal souls. The prospect OF re-
naming In body tortured by disease or
decrepit with senility is not alluring.
Yet We set aside valuable tracts OF land
for the stowage of such bodies; until. re-
CARELESS Of the sacred promise of their per-
petual rest" and inviolability. municipal
ties seize the room when needed and fling
the remains upon a dung heap. Almost
every page of the records of London and
Paris contains examples of the dissertation
of abandoned grayeyards, and there Is
hardly city in the old world that has not
disturbed at least one Of these resting
places of their whilom Inhabitants. In our
towns of rapid growth the cemetery OF to-
day becomes the heart of a metropolis to-
morrow; the demolition of graveyards in
New York and Boston has been a frequent
occurrence until it fails to attract atten-
ton.
When the Colon cemetery of Havana be-
came overcrowded. the Cubans found 1t
necessary to clear II of skulls. and pro-
miscuously shoveled them into common
boneyard. 1t presented an aspect so ghast-
ly that General Wood concluded to cover
the pit and to reopen IL only for the next
overflow of skeletons, expected In about
five years. In certain cemeteries in London
corpses are buried in standing posture be-
m lie laft m Iou hon
Bodies of the poor generally are packed
over each other In tiers and the trench is
kept open until filed In the poverty cor
ner of Calvary cemetery this has been the
customary treatment of the remains of
paupers. Newtown. where Calvary Is stu
ated, haroors eighty corpses to every liv-
ing inhabitant. The convenient villages of
Corona, Elmhurst and Woodside, once
parts of Newtown. which now are annexed
to New York and constitute the geo.
graphical center of the enlarged city, might
Increase in population IL 1t were not for the
proximity of vast and dreary charnel fields.
A law relating to public health provided
forty years ago that no grave be dug or
opened south of Seth street, and that no
cemetery be opened in any part of the city
and county of New York. This law should
be enforced and applied, not to greater New
York alone. but to the territory within a
radius of one hundred miles around every
populous town. People who insist on
their inanimate bodies remaining nviolate
should have them carried to distance
where they can neither Inconvenience nor
injure the living, who need the room and
are natural heirs of the departed. Famous
intermural cemeteries. like Mount Auburn
Boston; Greenwood New York. and Laurel
Hill, Philadelphia, could be transformed
into admirable parks. Monuments of ar
chitectural beauty might remain undis-
turbed. Others might be replaced by trees,
with suitable tablets to mark the spot Of
those upon whose dust they grow. The
Turks. 10th to desecrate the grave Of
Mrs lima hny I'd H.
tom, and thereby have made the GENE
teries of Constantinople attractive to stran-
gers. Two hundred city lots are now re-
quired to bury in the old-fashioned way the
seventy thousand persons that annually
die in greater New York. We probably
could save more than a hundred and fifty
of these precious lots in ashes of the seven
ty thousand were placed In urn cemeteries
preserved IN inches OF a Columborium or
strewn on the waves of a river. As ceme-
teries are exempt from taxation, the munic-
ipality would derive an income from the
lots, which the living then would use, and
from the improvements they would make
upon them.
Another important advantage would &C
crue to every needy mourner, in saving him
from useless extravaganza. He incurs at
present the expense of $50 at least for a
plain funeral: land values in the suburbs
of cities preclude a reduction in the cost
of burial The expense of cremation is only
SO. and could be largely reduced if the Gus
tom became more general.
Let our intelligent population set the ex-
ample as it does In San Francisco. where
almost thousand bodies are annually ere
mated, and the ignorant masses will be
sure to follow. Considering the marvellous
progress we have made in every other d.
rection. it Is strange that We have failed to
adopt the most rational means for the dis
position of dead bodies. We hardly are
abreast of Homer's contemporaries, who
realized that, however well a cemetery may
be managed. corpses can do harm. but
ashes never can. True religion does not
and never can teach that it is cody to in
jure those we leave behind when we die.