CREMATION, the burning of human corpses, appears to have been a general prac tice in early times, with three exceptions: Egypt, where they were embalmed; Judea, where they were laid away in sepulchers; and China, where they were buried in the earth. In Greece, suicides, children not yet having teeth, and persons struck by light ning, were denied the right to be buried. At Rome, burning was the rule down to the end of the 4th c. after Christ. Whether in any of these cases cremation was adopted or rejected for sanitary or religious reasons, it is difficult to say. Embalming would prob ably not succeed in climates less warm and dry than that of Egypt; the scarcity of fuel might also be a consideration. The Chinese are influenced by the doctrine of Feng-Shui, or incomprehensible wind water; they must have a properly placed grave in their own land, and with this view corpses are. often sent home from California. Even the Jews used cremation in the vale of Tophet when a plague came; and the modern Jews of Berlin and the Spanish and Portuguese Jews at Mile-End cemetery have been among the first to welcome the lately revived process. Probably, also, some nations had religious objections to the pollution of the sacred principle of fire, and therefore practiced expo sure, suspension, throwing into the sea, cave-burial, desiccation. or envelopment. Some at least of these methods must obviously have been suggested simply by the readiest means at hand. Cremation is still practiced over a great part of Asia and America, but not always in the same form. Thus, the ashes may be stored in urns, or buried in the earth, or thrown to the wind, or (as among the Digger Indians) smeared with gum on the heads of the mourners. In one case the three processes of embalming, burning, and burying are employed; and in another, if a member of the tribe die at a great distance from home, some of his money and clothes are nevertheless burned by the family. As food, weapons, etc., are sometimes buried with the body, so they are sometimes burned with the body, the whole ashes being collected. The Siamese have a singular institu tion, according to which, before burning, the embalmed body lies in a temple for a period determined by the rank of the dead man—the king for six months, and so down wards. If the poor relations cannot afford fuel and other necessary preparations, they bury the body, but exhume it for burning when an opportunity occurs. There can be little doubt that the practice of cremation in modern Europe was at first stopped, and has since been prevented in great measure, by views which had become associated with the Christian doctrine of the resurrection of the body; partly also by the notion that the Christian's body was redeemed and purified. Science has shown that burning merely produces quickly what putrefaction takes a long time to accomplish; but the feeling of opposition still lingers among the clergy of more than one nation. Some clergymen, however, as Mr. Ilaweis in his Ashes to Ashes, a cremation P. elude, have been promi nent in the reforming movement The objection was disposed of by lord Shaftesbury when lie asked, "What would in such a case become of the blessed martyrs?" The very general practice of burying bodies in the precincts of a church, in order that the dead might take benefit from the prayers of persons resorting to the church, and the religious ceremony which precedes both European burials and Asiatic cremations, have given the question a religious aspect. It is really a sanitary one. The disgusting results of pit-burial made cemeteries necessary. But the cemeteries arc equally liable to over crowding, and 'are often nearer to inhabited houses than the old church-yards. There is indeed a disposition to build villas near ornamental cemeteries. It is possible to make a cemetery safe approximately, by selecting a soil which is dry, close, and porous, by careful drainage, and by rigid enforcement of the rules prescribing a certain depth (3 to 10 ft.) and a certain superficies (4 yards) for graves. But one has only to read such a work as Biker's Laws Relating to Burial to see how many dangers burial legislation has to contend with. A certain amount of irrespirable gas will escape into the air, or into sewage drains, and thus reach houses, or corrupt material will percolate so as to con taminate water which is afterwards used. The great Paris cemeteries inflict headache, diarrhea, and ulcerated sore throat on their immediate neighbors; and a great mass of similar well-authenticated facts may be brought against even recent cemeteries in various countries. A dense clay, the best soil for preventing the levitation of gas, is the worst
for decomposition. The danger is strikingly illustrated in the careful planting of trees and shrubs to absorb the carbonic acid. Vault-burial in metallic coffins, even when saw-dust charcoal is used, is still more dangerous than ordinary burial. It must always be remembered that the cemetery system can only be temporary. The soil is gradually filled with bones; houses crowd around; the law itself (in England) permits the re-opening of graves at the expiry of 14 years. We shall not, indeed, as Browne says, "be knaved out of our graves to have our skulls made drinking bowls, and our bones turned into pipes." But on this ground of sentiment. cremation would certainly prevent any interruption of that "sweet sleep and calm rest" which the old prayer that the earth might lie lightly has associated with the grave. And in the meantime we should escape the horrors of putrefaction and of the "small cold worm that fretted' the enshrouded form." For the last 10 years many distinguished physicians and chemists in Italy have warmly advocated the general adoption of cremation, and in 1874. a con gress called to consider the matter at Milan resolved to petition the chambers of deputies for a clause in the new sanitary code, permitting cremation under the supervision of the syndics of the commune. In Switzerland, Dr. Vegmann Ereolani is the champion of the cause, and there tire two associations for its support,' So long ago as 1707, cremation was seriously discussed by the French assembly under the directory, and the events of the Franco-Prussian war have again brought the subject under the notice of the medical press and the sanitary authorities. The military experiments at Sedan, Chalons, and Metz, of burying large numbers of bodies with quicklime, or pitch and straw, were not successful, but very dangerous. The question was considered by the municipal council of Paris in connection with the new cemetery at and the prefect of the Seine in 1874 sent to all the cremation societies in Europe a circular asking information. The municipality of Vienna has actually made cremation permissive. There is a propa gandist society, called the " Grim," and the main difficulty for the poor seems to be the conveying the bodies five miles. To overcome this a pneumatic tube has been proposed. Dresden, Leipsic, and Berlin are the centers of the German movement. In Britain the subject has slumbered for two centuries, since in 1058 sir Thomas Browne published his quaint Hydriolaphilt, or which was mainly founded on the Be Pawn Rontanorum of the learned Kirchmannus. In 1817, 1)r. J. Jamison gave a sketch of the Origin of Circulation, and for many years prior to 1874 1)r. Lord, medical officer of health for Hempstead, continued to urge the practical necessity for the introduction of the system. It was sir Henry Thompson, however, who of late first brought the question prominently before the public, and started ill 1874 the cremation society of London. Its object is to introduce through the agency of cemetery companies, and parochial and municipal authorities, and burial boards, sonic rapid process of disposing of the dead, " which cannot offend the living, and shall render the remains absolutely innocuous." Thompson's problem was—" Given a dead body, to resolve it into carbonic acid, water, and ammonia, rapidly, safely, and not unpleasantly." Belying on the evidence which suggested recent burial legislation, he pointed out that in the neighborhood of cemeteries there is a constantly increasing risk of contaminated air and water. The problem he solved by the Siemens process of cremation, which, when generally employed, would effect a great saving in the cost of funerals, and would also leave a quantity of bone earth equal in value to the bones imported into this country chiefly for manure. The British authorities in India have already had much practical experience of cremation. Poor Hindus often did not supply wood and oil enough for the total consumption of the body, and hence sir Cecil 'tendon at Calcutta, and the sanitary commissioner at Madras, both found it necessary in the public interest to erect cinerators on the burning or ground, which might be used on payment of a fee. So also at Poonah, col. Martin, struck with the high cost (above 12 rupees) of even it poor funeral, constructed in 1864 a pentagonal cinerator for the use of Brahmans mid the other Iiindu castes.