In the centre of peninsular India, arouud Hyder abad, in the Dekhan, and at Bolarum, and at Secunderabad, there are many burial-places of that race, of whose existence nothing is known ; and about 20 miles S.E. of Secunderabad is one great resting-place of the dead, a vast burial ground extending over miles, which must have been the place of interment of a huge number of people, or used through many centuries. The mode of interment in all these has been to select a large stone, beneath which a winding tunnel or way had been excavated ; and the remains of bones and urns, with weapons, are found deposited in a central cavity, a circle of large loose stones being drawn around, the circumference of some of these circles being between one and two hundred yards. The people whose tombs are thus represented were undoubtedly nomades dwelling in tents, for not far off are the remains of a great nomade city, consisting solely of walls, within which the tents must have been erected, for no stone nor earth heap nor mound remains within the same enclo sure to indicate the former existence within of any building. The remains found within these cairns also leave the impression that, as with the barrow burials, the wives and servants were slain and interred along with the chief person ; and the Hindu and Itajput practice of suttee (anti) would therefore seem to be merely a continuation of the ancient Scythie sepulchral rite of immolating the favourite wife, the servant, and the horse to accompany their master and serve him in the next world.
The Christian treatment of the dead is various ; and in Europe, to this day, the indifference, not to say levity, of the Italians, in all relat ing to their dead, contrasts strangely with the tenderness and sentiment of the Germans, both Romanist and Protestant., as displayed in their cemeteries. In Naples, where are two cemeteries, with a pit for each day of the year, the humbler dead are stripped, and after a priest has read prayers over the bodies, they are all thrown into a hole by the cemetery assistants, amidst oaths and jocularity and laughter. The richer dead are stripped, placed in dry sand to be shrivelled up. and when dry they are dressed in their usual clothes, ticketed, and placed in a glass case. The German race, on the other hand, reverently dispose of their dead, and preserve in neatness the grounds and tombs of their cemetery, which they call Gott's Aker, God's field, but after a few years the ground is re-ploughed to be refilled.
In Ceylon, formerly, after burning the bodies of the deceased kings of Kandy, their ashes were carried by a man in a black mask to the Mahawelli Ganga, where he embarked in a canoe. At the deepest part of the river he clove the vase with a sword, scattered the ashes on the stream, and, plunging headlong after them, dived, arose near the opposite bank, whence be fled to the forest, and was presumed to bo never more seen. The canoe was allowed to drift away, the horse and elephants that accompanied the procession were set at liberty in the woods, and the women who had strewed rice over the remains were transported across the river and forbidden to return.
Several of the Hindu customs resemble practices mentioned in the Old Testament, as in Jeremiah xvi. 6 : Neither shall men lament for them, nor cut themselves.' For the Hindus, on the death of a relation, express their grief by loud lamentations, and not unfrequently, in an agony of grief, bruise themselves with whatever they can lay hold of. Ezekiel xliv. 25 : They shall come at no dead person to defile themselves;' and touching the dead defiles a Hindu, who must bathe to become clean again. Job xxvii. 19 : The rich man shall lie down, but shall not be gathered,' i.e., his soul shall be left in a wandering state ; and Hindus believe that persons for whom funeral rites have not been performed, wander as ghosts and find no rest. Jeremiah xxxiv. 5 : So shall they burn odours for thee.' Scented wood and other
odoriferous substances are placed upon the funeral pile of a rich Hindu, and burnt with the body. Matthew ii. 18 : Rachel weeping for her children, and would not be comforted, because they are not.' The lamentations of a Hindu mother for her child are very loud and piercing ; it is, indeed, almost impossible to conceive of a scene more truly heartrending than that of a whole town of such mothers wailing over their massacred children.
In Rama was there a voice heard, lamentation, and weeping, and great mourning.' Rajendra Lal Mitre, writing on the funeral ceremonies of the ancient Hindus, says the first ceremony was the removal of the dead from the house to the burning ground, and this was done on a cart, drawn by two bullocks, or by aged slaves. The procession was headed by the eldest of the party, and included an old black cow. The animal was sacrificed at the burning ground, and its fat, flesh, and organs were placed on the corpse, which was subsequently enveloped in the raw bide of the animal. The wife of the dead was made to lie by the corpse, and was thence removed by a younger brother, a fellow-disciple, or a servant of the dead, who offered to marry her. The ceremony of burying the bones was performed on the 3d, 5th, or 7th day ; and on the 10th day the mourners assembled together, and, after certain oblations, offerings, and prayers, raised a circle of stones, and then retired to the house of the chief mourner to feast on kid's flesh and barley.
As a rule now, the dead of Vaishnava Hindus are burned. As death draws near, a lamp is lit at the bed-head, and a homa ' sacrifice performed with camphor and cocoanut ; and as life dies out, the five elements of the cow are dropped into the mouth of the moribund from a tulsi leaf. Within two or three hours the body is lifted, and this is done early, as none of the household nor any of the neighbours can partake of food until the remains be disposed of. The pile of wood or cow-dung cakes used is about two feet high, and on it are placed some tulsi leaves, a little sandal wood, and the deceased is laid with his feet to the north. When laid on the pile, a cloth is placed over the face, and raw rice is placed on it over the mouth. The heir of the deceased places a charred bit of sandal-wood or a tulsi branch at each corner of the pile, and a Vityan sets fire to the mat, using fire taken from the sacred fire lit at the bedside of the dying man. On the following day the heir and friends visit the pile, remove the skull and the bones, on which he and all with him pour water and wash them,—wash them with the sikai, anoint them with oil and honey, and clean them with milk, and place them all on plantain leaves anointed with butter. A young cocoanut shoot is then placed on the skull, and the whole put into an unburned earthen pot, and taken or sent to a river or to the sea; the person who conveyed it returning to the temple, where he pronounces aloud the deceased's name, and adds, Pray for him.' Often they are sent to a holy river, even to the Ganges at Benares. The men relatives shave. The hair of the Brahman widow's head is shaved. The body is not always carried through the doorway of the house. If it be an inauspicious day, or if the house door be so placed that the courtyard has to be crossed, then the re mains are carried through an opening broken in the wall. Captain Butler, writing of the Hindus of Assam (Travels, p. 228), says if a man die inside a house, no Hindu can eat in it afterwards, or reside in it, as it has become impure ; it is generally pulled down and burned, and a new house erected on the same spot. All Assamese, when dying, are therefore invariably brought out to die in the open air on the bare ground, that the building may be preserved, and also to ensure the happier liberation of the spirit from the body. The remains of Hindus are unclothed for the last rites.