The remedial measures hereafter submitted for consideration have been deduced directly from the actual necessities experienced within the field of inquiry, and such only are submitted as clearly suggested themselves without reference to any external experience. The following preliminary view of the experience of other nations is presented for consideration on account of the confirmatory evidence which it contains, as well as the instances to be avoided.

Examples of successful Legislation for the Improvement of the Practice of Interment.

§ 127. It appears that the evil of the expensive interments consequent on the monopoly which the nature of the event, and the feelings of survivors, gives to the person nearest at hand for the performance of the undertaker’s service, is checked by special arrangements in America. In Boston, and most of the large towns in America, there is a Board of Health which nominates a superintendent of burial grounds, who is invariably a person of special qualifications, and generally a medical man. All undertakers are licensed by the Board of Health, by whom the licence may at any time be revoked. The sexton of the church which the deceased attended is usually the undertaker. The bills of the undertaker are made out on a blank form, furnished by the public superintendent of interment, to whom all bills are submitted, and by whom they are audited and allowed, before they are presented for payment to the relations or friends of the deceased. Previous to interment, the undertaker must obtain from the physician who last attended the deceased, a certificate specifying the profession, age, time of illness, and cause of death of the deceased. This certificate is presented to the superintendent of funerals. An abstract of these certificates, signed by the superintendent of funerals, is printed every week in the public journals of the city. The cost of a funeral for a person in the position of life of the highest class of tradesmen in Boston, is about fifty dollars, or 10l. English, exclusive of the cost of the tomb. The price of a good mahogany coffin would be fifteen dollars, or 3l. 5s. The price of a most elegant mahogany coffin would be perhaps double that price. The price of a pine coffin, such as are used for the persons of the labouring classes, would be about four dollars. There is a peculiarity in the coffins made in the United States,—that a portion of the lid, about a foot from the upper end, opens upon a hinge. This, when opened, exposes to view the face of the deceased, which is covered with glass. The survivors are thus enabled at the last moment to take a view of the deceased, without the danger of infection. In Germany, the coffins are nailed down, every blow of the hammer frequently drawing a scream from the female survivors.

§ 128. In the chief German states it is adopted as a principle, that provision shall be made, and it is made successfully, for meeting the necessities of the population in respect to the undertakers’ supplies of service and materials; and that on the occurrence of a death, those necessities shall not be given up as the subject of common trading profits to whatsoever irresponsible person may obtain the monopoly of them. At Franckfort provision is made for these services and supplies of material at the lowest cost to the public as part of a series of arrangements comprehending the verification of the fact of death on view of the body, the edifice for the reception and care of the dead previous to interment, and the public cemeteries, all under the superintendence of superior and responsible medical officers. The expenses of the supplies of materials are reduced so low under these arrangements, that they no longer enter into serious consideration as a burthen to be met on such occasions.

§ 129. At Berlin, a contract is made by the Government with one person to secure funeral materials and services for the public at certain fixed scales of prices. The materials and services are stated to be of a perfectly satisfactory character; and yet the undertaker’s charge for a funeral such as would here cost for an artisan 4l. and upwards, is not more than 15s. English money; the charge for a middle class funeral is about 2l., and for a funeral of the opulent class of citizens is about, 10l. And yet I am assured that the contractors’ profits on the extensive supplies required are deemed too high, and that the Government will, on the renewal of the contract, find it necessary to protect the poorer classes by a contract at a lower rate.

§ 130. At Paris, interments are made the subject of a fisc; but a contract is made with one head to secure services and supplies to the private individual at reduced rates, and so far the system works advantageously to the public.

§ 131. The whole of the interments are there performed, and the various burial and religious dues collected and paid under one contract, by joint contractors for the public service at regulated prices, called the Service des Pompes Funèbres. This establishment annually buries gratis, upwards of 7000 destitute persons, or nearly one-third of all who die in the city. The funerals and religious services are divided into nine classes, comprehending various settled particulars of service, for which a price is fixed. The appointed service for any of these classes may be had on the terms specified in a tariff. This is found to be a great benefit to testators and survivors, as it enables them to settle the ceremonial with certainty, and without the possibility of any extortion. The first class of funerals are of great pomp: they include bearers, crosses, plumes, eighteen mourning coaches and attendants, grand mass at church, 120 lbs. of wax tapers, an anniversary service, and material of mourning cloth; and also the attendance of Monsieur le Curé, two vicars, twenty-one priests, six singers and ten chorister boys, and two instrumental performers, at a cost of 145l., for a funeral superior in magnificence perhaps to any private funeral in England. The charge for the service and materials of the ninth class, in which there is the attendance of a vicar and a priest, and of a bass singer or chorister for the mass, is about 15s. of English money. In the service ordinaire there is less religious service, and that is performed gratuitously. The only charge made is the price of the coffin, which is five or seven francs, according to the size: the coffin is covered by a pall, and carried on a plain hearse, drawn by two black horses. This funeral is conducted by a superintendent and four assistants, exclusive of the driver. The following is the scale of charges, and the numbers interred under each, during two years:—

§ 132. On the number of burials in Paris for 1841, the gross income would be about 80,000l. per annum. Out of this sum the contractor pays the fixed salaries of the staff of officers, which consists of a chief inspector of funeral ceremonies, of 27 other directors besides, 78 bearers, one inspector of cemeteries and four keepers; officers chiefly appointed by the municipality. The total amount of the salaries which he pays is 5862l., English money. He keeps an establishment of 30 hearses and 76 carriages, with suites of minor attendants properly clothed, and inters the 7000 of the pauper class gratuitously. The last contractor paid annually to the municipality 17,000l., which sum was chiefly devoted to ecclesiastical objects. The large profits which he realized led to considerable competition, and a new contract was recently sealed for nine years, securing for public purposes an annual income of 28,000l.

Besides this amount, there is a revenue of about 20,000l. per annum derived by the municipality from the sale of tombs, and from the tax on interments, which is twenty francs for the interment of every adult, and ten francs upon children under seven years of age. One-fifth of this revenue, or about 4000l., is devoted to the hospitals.

§ 133. The remains of those who die in the public hospitals in Paris, and are not claimed by their friends, are, after dissection, merely enclosed in a coarse cloth and deposited in the ground, without any funereal rites. This number amounts, as stated, to no less than 7000 annually. The total average deaths in Paris is from 28,000 to 30,000 annually. This, in a population of 900,000, gives about one burial to every thirty of the population annually, which is nearly as large a proportion of annual deaths and burials as that in Manchester. The deaths and burials in the British metropolis (though varying in different parts, from 1 in 28, as in Whitechapel, to 1 in 56, as in Hackney, chiefly according to the condition of the locality) average for the entire population of 1,800,000 inhabitants, one death or burial in every forty-two of the inhabitants, or one-fourth less of burials than at Paris in proportion to the population. In Paris the average number of inhabitants to every house is 36. If the mortality were there in the proportion of London there would be 7,000 fewer burials yearly. An assertion may be ventured, that more than this excess of mortality is ascribable to the still lower sanitary condition of the labouring population in Paris, which has its concomitant in a still lower moral condition than yet prevails amongst the population of our large towns.^[26]

§ 134. In Paris the law requires that the dead shall be interred within twenty-four hours after the decease, but this law may be evaded by neglect to give notice of the death. The general practice, however, appears to be, that interments take place within two days.

§ 135. In America, the later regulations manifest the tendency of the general experience to connect the regulations of interment with the general regulations for the protection of the public health, and to do this by single, specially qualified, paid, and responsible officers, rather than by Boards, or by any unskilled and honorary agency. The revised statutes of Massachusetts introduce the alternative of the appointment of a single officer. Every town is empowered to appoint a Board of Health, “or a health officer:” and the Board so appointed may appoint “a physician to the Board.” The Board acting by such officer may destroy, remove, or prevent, as the case may require, all nuisances, sources of filth, and causes of sickness. “Whenever any such nuisance or source of filth, or cause of sickness shall be found on private property, the Board of Health, or health officer, shall order the owner or occupant thereof at his own expense to remove the same within twenty-four hours, and if the owner or occupant shall neglect so to do, he shall forfeit a sum not exceeding one hundred dollars,” c. 21, s. 10. In cases of the refusal of entry into private property, on complaint to a magistrate, the magistrate may thereupon issue his warrant, “directed to the sheriff, or either of his deputies, or to any constable of such town, commanding them to take sufficient aid, and being accompanied by two or more members of the said Board of Health, between the hours of sunset and sunrise, to repair to the place where such nuisance, source of filth, or cause of sickness complained of may be, and to destroy, remove, or prevent, the same, under the direction of such members of the Board of Health.” The cleansing of the streets and houses is in most cases included in the functions of the Board of Health, or of the health officer, who regulates the removal of all refuse. Sec. 14, c. 21.

Every householder, when any of his family are taken ill, is required, on a penalty of one hundred dollars,—and every physician in the like penalty, on ascertaining that any person whom he visits is infected with the small-pox, or other disease dangerous to the public health,—to give immediate notice to the officers of public health, and they may, “unless the condition of such person is such as not to admit of his removal without danger of life,” remove him at once to the public hospital, whatever may be his station in life. Sec. 43 and 44, c. 21.

I have been favoured by Dr. Griscom, the inspector of interments at New York, with the copy of a report on the sanitary condition of the population of that city; which points out the great extent of deaths that are preventible by the adoption of means similar to those recommended in the General Report for the improvement of the sanitary condition of the population in Great Britain. This report, revealing extensive causes of death in New York, of which a large proportion of the population must have been unaware, may be adduced in proof of the immense services derivable from such an office, when zealously executed, in guarding against evils more destructive than wars.^[27]

§ 136. In Munich, and in other towns in Germany, the visits and verification of the fact of death as the warrant for interment, is felt to be an important public security, and is highly popular; but one cause of its popularity is the jurisprudential functions of the officer of health, as means of preventing premature interments, and the escape of crime; for comparatively little attention appears yet to have been given to the practical means afforded by the office of tracing out and removing the causes of disease. The difficulty appears to be in respect to the jurisprudential functions of the officers of health to satisfy the public anxiety for the exercise of solemn care in every case of a multitude, where only one case in that multitude will, on the doctrine of chances, be a case calling for intervention; and where it is not provided, as it may and ought to be, that the discovery of that one shall be a matter of deep personal interest, instead of a mere source of trouble to the officer himself, his examinations may be expected to degenerate into a routine in which the intended security will fail in the less obvious cases.

In later times very comprehensive regulations as to the sites and management of cemeteries, and the service of officers of health, who have charge of the cemeteries, have been adopted throughout the Austrian dominions, and it is stated that they work very satisfactorily. On the occasion of every death by accident or violence, or of suspicion, a close inquiry as to the causes is made by the town physician. In Vienna a strict inquiry is made into every such death by the following officers, who all attend for that purpose;—namely, the town physician, the surgeon in chief, the professor of pathological anatomy, a lawyer, and in some cases, when analyses are required, a chemist. The results of their examinations are set forth in a “protocol,” a carefully prepared document, “bien motivé,” which sometimes takes two or three days in drawing up. The effect of this inquiry is the prevention, to a great extent, of crimes of violence, and the production of public confidence. It is stated to be highly popular.

§ 137. In Paris some cases have of late occurred, which have created much public uneasiness by the evidence they afforded of the defective organization of the service of the officers of health, and occasioned it recently to undergo an examination with the view to the adoption of better securities. It appears that, from a very early period, to satisfy the public solicitude, the law required the fact of the reality of a death to be verified by the personal visit and inspection of the Maire of the district of the city where the death had taken place. Subsequently, the Maires were allowed to delegate this duty to officers of their own nomination, persons qualified for the duties by a medical education, and who were called Officiers de Santé. But the appointments thus made by the Maires did not give public satisfaction; and in the year 1806 it was required that the persons appointed as “officiers de santé” by the Maires, should be chosen by them from amongst the doctors in medicine and surgery who were attached to the public hospitals. They appear, however, to have been mostly chosen without reference to public qualifications, from their own medical friends in private practice. This arrangement of appointing persons in private practice appears to have prevailed in other countries, and to have frustrated much of the benefits otherwise derivable from the institution. Thirty-five of these private practitioners are now appointed to perform the duty. Reports have gained ground that from negligent discharge of the duty, persons had even been buried alive, and that the verification had been given in cases of murder. On a recent commission of inquiry, the celebrated surgeon, M. Orfila, thus speaks of the necessity of the verification of the fact of the decease.

“It is possible to be interred alive! Interments may take place after murder, committed with the knife or by means of poison, without a suspicion being created that the death has been occasioned by violence. Ignorance or malevolence may attribute to crime deaths that have occurred from natural causes!”

After referring to ancient cases in which evidence was recorded of parties having been buried alive, he adduces the following recent instances of parties having been interred without due verification of the cause of death by the Officier de Santé:—

“We all know the case of the death of the grocer in the Rue de la Paix, who died of poison by arsenic. The interment took place after the verification of the death. In about a month afterwards I was called upon to examine the body as to the poison. Although the putrefaction of the corpse of the person who was of a very full habit had been much advanced, I was enabled to discover the presence of the arsenic by which the crime had been perpetrated.

“The widow Danzelle, of the Rue Beauregard, was found dead in her bed on the 1st of January, 1826. The certificate of the decease was given in due form to the relations to authorise the interment. In that certificate, given to M. le Commissaire de Police, the medical practitioner declared, ‘the death has taken place, and it appears that it has been occasioned by a commotion of the brain with hæmorrhage.’ ‘The deceased’ added he, ‘lived alone; she was found dead in her chamber, where she appeared to have fallen down.’ The municipal authorities caused the interment to be adjourned, and required a new examination of the body in the presence of the Commissioner of Police, assisted by two doctors in medicine. The result of the examination was, ‘that Madame the widow Danzelle had fallen under the blows of an assassin; the corpse bore five recent wounds in the neck, made with a cutting instrument, and the carotid artery had been divided.’

“In the month of July, a child of Dame Revel, Rue de Seine Saint Germain, died very suddenly. The authorities being informed that the child had been the subject of much ill-treatment on the part of the parents, ordered an inquiry and une expertise medico-legale. The examination of the body showed that the rumours as to the barbarous conduct of Dame Revel, the mother, were but too well-founded. Dr. Olivier testified to the fact, that the body bore twenty-seven recent contusions on the body and members, and a fracture of nearly five inches in extent, which almost entirely broke through one of the bones of the cranium.

“The death of this poor child, which was three years and three months old, awakened suspicions which had arisen on the death of its eldest brother, of eight years of age, which had been interred on the 28th of February preceding. The body was disinterred, and Dr. Olivier, to whom this second examination was confided, notwithstanding the length of time that had occurred since the death, found traces of numerous contusions on the body and members, and a wound above the right ear, with a fracture and disjunction of the bones of the cranium.”

And notwithstanding in this, as in the other case, the interment was effected without observations.^[28]

After giving instances where the innocent were justified or suspicions were allayed by post mortem examinations, which proved that deaths suspected to have been from murder had occurred from natural causes, M. Orfila concludes by stating:—

“I do not believe that it often happens that persons are interred alive in Paris, though I must admit that such events may take place; but I am convinced that the earth has covered and continues to cover crimes without any suspicion being raised in respect to them.”

§ 138. Another report imputes the neglects of the “officiers de santé,” to the forgetfulness of duties, the force of habit or routine, the results of age and infirmities; and the chief remedy recommended, and now apparently in course of adoption in Paris, is the erection on the unsubstantial foundation of service by a number of private practitioners, of two additional stages as securities, namely, of three paid medical officers, who are to devote their time to the superintendence of the performance of the public duties by the private practitioners, and, secondly, a certain number of high honorary officers, who are to superintend both classes of paid officers. This is an example of one of those superficial alterations, in which, from want of firmness on the part of the legislature to compensate fairly and amply the interests which it is obviously necessary to disturb, and from not duly regarding and estimating the immense amount of pain and public evil which requires measures of alleviation of corresponding extent and efficiency; consequently from allowing that amount of pain and mortality to weigh as dust against local patronage and latent sinister interests,—that evil is only masked, and more widely and deeply spread by the intended remedy. Of a certainty the attention of every private practitioner, as he gains practice, whilst acting as a public officer, must every hour of the day be from his public duties, and with the means of adding to his emoluments. That the least possible time may be taken from them, the public duties are slurred over, conclusions are snapped from the readiest superficial incidents; extensive and removable, but latent causes of evil, the development of which would require sustained and laborious examination, are perpetuated, by being stamped authoritatively as “accidental” or arbitrarily classed under some general term assigning the evils as the results of some inscrutable cause. The three superior paid inspectors will not long be able to stimulate the thirty-five private practitioners to a close attention to their public duties against their paramount and ever-pressing interests, or will soon tire of doing so. The service will become one of mere routine and of short and easy acquiescence in all except the most extraordinary cases which present an appearance of danger to the officer himself if he overlook them. Under such arrangements, the functions of the office degenerates into a highly prejudicial form, protracting the evil, by creating an impression from the fact of the existence of the office, that all has been done in the way of prevention or remedy that can be done by such an officer. The admixture of private practice with important public duties in such cases, is attended with further evil in depriving the public of much volunteer service from the whole class of private practitioners, for many who would give information to advance science, or to aid the public service, can scarcely be expected to give cordial aid that may add to the credit and promote the interests of a rival. To the people themselves such services, from a locally connected private practitioner, are generally less acceptable than those of an independent and responsible public officer. The official service must, in time, fail to inspire confidence, for it must fail to elicit evidence to justify public confidence. The additional expense of the three additional officers will only have created an additional interest, in slurring over cases that may have been overlooked by the other class of officers, involving blame for remissness to the superior officers. When exposures do take place, these two classes of officers will only add to the means of perplexing public attention, and of dividing and weakening responsibility. If less than half the number of officers, devoting their whole time to the service, would be sufficient (as will be shown they would), for the efficient discharge of these highly important duties in London, less than one-third of the number would suffice in Paris.

§ 139. Except in the regulation of the expenses of the funerals, there appears to be nothing in the practice of interments in Paris, that deserves to be considered with a view to imitation. Indeed, the whole arrangements there are now under revision, and exertions are being made for their improvement. The little account that appears to have been at any time made of the feelings of the labouring classes, and the burial after dissection, of the poor dying in hospitals, without funereal rites, the almost total omission of any marks of sympathy or respect towards their remains,—cannot but have a most demoralizing effect on the survivors. The mode in which the evil of the retention of the corpse amidst the living is provided for by the law, which requires that interments shall take place within twenty-four hours after notice, must frequently oppress the feelings of the dying and of survivors, and harass them with alarms which the medical inspection provided, as we have seen, § 137, is not of a character to allay. The intermediate stage of removal provided at Franckfort and other German towns; the retention of the corpse in a separate room warmed and ventilated, and watched at all hours, and lighted during the night; the regular medical attendance and inspection, and other cares bestowed until there are unequivocal signs of dissolution, and the minds of all classes are satisfied, appears to be a superior arrangement, salutary in its effect and principle.^[29] Beyond these benevolent arrangements may be commended the acts of real good will and charity by which the feelings of the labouring classes are consulted and satisfied by community of sepulture, and the benevolent care and spirit of good will in which it appears to be maintained.

Experience in respect to the sites of Places of Burial, and sanitary precautions necessary in respect to them.

There appear to be very important questions connected with the consideration of the site of the place of burial to populous districts.

§ 140. The question of the distance of places of burial (irrespective of convenience of conveyance) appears to be dependent on the numbers buried,—on the composition and preparation of the ground,—on the elevation or depression of the place of burial,—and its exposure to the atmosphere and the direction of the prevalent winds for the avoidance of habitations.

§ 141. The extent of burial ground requisite for any district will be determined by the rate of decomposition.

§ 142. At Franckfort and Munich, and in the other new cemeteries on the continent, where qualified persons have paid attention to the subject, the general rule is not to allow more than one body in a grave. The grounds for this rule are,—that, when only one body is deposited in a grave, the decomposition proceeds regularly,—the emanations are more diluted and less noxious than when the mass of remains is greater; and also that the inconvenience of opening the graves, of allowing escapes of miasma, and the indecency of disturbing the remains for new interments, is thereby avoided; and in the case of exhumations, the confusion and danger of mistaking the particular body is prevented.

§ 143. The progress of the decay of the body is various, according to the nature of the soil and the surrounding agencies. Clayey soils are antiseptic; they retain the gases, as explained by Mr. Leigh; they exclude the external atmosphere, and are also liable to the inconvenience of becoming deeply fissured in hot weather and then allowing the escape of the emanations which have been retained in a highly concentrated state. Loamy, ferruginous, and aluminous soils, moor earth, and bog, are unfavourable to decomposition; sandy, marly, and calcareous soils are favourable to it. Water, at a low temperature, has the tendency, as already explained, to promote only a languid decomposition, which sometimes produces adipocire in bodies: a high and dry temperature tends to produce the consistency and permanency of mummies. A temperature of from 65 degrees Fahrenheit and upwards, and a moist atmosphere, is the most favourable to decomposition. The remains of the young decompose more rapidly than those of the old, females than males, the fat than the lean. The remains of children decompose very rapidly. On opening the graves of children at a period of six or seven years, the bodies have been found decomposed, not even the bones remaining, whilst the bodies of the adults were but little affected. The process of decomposition is also affected by the disease by which the death was occasioned. The process is delayed by the make of some sorts of coffins. The extreme variations of the process under such circumstances as those above recited is from a few months to 30 years or half a century. Bones often last for centuries.

§ 144. The regulation of the depth of the graves has been found to be a subject requiring great attention, to avoid occasioning too rapid an evolution of miasma from the remains, and at the same time to avoid its retention and corruption, to avoid the pollution of distant springs, and also to avoid rendering increased space for burial requisite by the delay of decomposition usually produced by deep burial, for the ground usually becomes hard in proportion to the depth, and delays the decomposition. Attention to these circumstances by qualified persons in Germany has led to different regulations of the depth of graves at different ages. At Stuttgart the different depths are as follows: for bodies of persons—

At the Glasshutte, in the Erzgebirge, the depths are as follows:

At Franckfort the average depth prescribed for graves is 5 ft. 7 in.; at Munich 6 ft. 7 in.; in France 4 ft. 10 in. to 6 ft.; in Austria 6 ft. 2 in., if lime be used.

§ 145. Space between graves is also a matter requiring attention to avoid the uncovering of the coffin in one grave in opening another, and to avoid the accidents arising from the falling in of the sides of the graves: this space must vary according to the consistency of the ground and the depth of the graves. At Munich and Stuttgart the space prescribed, is in round numbers, rather more than 32 square feet to each adult. To avoid treading on the graves, and to allow the access of friends, spaces must be allowed also for walks.

These circumstances considered, the space requisite for the interments in a town may be determined by the multiplication of the average square superficies of a grave, by the average yearly mortality, and the period of years which the grave is to remain closed. “As an example,” says Dr. Reicke, “of the mode of calculating the necessary space for the burial ground of a populous district, I will take a town of 35,000 inhabitants. Accordingly of this number it may be reckoned there will yearly die 1000. Of the number 500 will be adults, 50 children, from 7 to 14, and 450 children from 0 to 7 years. For the adults, allowing more than the most economical space, I calculate graves of 48 square feet Wirtemburg (i. e. 54·72 square feet English); for the children between 7 and 14 years, 24 square feet (27·36 English feet); and for those under 7, 20 square feet (22·80 English). For the adults I take a period of 10 years, for the youth 8 years, for the infants 7 years, as the time during which periods the grave must not be opened.” According to this calculation the space required for the interment of the several classes would be—

“According to the usual calculation the requisite space would be:—

So that, by the above calculation and classification, there is a saving of 42,636 square feet.

“I must, however, beg to be understood that this calculation is only meant to serve as an example, and that the factors on which it is grounded must undergo the necessary variations, according as the soil is more or less favourable to decomposition, and therefore requiring a longer or shorter period of rest; and according to the greater or less consistency of the soil, and therefore requiring the space between the graves to be greater or less; and, lastly, according as the average mortality varies, and especially the rate of mortality of the three classes of ages.”

These factors would give different results for different populations, according to their different proportions of death. As an example of a town population, in Whitechapel the proportion of deaths for every 35,000 of the population will be 1125 deaths yearly. As an example of a rural population, for every 35,000 of the population in Hereford, there will only be 562 deaths annually, and the space required for interments for the two populations will be as follows, at the actual rate of deaths per 35,000 amongst the population in the Whitechapel Union in 1839:

Rate of deaths per 35,000 in the Herefordshire Unions in 1839:

But in consequence of the smaller proportion of children dying in the rural district, a larger space is requisite than would appear from a comparative number of the interments if the graves were of the same size. The average size of the different graves may be taken as an epitome of the strength of the same numbers of the two populations: that of the town grave being in round numbers 39 feet, while the rural grave is 44 feet.

Nevertheless, the extent of land requisite for cemetery, on a decennial period of renewal, for a population of 20,000 in a rural district would be only 44
10 acres, whilst for 20,000 of such a town population as that of Whitechapel, it would be 74
10 acres.

§ 146. In 1838 the deaths in the metropolis were nearly 52,000; and for round numbers the average maybe taken as 50,000 annually. Such an amount of mortality would require on the scale proposed by Dr. Riecke, for the several classes of graves, about 48 acres, or a space of nearly the size of St. James’s Park within the rails, annually. On the same scale, supposing the interments generally renewable in decennial periods, the space required for national cemeteries in the metropolis would be 444 acres, or a space coextensive with Hyde Park, which has 350 acres, and the Green Park and St. James’s Park put together; or rather more than one-fourth more than the Regent’s Park, which has 350 acres; or one-fourth less space than the Hyde Park and Kensington Gardens taken together. But besides the spaces for the cemeteries, spaces would be requisite as belts of land surrounding them, and to be kept clear of houses.

§ 147. The proper distance of places of interment from houses, is calculable according to the number of interments. On this subject there have been some, though not complete observations. There is a church-yard at Stuttgart, in which 500 bodies are interred yearly, at depths varying with the age, according to the scale of regulations stated, with no more than one corpse in each grave, yet a north-west wind renders the emanations from the ground perceptible in houses distant from 250 to 300 paces. The stench of the carrion pits at Montfaucon is almost insupportable to a person not used to it, at a distance of 6500 feet, and with certain winds at double that distance, and under some circumstances even to the distance of five miles. Besides the surface emanations, the pollution of the subsoil drainage and springs have to be regarded. Captain Vetch states, that on some plains in Mexico, where animals have been slaughtered and buried in pits in permeable ground, the effects on vegetation were to be seen along the edges of a brook for a distance of three-quarters of a mile. In some parts they actually slaughtered and buried animals for the purpose of influencing the surrounding vegetation. By the best regulations in Germany, as already stated, wells are forbidden to be sunk near grave-yards, except at certain distances, such as 300 feet. Ante, §§ 13, 14.

§ 148. On such data as have been obtained, the distance of a cemetery ought to vary according to its size, or the number of the population for whom burial is required. The cemetery for a small population of from 500 to 1000 inhabitants, should, Dr. Reicke considers, be not less than 150 paces; for 1000 to 5000 inhabitants, not less than 300 paces; for above 5000, not less than 500 paces. In Prussia, the distance from houses at which cemeteries may be built, is fixed at not less than 500 paces; at Stralsund, in Prussia, at 1000 paces.

§ 149. It is recommended that in general public cemeteries should be placed at the east or the north, or the north-east of a town: the south and south-west winds, being usually moist, hold the putrefactive gases in solution more readily than the north, or north-east winds, which are dry. The higher the elevation of a cemetery, the nearer may it be permitted to a city, as putrefactive gases are lighter than the atmosphere and ascend. For the same reason, cemeteries lower than the houses should be at a greater distance. A site, with a slope to the south, is deemed the best, as it will be drier and warmer, and facilitate decomposition.

§ 150. Competent witnesses declare, that by a careful preparation of the ground, and without any appliances that would be otherwise than acceptable to the most fastidious minds, the escape of miasma may be so regulated as to avoid all injury to the health, and springs may be protected from pollution by drainage; and that by these means the necessity of far distant sites, and the inconvenience and expense of conveyance of the remains, and obstructions to the access of friends to the place of burial, may be avoided.

§ 151. Amongst these means, one for preventing the escape of emanations at the surface by absorbing and purifying them, is entirely in accordance with the popular feeling. The great body of English poetry, which it has been remarked is more rich on the subject of sepulture than the poetry of any other nation, abounds with reference to the practice of ornamenting graves with flowers, shrubs, and trees. A rich vegetation exercises a powerful purifying influence, and where the emanations are moderate, as from single graves, would go far to prevent the escape of any deleterious miasma. It is conceived that the escapes of large quantities of deleterious gasses by the fissuring of the ground would often be in a very great degree prevented by turfing over the surface, or by soiling, that is, by laying vegetable mould of five or six inches in thickness and sowing it carefully with grasses whose roots spread and mesh together. At the Abney Park Cemetery, where the most successful attention is paid to the vegetation, this is done; but in some districts of towns it marks the impurity of the common atmosphere that even grass will not thrive; and that flowers and shrubs which live on the river side, or in spaces open to the breeze, become weakly and die rapidly in the enclosed spaces in the crowded districts. Several species of evergreens, and the plants which have gummy or resinous leaves, that are apt to retain soot or dust, die quickly. The influence, therefore, of a full variety of flowers and a rich vegetation, so necessary for the actual purification of the atmosphere, as well as to remove associations of impurity, and refresh the eye and soothe the mind, can only be obtained at a distance from most towns. It occasionally happens that individuals incur expense to decorate graves in the town churchyards with flowers, and more would do so, even in the churchyards near thoroughfares, but that they perish.

§ 152. Mr. Loudon recommends for planting in cemeteries, trees chiefly of the fastigiate growing kinds, which neither cover a large space with their branches nor give too much shade when the sun shines, and which admit light and air to neutralize any mephitic effluvia. Of these are, the Oriental Arbor Vitæ, the Evergreen Cypress, the Swedish and Irish Juniper, &c. For the same reason, trees of the narrow conical forms, such as the Red Cedar, and various pines and firs are desirable. In advantageously situated cemeteries, some of the larger trees, such as the Cedar of Lebanon, the Oriental Plane, the Purple Beech, the dark Yew, and the flowering Ash, sycamores, Mountain Ash, hollies, thorns, and some species of oaks, such as the Evergreen Oak, the Italian Oak, with flowering trees and shrubs, would find places in due proportion.

§ 153. There is one point of view in which the site of cemeteries does not appear to have been considered on the continent, and perhaps in no place could it be of so much importance as in London, namely, the convenience of access for processions, including in the consideration the protection of the inhabitants of particular quarters from an excess of funereal processions, and the mourners from the conflicting impressions consequent on a passage through thoroughfares crowded by a population unavoidably inattentive. It might be found on a survey that the banks of the river present several eligible sites for national cemeteries, and one pre-eminent recommendation of such sites would be the superior and economical means of conveyance they would afford by appropriate funereal barges, for uninterrupted and noiseless passage over what has been denominated “The Great Silent Highway.”

Extent of Burial Grounds existing in the Metropolis.

§ 154. The rule, as deduced (§ 142.) from the German practice, would give an average of 110 burials per acre per annum in a town district.

§ 155. In 1834, some returns of the extent of burial grounds and the number of burials during the three years preceding, in the places of burial within the diocese of the Bishop of London and the bills of mortality, were laid before the House of Commons. From those it appeared that the ground occupied as burial ground within the diocese amounted to 103 acres, and that the average number of burials was 22,548, or 219 per acre, being from 108 to 117 more per acre than the preceding rule would give. In some grounds the number of interments were as high as 891 per acre. But that return did not include the burials in the whole of the metropolis. From the results of a systematic inquiry which has been recently made throughout the whole district of the metropolis (as defined in the report of the Registrar-General) into the extent of the burial-grounds and the average weekly number of burials at each place, it appears that the total area now occupied as burial ground, including the new cemeteries, and the annual rate of burial in each class, is, as nearly as can be ascertained, as follows:—

The total numbers of burials, as ascertained by verbal inquiry at each graveyard, approximate so nearly to the total numbers of deaths as to afford a presumption in favour of the general accuracy of these returns.^[30]

§ 156. The most crowded burial grounds, on the average, are, it appears, the grounds which belong to private individuals, usually undertakers. In these places an uneducated man generally acts as minister, puts on a surplice, and reads the church service, or any other service that may be called for. These grounds are morally offensive, and appear to be physically dangerous in proportion to the numbers interred in them. In one of them the numbers interred appears to be at the rate of more than 2,300 per acre per annum. Names are given to these places by the owners, importing connexion with congregations, but without any apparent authority for doing so. They are repudiated by the most respectable Dissenters. On this point it appears to be just to submit an extract from a communication (on his individual responsibility) from the Rev. John Blackburn, Pentonville, one of the secretaries of the Union of Congregational Dissenters:—

I have no facts to communicate relating to the physical effects produced by the present crowded state of the old grave-yards, but I am sure the moral sensibilities of many delicate minds must sicken to witness the heaped soil, saturated and blackened with human remains and fragments of the dead, exposed to the rude insults of ignorant and brutal spectators. Immediately connected with this, allow me to mention that some spots that have been chosen both by episcopalians and dissenters, are wet and clayey, so that the splash of water is heard from the graves, as the coffins descend, producing a shudder in every mourner. I may with confidence disclaim the imputation that the grave-yards of dissenters were primarily and chiefly established with a view to emolument. Many grave-yards that are private property, purchased by undertakers for their own emolument, are regarded as dissenting burial grounds, and we are implicated in the censures that are pronounced upon the unseemly and disgusting transactions that have been detected in them.—These are not dissenting but general cemeteries: dissenters use them for the reasons already stated [which are omitted, being the objections urged by dissenters against the indiscriminate use of the burial service.] The pastor of the bereaved family accompanies them to the grave, or meets them there, adapts his ministrations to their known circumstances, and without fee or reward—except in rare cases—discharges them as part of his pastoral work. By far the greatest portion of the persons buried in these grounds are not dissenters at all; and to meet the feelings of their connections the proprietors of these grounds obtain the services of men, who, without scruple, ape the clergyman, assume the surplice, and read the service of the church; a fact which is sufficient to show that they are not dissenters themselves, nor seeking to conciliate dissenting objections. The congregational or independent denomination, to which I belong, have about 120 chapels in and around London, and I believe there is not more than a sixth part of them that have grave yards attached, and all those are not in the hands of trustees appointed by the people. But, as far as I know and believe, there are but very few of these open to the sweeping censures that have been pronounced upon them. At a recent meeting of the congregational ministers of the metropolis they resolved, “That this board will always hail with satisfaction the adoption of any efficient means to correct abuses connected with burial grounds, as well general as parochial, where such abuses are proved to exist;” and I trust that the character of dissenters in general for good citizenship, is sufficient to assure you that they will never permit their private interests to oppose any great measures for our social improvement that are really national in their spirit and design.

As the sufficiency of the burial grounds existing within the metropolis does not properly come into question under the general conclusion that there ought to be none there, the only observation I at present submit upon the space of ground now occupied is that it would serve hereafter advantageously to be kept open as public ground.

§ 157. The well considered regulations then, give about 1452 common graves per acre for a town population. § 145. In the arrangements made for cemeteries belonging to a joint stock company, it is calculated that every acre of ground filled with vaults and private graves, will receive no less than 11,000 bodies. On the average size of coffins of 6 feet 3 by 1 foot 9, the common estimate is that the floor of an acre will receive 3,887 coffins laid side by side.

§ 158. Another calculation for the produce of a company’s cemetery, is that each grave will be 6 feet by 2 feet, or 12 square feet, or 3630 graves to the acre (which contains 43,560 square feet), and that every grave shall contain 10 coffins in each grave. Twenty-five shillings is charged for each coffin interred: hence each acre is calculated to produce, when filled (without reference to the public health), a gross sum of 45,375l. In one instance, where the burials in a company’s cemetery were five deep, the sales of graves actually made were at a rate of 17,000l. per acre, gross produce.

§ 159. The retention of bodies in leaden coffins in vaults is objected to, as increasing the noxiousness of the gases, which sooner or later escape, and when in vaults beneath churches, create a miasma which is apt to escape through the floor, whenever the church is warmed.^[31] In Austria, and in other states, interment in lead is prohibited. In the majority of cases in England, burial in lead, as well as in other expensive coffins, appears to be generally promoted by the undertakers, to whom they are the most profitable. The Emperor Joseph, of Austria, on the knowledge of the more deleterious character of concentrated emanations from the dead, forbade the use even of coffins, and directed that all people should be buried in sacks; but this excited discontent amongst his subjects, who agreed in the sanitary principle of the measure, but complained that, putting them in sacks, was treating them as the Turks would do, and the regulation was altered for burial in coffins made of pine, which decays rapidly.

§ 160. It is to be observed as an improved direction of the public mind in the British metropolis, that on the part of persons who have the means of defraying the expenses of vaults, an increasing preference of inhumation is manifested, and that it is found by cemetery companies that catacombs prepared for sale are not so much in demand as was anticipated from the proportion in which they were in demand in the parochial burial grounds. The state of some of the places of common burial has evidently been such as to lead to the practice of entombment in preference to inhumation. The associations commonly expressed with inhumation (redditur enim terræ corpus, et ita locatum ac situm, quasi operimento matris obducitur, Cic. de legibus) were with a purer earth. In the most carefully regulated cemeteries in Germany the sale of any portions in perpetuity is entirely prohibited. The recent investigation of the disorders which have arisen in the management of the Parisian cemeteries, has led to a conclusion for the adoption of the same regulation, it having been found that, in time, families become extinct, or fall into decay; that a proportion of the tombs and vaults are neglected and fall into ruins, and detract from the general good keeping of the rest. Under such circumstances the private tombs too frequently raise associations of a character the very opposite of those intended by the purchasers. Their numbers at the same time increase and continually encroach on the spaces for general burial, and would ultimately occupy the whole of the cemeteries; and in the progress of population would absorb and hold large tracts of most important land near towns, in what would literally be one of the worst species of mortmain.^[32] It has, therefore, been found necessary to restrict the sale of perpetuities in vaults or graves, and to give only what may be called leases for years, renewable on conditions, for the public protection.

§ 161. In the common grave-yards in the metropolis, the bones are scattered about, or wheeled away to a bone-house, where they are thrown into a heap. The feeling of the labouring classes at the sight of the removal of the bones from an overcrowded churchyard was expressed in a recent complaint, that those in charge of the place “would not give the poor bones time to decay.” In Paris it is the custom to arrange skulls and bones, in various forms, in catacombs: but they are offensive objects; and the feelings of the poor man must be but ill consulted in presenting to him, in these decayed and debased remains, the prospect of the use of his own skull and bones to form part of a great and revolting monument. A more beneficial arrangement is that in the better regulated German cemeteries, where it is the invariable rule to remove from the sight and to re-inter carefully, all bones, the object being to preserve the associations of a gradual, inoffensive, and salutary restoration of the material elements.

§ 162. By the Code Napoleon any one was permitted to be interred in his own garden, or wheresoever he pleased. By the better considered jurisprudence in Germany this liberty is withheld: because if the practice were to become general, such decomposing remains would be spread about without order, to the injury of the public health: it would facilitate the burial of persons murdered; many by precipitate and ill-regulated burial would be buried alive; many would be buried in this mode to evade proper inquiries. An examination of the circumstances of private and speculative burial grounds in this country developes many facts, in corroboration of the soundness of the German jurisprudence on this subject.

§ 163. The information with relation to material arrangements of the public cemeteries in Germany is submitted, as showing how much there is in their details of important questions of scientific appliances for consideration, which, in the new cemeteries as well as in the old burial grounds in this country, have generally been overlooked: appliances which, even if they were practicable on a parochial scale of management, would surely be little understood by the ordinary class of parochial officers. Though the practice in Germany appears to be on most points in advance, the inquiry has elicited various suggestions of probable important improvements upon it, which it is thought unnecessary to discuss, as being more fitted for investigation when new cemeteries have been determined upon than at present. It may for the present suffice to state, that a confident expectation is entertained by the best informed witnesses, that were the attention of the most competent persons who have hitherto been scared away, secured to the subject, still further useful improvements would be in a very short time effected.

§ 164. The following portion of evidence from Dr. Lyon Playfair, which adverts to the management of the evil in the common grave-yards, may however be adduced as an example of the character of some of the improvements already suggested.

You have examined into the state of certain church-yards with reference to their sanitary effects; have you not?—I have examined various church-yards and burying-grounds for the purpose of ascertaining whether the layer of earth above the bodies is sufficient to absorb the putrid gases evolved. The carbonic acid gas would not in any case be absorbed, but it is not to this that the evil effects are to be attributed. The slightest inspection, however, shows that the putrid gases are not thoroughly absorbed by soil lying over the bodies. I know several church-yards from which most fœtid smells are evolved, and gases with similar odour are emitted from the sides of sewers passing in the vicinity of church-yards, although they may be above 30 feet from them. If these gases are thus evolved laterally they must be equally emitted in an upward direction. The worst burying-grounds which have come under my notice are those belonging to private persons, generally undertakers, who make their livelihood by interring at a cheap rate. I visited one of these only a few days since. It was about 150 feet long and about 30 broad, and had been used for 80 years as a burying ground, and was still a favourite place of interment among the poor. Of course many bodies are placed in one grave, and when the ground becomes too much raised by bodies, it is levelled, and the boxes, &c., exhumed during the levelling, are thrown into a large cellar fitted to receive them. This whole ground was a mass of corruption, as may well be supposed, and it is situated in a densely populated neighbourhood. I mention this case as one among many other similar cases of private burying-grounds, in order to suggest that attention should be paid in any alteration respecting the laws regulating interments, to prevent burying-grounds being kept as objects of pecuniary speculation, at least within towns; for this practice gives much inducement to violate every feeling of decency and regard for public health in the desire for gain.

Can you suggest any method for preventing the escape of miasmata from graves, or from places for the interment of the dead?—I cannot suggest any methods as the results of experiment; but, at the same time, I think it possible that the evil might be much abated by the use of certain materials. For example, in a theoretical point of view, chloride of lime would be quite effectual, but it might not be applicable in practice, both from its expense, and from its great tendency to be decomposed. A cheap method of absorbing putrid effluvia, is by a mixture of charcoal from burnt tar, burnt clay, and gypsum. When such a mixture is mixed with putrid matter, all smell is immediately removed, and the matter is rendered inoffensive to health. When this mixture is strewed over decomposing animal and vegetable matter, it ceases to emit disagreeable odours. In like manner, if a layer of such a cheap mixture as this were thrown around and over a coffin, it would absorb probably the greatest part, if not all, of the putrid miasmata arising from the decomposition of the body. It possesses also this advantage, that it would not impair by keeping, even though the coffin did not burst for some years. I beg, however, again to state, that I throw this out as a mere suggestion, as I have never tried it in the case of graves, although I think it would be well worthy of a trial. Vegetation also ought to be encouraged over the graves. The legitimate food of plants is derived from decaying animal matter; for indeed all the food existing in the air, from which they derive their nutriment, is furnished to the atmosphere by the decay of organic matter. Plants assist in absorbing the emanations which escape from graves.

§ 165. It has been mentioned as an objection entertained in Germany to the use of clayey soils, on the ground that they retain the gases, and prevent that regular access of air which is necessary (as explained in a portion of evidence already adduced) to allow decay to proceed without putrefaction, which is the most dangerous condition. Good sand and good gravel are of value in the metropolis. It is stated by a gentleman connected with one of the cemeteries, and it is here mentioned to show the prevalent want of knowledge, that it is the common practice when sand and gravel are dug out to form a grave, not to return it, but to fill in with the cheap and coarse, but retentive, London clay. Now the grave-diggers frequently suffer severely in re-opening the graves which are thus filled in by the retentive clay, and require to be stimulated to their work by ardent spirits; and their ghastly appearance, as Mr. Loudon observes, attests the sufferings which they undergo. In another new cemetery, where the grass was very poor, the turf-mounds covering some of the graves was trodden down; on inquiring the reason, it was stated that sheep had been let in to eat the grass, to save the expense of cutting it. Some of the trees and shrubs first planted had not thriven well, and the officers stated that they had not yet been able to persuade the directors to go to the expense of renewing them. In most other cemeteries the plantations were in very good order, and several presented points of improvement, in the architectural arrangements. But, as observed by Mr. Loudon, “nearly all the new London cemeteries, and most of the provincial cemeteries, adopt the practice of interring a number of bodies in the same grave, without leaving a sufficient depth over each coffin, to absorb the greater part of the gases of decomposition.” It may indeed be confidently affirmed that there is scarcely one of the new cemeteries in which one or other of the well established principles of management, in the choice of the site, or the preparation of the soil, or in the drainage, or in the mode of burial, or in the numbers interred in one grave, or in respect to the precautions to prevent the undue corruption of the remains and escapes of dangerous morbific matter, or in the service and officers, or in jurisprudential securities, is not overlooked. (§ 20.)