302 Letter on Affairs in general, [MARCH, 



The first (or most expensive) manner of burial, costs 4,303 francs, or 

 175 ; and of these, the average number in the year is 55. 



The second price is 1,825 francs, or 73 ; and here the number is 31 1. 



The third, and fourth, at 725 francs, and 275 francs, or 29, and 11 ; 

 are nearly equal in number, the one is 1,075, and the other 979. 



The fifth class has the numbers higher still. Plere we get lower in the 

 scale of society. The price is 125 francs, or 5 ; and the number 1,531. 



And in the sixth class, which is lower still, the price being only 4 1 francs, 

 we have almost as few as in the second scale of expense, at 1,825 francs 

 the number is only 339. 



The most singular fact, however, is to come. The whole amount of 

 burials, in Paris, in these six classes, is 4,290 : and the pauper burials 

 (inhumations sur certijicats cTindigence) within the same period, are 

 12,6(53! So that more than three in four of the people who die in Paris 

 are buried by charity ! And this account does not include the burials from 

 hospitals. Some of the French political and statistical writers attempt to 

 account for this circumstance by the fact of the monopoly ; and by the tax 

 that the Government levies (in the shape of sharing the Company's profits) 

 upon funerals generally. But the sixth class of burial at the Company's 

 pricescosts only 41 francs, or about .!..! 4s. British " tout compris." 

 It would hardly be possible to do the work at a much cheaper rate than 

 that. 



Another column in this same chapter of M. Chabrol, gives a curious 

 calculation upon the number of tombs and monuments standing in the 

 churchyards of Paris, with their cost and value. In the year 1824, it 

 appears that there were 19,148 tomb-stones, and 1,750 monuments, in 

 the three cemeteries of the city ; the cost of which was estimated at 

 5,359,550 francs, or about 223,300. Four-fifths of these erections were 

 in Pere la Chaise which is certainly the most beautiful specimen of 

 churchyard scenery in Europe. 



Speaking of the pawnbrokers above, puts me in mind that Mr. Peel 

 promised Mr. Serjeant Onslow that the Usury Laws should be seriously 

 considered in the course of the present session. I only hope we shall 

 proceed cautiously. The subject is one of very great importance. And a 

 great many of my personal friends who have thought about it declare 

 that they don't know where to borrow money at Five per cent, already. 



While 1 am on the subject of money, too, I may as well take notice 

 there have been some odd omissions lately to recognize the authority of the 

 King's image in his current coin. Two persons have been taken up as 

 utterers of bad money, whose money just as they were going to Newgate 

 as forgers was discovered to be perfectly genuine; and such as the prose- 

 cutors if strict justice had been insisted upon had, perhaps, rendered 

 themselves indictable by refusing to accept. In fact, the practice used in 

 these cases seems to be monstrous. A tradesman is fairly entitled, if he 

 doubts the goodness of the money offered to him, to express that doubt, and 

 decline parting with his goods for it : but nothing short of the most trans- 

 parent proof of fraudulent intent can warrant his even accusing far less 

 laying hands upon a stranger. To get rid of this growing ill-habit, 1 

 would recommend always under correction to the next gentleman who 

 shall be seized upon for offering a shopkeeper money (provided he knows 

 the affair will bear investigation) that he shall thrash the peccant glover or 

 hosier, simply because 1 would not commit murder within an inch of his 

 life. In doing this, he would do the public a service ; and himself 4f he is a 



