15 



man David Livingstone to be carried back to be buried amongst his own 

 people. Some years ago Dr. Bayles, of Orange, N. J., tried this process of 

 drying, and with some slight chance of success, but the expense of the 

 process will practically prohibit it. Such are a few of the methods that 

 have been adopted, but I must pass on to my subject. 



Cremation has been in vogue more or lees since all time, and was 

 commonly practised ia the second hdlf of the Bronze Period by the 

 Greeks and Romans, and also in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, and to 

 some extent in England. It has been practised by nearly every 

 Dation at some time or other of its history— the Chinese being the 

 exception. Even amongst the Jews we find that the bodies of Saul 

 and his three sons, after the battle in Gilboa, were burned, and their 

 ashes buried under a tree, and that in time of pestilence fires were 

 kept burning in the Valley of Tophet to consume the dead. It ia 

 impossible to eay why the ancients burned their dead. It may have 

 been as a sanitary measure with some, while others believed that fire 

 was the only way of freeing and purifying the soul from the unclean 

 body. Associated with the burning of the dead there are some strange 

 customs— the practice of putting ashes in urns was almost universal, 

 and the finding of these urns in Great Britain shows that the prac- 

 tice was common in these parts. The Greeks originally buried their dead ; 

 then they learned cremation from the Phoenicians ; then they went 

 back to burial, With the Greeks the custom was to burn with the body 

 everything esteemed by the deceased. 



The Aracan tribes of Further India burn thdr dead, and leave 

 packets of rice on the spot. Neglect of this duty is a bar to inheri- 

 tance. Hindoos have always practised cremation, and in former times, 

 when too poor to buy enough of fue), they half burned the body, and 

 then cast it into the sacred rivers, lhis was prohibited, however, by 

 Sir Cecil Beadon, who erected a cinerator on the banks of the Hooghly, 

 whe.e all could be burned at very nominal cost, something about 4°. I 

 have seen cremations in this cinerator at Calcutta, and though it was 

 extremely simple and nothing done to destroy the fumes, I did not 

 perceive anything very offensive, neither did I notice any want of 

 reverence in the ceremony. The revival of interest of recent years in 

 the cremation movement is altogether of a sanitary reform, and the 

 result of scientific investigation. In England the prime mover is the 

 well-known and highly accomplished surgeon, Sir Henry Thompson, 

 ably assisted by the late Mr. Wm. Eassie, sanitary engineer, and Sir 

 Spencer Wells, whose remains were recently cremated at Woking. 



In 1874 Sir Henry Thompson's first article appeared in the Contem- 

 porary Re new , and soon after its appearance a society was formed, 

 having as its original members many well-known names : — Shirley 

 Brooks, William Eassie, Ernest Hart, Rev. H. R. Haweie, G. H. 

 Hawkins, John C. Jefferson, F. Lehmann, C. F. Lord, W. Shaen, A. 

 Strahan, Henry Thompson, Major Vaughan, Rev. C. Voysey,T. Spencer 

 Wells, and Mrs. Crawshay. 



These formed the committee, and Sir H. Thompson was elected 

 the first president. He still holds that office. In 1879 a crematorium 

 was established, but the then and succeeding Home Secretaries 

 threatened adverse legislation if the society attfmpted to put it 

 into operation. The society therefore deemed it prudent to adopt a 

 quiet policy, and delay all operations for the time being. 



In 1884 Dr. Price, the Welsh Druid, burned the body of his child, 

 against the order of the Coroner. He was charged, first, with 

 having prevented the holding of an icquest on the body ; and secondly, 

 in having attempted to burn the child's body. Sir James StepheD, 

 who presided over the court at Cardiff, addressed the Grand Jury at 

 some length on this case, and finally declared, *' After full consider- 



