152 Principles of Landscape- Gardening 



facilitate the sliding on and drawing off of the coffins, and the turning of the 

 table, by means of the pivot, saves the most difficult and awkward portion of 

 the labour performed by the bearers, who, when not much accustomed to it, 

 are apt to stumble, and create alarm in the mourners lest the coffin should 

 fall. When a bier-table of this kind is used, the area left for it need not 

 exceed 8 ft. in diameter, which will thus save 4 ft. in the entire length, and 

 the same in the breadth, of the chapel. 



A very convenient apparatus of this kind has been put up at the Kensal 

 Green Cemetery. In the body of the chapel is a bier, in the form of an 

 altar, about 8 ft. long, 4 ft. broad, and 4 ft. high, hung round with black 

 velvet. The upper surface of this altar-like structure consists of a top for 

 holding one or two coffins ; and, to facilitate the putting on and taking off of 

 these, this plate or top is furnished with rollers. After the desk service has 

 been read, the top containing the coffin or coffins can be turned slowly 

 round by machiner\', operated on by a small movable winch handle on one 

 side, which is done after the service has been read, when the interment is to 

 take place in the open ground, or in the catacombs at a distance from the 

 chapel ; but, when the coffin is to be removed to the vaults under the chapel, 

 there is machinery below, worked by a man there on a signal being given 

 by ringing a small bell, by which the entire bier, and the coffin, or coffins 

 which may be on it, are slowly lowered into a central area in the vault be- 

 neath. The mourners having descended by a staircase much too small for a 

 chapel so magnificent in other respects, the coffins are carried from this area 

 to the vaults, which radiate from it in four directions, and occupy nearly an 

 acre of ground. The machinery by which the bier is lowered consists of 

 two vertical male screws, worked by two female screws or nuts, which are 

 moved by means of two beveled wheels set in motion by a man turning a 

 windlass handle. This machine, while it lowers the bier through the floor, 

 moves at the same time two horizontal shutters, which gradually close the 

 opening in the floor as the coffin descends from the view of the spectators in 

 the chapel ; while, by the time they have arrived in the area below, the bier is 

 already at the bottom, with the coffin on it, ready to be removed to the vault. 

 The great advantage of using a screw movement for the descent of the bier is, 

 that the motion can never be otherwise than slow and solemn, and that it 

 cannot run down in case of the handle being set at liberty. This admirable 

 contrivance was invented and executed by Mr. Smith, Engineer, Princes 

 Street, Leicester Square, the patentee of an excellent window shutter, and 

 of several other inventions noticed in our Encijclop. of Cott. Architecture. The 

 cost was about 400/. In the Norwood Cemetery the same object is effected 

 by means of Bramah's hydraulic press, which raises and lowers the bier with 

 the slightest possible noise, and with a degree of steadiness which cannot be 

 equalled by any other machine. The cost is about 200/. There is one draw- 

 back, however, to this machine, which is, that during very severe frosts the 

 water is liable to freeze ; but this may be guarded against by shutting all the 

 outside doors of the vaults, and by the use of stoves. In ordinary winters, 

 however, the latter are unnecessary. This machine was put up by Messrs. 

 Bramah, Prestage, and Ball, 124. Piccadilly. 



The number of sittings need seldom exceed fifty, at least in the neighbour- 

 hood of London, as it rarely happens that more than a fourth of that number 

 attend a funeral. Whatever be the architectural style of the chapel, it ought 

 to contain a bell, the ringing of which, when the hearse is approaching from 

 the entrance gate to the chapel, may be considei'ed as a part of the burial 

 service. The bell ought to be placed in a bell turret, rising from one of the 

 gables, so as to become a conspicuous feature, and distinguish the chapel 

 from a cottage or barn, in the same manner as the chimney tops of a dweUing- 

 house are characteristic of a human habitation. 



The entrance lodge to a cemetery ought to comprise a room to serve as an 

 office to contain the cemetery books, or, at least, the order book and I'egister, 



