Mooney.] 268 [Oct. 19, 
which time the soul stands in the presence of its Maker and ig safe for the 
time being. It is there weighd in the scales of the Archangel Michael 
and receivs its sentence of reward or punishment according to the meas- 
ure ofsits iniquity. The belief that the souls of the dead ar weighd by 
the angel Michael prevails all over Europe, and is noted in one of Rals- 
ton’s Russian Fairy Tales. The idea comes down to us from remote 
antiquity. At the ruins of Monasterboice abbey, near Drogheda, founded 
in the sixth century, is a sculpture representing the judgment,.in which 
one figure is weighing the souls in a balance,* and precisely the same 
thing is portrayed on a Japanese picture of the judgment, recently ex- 
hibited in Washington, the original of which date» back for centuries. 
Should its load of sin carry the soul to the bottom of the scale, the Mdis- 
téntd: seiz it and drag it down into hel. There seems also to be an indis- 
tinct belief, common to many primitiv peoples, that the soul hovers near 
the body until the latter is finally laid at rest in the grave. As the Mdis- 
tinid* ar particularly alert just before daybreak, great care is taken that 
there shal be no crying at that time during the few days intervening 
between death and burial, and one of the most dreaded maledictions in 
the west of Ireland is Sgreada na maid'ne ort,t ‘‘The cry of the morn- 
ing on you!’’ In some districts, according to Lady Wilde, ‘‘ when a death 
was expected it was usual to have a good deal of bread ready baked in the 
house in order that the evil spirits might be employed eating it, and so let 
the soul of the dying depart in peace.’’t 
The manner of laying out the corpse preparatory, to the wake differs 
somewhat in various districts, but the principal details are the same. In 
Meath the body was placed upon a board frame like a door, which rested 
upon a table, but was somewhat wider than it, so as to project beyond it 
on the right side. The frame and table ar coverd with a white sheet 
reaching down to the floor. The body, drest in its shroud, is extended 
upon this sheet, with the feet toward the east, being placed upon that part 
of the frame resting immediately upon the table. Another sheet is thrown 
over the corpse so as to conceal it from view. Along the projecting edge 
of the frame ar placed several plates containing pipes and tobacco for the 
watchers and attendants at the wake. In this part of the country the 
plate was never placed at the head, foot or upon the breast of the corpse, 
Between the plates ar large blessed candles, which ar lighted and kept 
constantly burning as long as the corpse is in the hous, the rule being to 
keep the body for two nights and bury it on the third day. During all 
this time the body is never left alone, but is watchd day and night by 
friends of the deceasd, of about the same age, the men sitting up all 
night until relievd by the women in the morning. In some districts the 
body of an adult is sometimes adornd with black ribbons, that of an un- 
married person with white ribbons and that of a child with flowers. In 
*.W. R. Wilde, The Boyne and the Blackwater, 2d ed., 803, Dublin, 1850. 
4) Pronounced, Shgrdidha na ménya urth. 
t Ancient Legends of Ireland, ii, 118, London, 1887, 
