( 173 ) 



CHAPTEE XII. 

 The Cemetkries of Paris. 



To anyone accustomed to associate cemeteries with gardens more or 

 less beautiful, the cemeteries of Paris are far from being agreeable. 

 In these human loye does not fail in its testimony ; but such are 

 the evils of overcrowding, of still following plans less evidently 

 wrong when the city was much smaller, and of a horrible system 

 of using the same ground for interments many times over — that 

 the best aspects of these cemeteries are painful to anyone who 

 knows what is possible or what has already been accomplished in 

 the formation of decent burial-grounds near large cities. Nothing 

 more agreeable is to be seen than crowded stones and whole acres 

 covered with decaying blackened " immortelles " — the sight being 

 most depressing to anyone accustomed to green churchyards. In 

 the portions devoted to the graves of the rich, or of such as passed 

 on their way to the grave by the paths of fame or glory, a little 

 chapel or a ponderous tomb often prevents, for a time, the dust 

 of individuals from mingling with the common clay of their 

 neighbours, and the earth is not used merely as a deodorising 

 medium, as in other parts of the same cemetery. 



Where the poorer people bury their dead in this part of the 

 graveyard may be seen a most revolting mode of sepulture. A 

 very wide trench, or fosse, is cut, broad enough to hold two rows 

 of coffins placed across it, and one hundred yards or so in length. 

 Here they are rapidly stowed in one after another, close together, 

 no earth between the coffins, and wherever the coffins, which are 

 very fragile, happen to be short so that a little space is left 

 between the two rows, those of children are placed in lengthwise 

 between them to economise space ; the whole being done much as 

 a workman would pack bricks together. This is the fosse commune. 



