174 



THE PARKS AND GARDENS OF PARIS. [Chap. XII. 



or graye of the htunble class of people, who cannot afford to pay 

 for the ground. The remains of these people thus dishonoured 

 are not eyen allowed to rest in the grave, such as it is, but after 

 the lapse of a short time their hones are dug up and the ground 

 prepared for another crop. There is thus a very wide difference 

 between " sickle and crown " in Pere-la-chaise. A cutting thirteen 

 or fourteen feet wide, with the earth thrown up in high banks 

 on either side, a priest standing at one part near a slope formed 

 by the slight covering thrown over the buried of that day, and, 

 frequently, a little crowd of mourners and friends, bearing a 

 cofiSn. They hand it to the man in the bottom of the trench, who 



packs it beside the 

 others without 

 placing a particle 

 of earth between ; 

 the priest says a 

 few words, and 

 sprinkles a few 

 drops of water on 

 the coffin and clay; 

 some of the mourn- 

 ers weep, but are 

 soon moved out by 

 another little 

 crowd, with its 

 dead, and so on 

 till the long and 

 wide trench is full. They do not even take the trouble to throw a 

 little earth against the coffins last put in, but simply place a rough 

 board against them for the night. Those places not paid for in 

 perpetuity are completely cleared out, dug up, and used again 

 after a few years. The wooden crosses, little headstones, and 

 countless ornaments are carted away or are thrown together 

 in great heaps, the crosses and consumable parts being generally 

 sent to the hospitals as fuel. The headstones from such a clear- 

 ance (when not claimed in good time by their owners) go to make 

 the drainage of a drive, or for some similar end. And yet these 

 people, who cannot afford to pay for the ground in perpetuity, 

 go on erecting inscribed headstones, and bringing often their 



l7t a Paris Cemetery in the Nineteenth Century. 



