Manners and Customs in Colonial Days m 



by the dominie, the body was carried to the grave — usually 

 only a few rods away — and interred. No female ever went to 

 the grave. A volley was customarily fired over the grave, 

 even if the body were that of a woman. After these solemn 

 services were performed, the mourners returned to the house, 

 where they were refreshed after their fatigue with a lavish 

 collation and unlimited quantities of drinkables. While im- 

 bibing these latter and burning the incense of tobacco to the 

 memory of the departed, they recounted his life and recalled 

 his manifold virtues, until they became so overcome by them — 

 or by the drink — that they became speechless. It was a mat- 

 ter of honor with the bereaved family to see that there was no 

 cessation in the supply of solid and liquid refreshments ; and so 

 these funeral ceremonies sometimes lasted for several days. 

 The author cannot refrain from repeating the story of a Scotch 

 mourner, who after two days of mourning, solemnly arose, 

 glass in hand, and proposed the health of the bride and groom. 

 Upon being admonished by a neighbor that the affair was 

 not a wedding but a funeral, he remarked: "Weel! I dinna 

 care what 't is; 't is a grand success anyhow." 



Funerals conducted in this style were often so expensive as 

 to impoverish a family that would otherwise have been com- 

 fortably off. Besides the refreshments, mourning gloves and 

 bands were furnished the minister and the mourners, while 

 mourning rings and pins were provided for the relatives and 

 close friends. It is stated that ministers who conducted many 

 funerals had a considerable source of income from the sale of 

 the mourning gloves with which they were presented at each 

 ceremony. If only a short distance from the grave, the body 

 was carried on a bier by underbearers. The author remembers 

 seeing, when a boy, between the years 1865 and 1870, a mem- 

 ber of the Schermerhorn familv buried from the old mansion 



