346 Be Mortuis. [July, 



the means, not only of putting an end entirely to the practice of 

 incremation, but also to a great extent to that of depositing votive 

 offerings in the graves of the departed. The introduction of such 

 sentences as those which our burial-service contains, agaiost the 

 thought that we can take anything with us out of the world, 

 evidently when introduced by the early Church had reference to the 

 heathen practice of placing objects highly esteemed in the grave with 

 the dead.* 



Schiller's lines (translated by Lytton) well express this practice 

 so common among the aborigines of our own day : — 



" Here brins: the last gifts ! and with these 

 The last lament be said ; 

 Let all that pleased, and yet may please, 

 Be buiied with the dead. 



Beneath his head the hatchet hide 



That he so stoutly swung ; 

 And place the bear's fat haunch beside — 



The journey hence is long ! 



And let the knife new sharpened be 



That on the battle-day 

 Shore with quick strokes — he took but three — 



The foeman's scalp away ! 



The paints that warriors love to use, 



Place here within his hand, 

 That he may shine with ruddy hues 



Amidst the spirit-land." 



It not unfrequently happens that fragments of the bones of 

 sheep and other animals are found in cinerary urns associated with 

 the human remains. This is easily explained when we consider the 

 manner in which the rites to the dead were performed. 



If the dead person were a chief or warrior of note, it was usual 

 to erect a funeral pyre of great size, upon which the corpse was 

 laid, surrounded by the bodies of various animals slain in honour of 

 the dead, together with costly unguents and perfumes. Frequently 

 a number of slaves and captives were also sacrificed to the manes of 

 the departed. Thus, in Homer's ' Iliad,' we have a graphic descrip- 

 tion of the death of Patroclus during the Trojan war, and the 

 honours paid to his body by Achilles and the Greeks : — 



" While those deputed to inter the slain 

 Heap with a rising pyramid the plain. 

 A hundred feet in length, a hundred wide, 

 The growing structure spreads on every side ; 

 High on the top the manly corse they lay, 

 And well-fed sheep and sable oxen slay : 

 Achilles covered with their fat the dead, 

 And the pil'd victims round the body spread ; 



* Bolltston * Archseologia,' vol. xlii. 



