PARK AND CEA\ETERY 
103 
Crown Hill Cemetery Company, but, according to 
the court of appeals of Kentucky, was in law the 
personal obligation of its signers. Their experience 
may furnish a suggestion to others who have notes 
to sign for cemetery companies. 
Right of Administrator to Buy Place for Burial. 
The right of an administrator to purchase a lot 
in which to bury a deceased person rests on very 
similar principles to those which control the admin- 
istrator’s right to pay the funeral charges and the 
expenses which are immediately attendant upon the 
death and burial. While the administrator has the 
undoubted right to buy a place to bury the dead 
in, due regard must always be had to the situation 
of the estate, to the question of its solvency or in- 
solvency, and to the circumstances attending the 
e.xpenditure. The difficulty under which the ad- 
ministrator always labors is easily recognized. The 
stricken relatives are always clamorous for what 
they consider a fitting place in which to lay the 
dead, while the administrator is largely controlled 
by the financial considerations which must govern 
his action. These observations are made by the 
court of appeals of Colorado in* a case where it 
holds that it was manifestly ill conceived and un- 
justifiable for an administrator to expend $1,350 for 
a burial lot when the estate of the deceased was in- 
solvent and only amounted to about $5,000, or 
nearly 25 per cent of all the money which came 
into his hands as administrator, and that an allow- 
ance of $240 was ample and liberal, under the cir- 
cumstances, for this purpose. 
Contract of Purchase Must Be in Writing. 
A statute of the character of chapter 501 of the 
New York State laws of 1881, which provides any 
incorporated religious society having a cemetery 
“may sell lots or plats” therein “subject to such 
conditions and restrictions as may be imposed upon 
the use of such lots or plats,” the Surrogate’s 
Court of Westchester county holds, provides for 
the sale of an interest in land, and a contract of 
purchase must be in writing to be binding. With- 
out the aid of the statute, the surrogate states that 
it may be said that the very nature of the right of 
sepulture implies a right in land lasting in its char- 
acter. For no interest in land, other than an abso- 
lute title, can there be claimed a greater right of 
permanency. No one would be presumed to have 
selected as a place of burial one in which his or her 
remains could lie only during the pleasure and sub- 
ject to the whim of a corporation religious or other- 
wise. The characteristics of a license which is per- 
sonal and revocable, are repugnant to the idea of a 
burial place. Here a man had concluded to take a 
certain lot at the price of $450, and paid $10 on 
account. Because there was no writing entered in- 
to, for the above reasons it is held that the balance 
of the purchase price could not be recovered from 
his estate, although on his decease he was buried 
in the lot. 
Care of Forest Trees. 
A large number of fine trees meet with an early 
death, on account of rotting in the center. This 
rotting is brought about in all cases, by stumps of 
broken branches. When these rot, the decay soon 
permeates the whole trunk. No stump should ever 
be left on a tree, whether the branch be cut off with 
a saw or broken off by the wind. It should be tak- 
en away clean to the trunk, and the scar painted 
over so as prevent decay, until the wound is wholly 
covered by the new growth of wood and bark. 
When trees commence to fail, many persons imag- 
ine it is owing to some trouble at the roots, and if 
the tree is much valued, the earth around the roots 
may be dug up and disturbed. It is a good pract- 
ice to apply fertilizing material, even to an old tree, 
as an abundance of food helps it to sustain its vigor; 
but all this is of no avail as long as dead stumps 
are left to decay the center of the tree. It is chief- 
ly on this account that so much injury results from 
cutting back large branches. In a large number of 
cases the stump dies, with the results already enum- 
erated. — Meehans' Monthly. 
The above fragment of a monument in an Italian 
cemetery, displays to some extent to what degree 
sculptural art is carried in the higher class of ceme- 
tery monuments in sunny Italy. 
