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212,
Story of an Emigrant.
ments, grass plots, trees, and flowers are dear places which,
to some extent, reconcile man to stern death, while here
everything seemed dead and hopeless. I will describe for the
reader what I saw at one of mv visits to this place of
desolation. On the flagstones in the roofless apartment were six
separat6 pyres, two of which were already reduced to ashes
when I entered, two others were about half consumed by the
fire, only a few bones being visible among the fire-brands;
but on each of the other two was a naked corpse, the
outside of which was scorched by the flames, while blood and
water were slowly oozing out of mouth and nostrils, while
the burning flesh hissed and sputtered where the heat was
most intense, so that the whole presented a shocking sight.
A score of half-naked Brahmins were busy around the
pyres muttering prayers and making signs over the dead,
while the nearest relatives walked around the corpses
utter-i lg cries of lamentation. Particularly violent was the grief
of a young woman ^’hose mother had just been laid upon
the pyre, deep sorrow and heart-rending lamentations
testifying to the love she had borne the deceased.
Now the fine-split wood is piled up into a new pyre about
six feet long, two feet wide, and two and one-half feet high,
and four men bring the corpse of a man on a bier. It is
covered with a white sheet, which is taken away, so as to leave
only a small piece of cloth covering the corpse. This is the
body of a Fakir, a stately man with fine features, and past
the prime of life. As soon as the body is placed on the pvre,
two Brahmins pile fine-split wood around and over it so
that only the face is visible. Then comes the eldest son of
the deceased and rubbing the face with fresh butter lays
several lumps of it on the pvre. lie then walks three times
around the corpse and lights with a fire-brand a whisk of
straw in his father’s pyre. The fire spreads rapidly through
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