t would thank its provident partner, that she had
been more solicitous to defend it from dishonors at its dissolution,
than careful to pamper it with good things in the time of its union.
If Caesar were chiefly anxious at his death how he might die most
decently, every Burial Society may be considered as a club of Caesars.

Nothing tends to keep up, in the imaginations of the poorer sort of
people, a generous horror of the work-house more than the manner in
which pauper funerals are conducted in this metropolis. The coffin
nothing but a few naked planks coarsely put together,--the want of a
pall (that decent and well-imagined veil, which, hiding the coffin
that hides the body, keeps that which would shock us at two removes
from us), the colored coats of the men that are hired, at cheap
rates, to carry the body,--altogether give the notion of the deceased
having been some person of an ill life and conversation, some one who
may not claim the entire rites of Christian burial,--one by whom some
parts of the sacred ceremony would be desecrated if they should be
bestowed upon him. I meet these meagre processions sometimes in the
street. They are sure to make me out of humor and melancholy all the
day after. They have a harsh and ominous aspect.

If there is anything in the prospectus issued from Mr. Middleton's,
Stonecutter's Street, which pleases me less than the rest, it is to
find that the six pair of gloves are to be returned, that they are
only lent, or, as the bill expresses it, for use on the occasion. The
hood, scarfs, and hat-bands, may properly enough be given up after
the solemnity; the cloaks no gentlemen would think of keeping; but a
pair of gloves, once fitted on, ought not in courtesy to be
redemanded. The wearer should certainly have the fee-simple of them.
The cost would be but trifling, and they would be a proper memorial
of the day. This part of the Proposal wants reconsidering. It is not
conceived in the same liberal way of thinking as the rest. I am also
a little doubtful whether the limit, within which the burial-fee is
made payable, should not be extended to thirty shillings.

Some provision too ought undoubtedly to be made in favor of those
well-intentioned persons and well-wishers to the fund, who, having
all along paid their subscriptions regularly, are so unfortunate as
to die before the six months, which would entitle them to their
freedom, are quite completed. One can hardly imagine a more
dis