The Daily Telegraph. FRIDAY, JULY 12, 1889.

Daily Telegraph (Napier), Issue 5575, 12 July 1889, Page 2

The Daily Telegraph. FRIDAY, JULY 12, 1889.

Souk time last year we cfilicd attention to the early necessity of closing the Napier Cemetery ; and tho importance of the subject being sufficiently obvious, the Municipal Council appointed a committee to select a suitable site for a neorepolis outsido the boundaries of the borough. Wβ are not aware that anything has been done further, and week by week, and month by month, burial continues. Tho small spur selected for a cemetery at a time when nobody thought that Napier would ever beoome " much of a place," is now conspicuous from the distance by reason of its many monuments to the dead. And these melancholy memorials of those who have gone before are increasing «) rapidly that we are bound once more to refer to the subject. Science, teaches, and experiencoproves, that tho burial of the dead menaces tho health of tho living. The earth hides, but does not destroy; it nurses and preserves the germs of diseases in all their malignity till a favorable moraont arises for their release to spread sickness and death broadcast. But in epite of this knowledge, in all probability it will be> many a long year before deep-rooted prejudice will give place to enlightenment, and cremation take tho place of burial. In the meantime prejudioe demands that thero eh/ill be cemeteries, and it rests with tho authorities that theao shall be as littlo injurious as P'oosiblo. Now nothing cun be more harmful to a community than a crowded cemetery in its midst. We in Napier uro apt to attribute the most of tho j sickness that is sometimes prevalent hero to the swamp, to tho so fveroutfall, tobaddrainage, or to tho absence of household cleanK'ness. Is it not just as probable that wo owe what sickness wo have to the constant opening up of tho soil of tho cemetery ? How many who have died of infectious disease have been buried in a. family grave which has been operned and reopened to admit other members of tho eumo fiirnily P Surely here is to 100 found a sourco of danger? How is it that when there is a slight increase of sickness so many of tho cases uro reported aa being in the Chaucer and Spencer roada neighborhood? Those roads run at tho Soot of tho cemetery, the steep sides of which must drain into the water channels. And yet this fact is ignored, aud poodle prattle about tho lagoon and tho sower outfall! Whet lias happened at Wellington will inevitably occur here, and tho closing of tho cemetery will become so imperative as to call for legislative enactment. " Tho Cemuteries Act Amnndinent I Bill " now before tho House, provides that, i "if within six. calendar months froni the gazottiug of au Otd.or by tho Governor in Oounoil that burro]* in any cemotory or burial-ground shall coaso. tho local authority of tho district in w'.bich such cemetery or burial-ground is situate shall not have provided a now suflicient cemetery, it shall bo lawful for tbo Governor in Council to appoint a Commission of three persona, one of whom Bhftll bo a member of the local authority of BU'jh district, to enquire into und report on the suitability of a sito for such new com etery, and tho estimated cost of acquiring the samo ; and if in the opinion of the Governor in Council such site be suitable, and. tho estimated cost of acquiring tho same bo reasonable, ho may, by Order in Council to be gazetted, declare such site to bo taken for tho pnrposes of a cemetery on behalf of such locel authority; and thereupon-, on eucli gazetting, such site shall be deemed' to bo taken for such purposes, and shall vest in tho local authority upon trust for such purposes. All land bo taken for a site for a cemetery shall be deemed to have been taken by such local authority under the provisions of Parts 11. and 111. of " Tho Pu.blic Works Act, 1882," and all tho provisions of the said two parts of suoh last-meutio ned Act shall apply accordingly. If the local authority and the owner of such land caunot agree as to the price to bo paid for the earn .c, the amount to be paid shall be ascertain ied by a Compensation Court

under the said " PubMWorks Aqt l3| lßߣ,". of the land taken shialfbe IKe claimant before euoh Compensation Gourmand the local: authority shall b<ij'sb.o re-, spondent. The amount to be paid! for the) purchase of such land, whether aioßftained by private contract or under the provision's of" The'Pablio Worte'Aot? r ISB2/landih;e' costs,;if any, by thi?,CompensatMnjCo'urtf directed to be paid by the local authority, shall be paicTout of tbe general borough or town distriot'f lind, as the case may require. Nothing herein contained shall abridge, annul, or .vary, the powers ..vested iajmy., local authority by the said Act for the acquisition of a site for a cemetery.