THE HUMOURS OF UNDERTAKERS

Dunstan Times, Issue 2480, 10 May 1909, Page 3

THE HUMOURS OF UNDERTAKERS

It will not be the fault of undertakers Journals if death shall not soon becomi ghastly ludicrous through their ways of advertising. It is said of the incorrigible French humourist, Rabelais, that before breathing his last he had candles constructed in such a way that when the nioin'ners sat beside his bier aftei all was over i inlights went off as Roman candles, to the horror and amazement of the grief-stricken relatives. This may be called intentions: humour, but the workot enterprising undertakers in this department of human endeavour appears to be wholly unintentiona’ and even unconscious; One of them, for instance, says of a re - cently published novel that "It has the purity of spring water, the sparkle ol champagne, the soft intoxication of delight and the strong, sweet essence of truth which permeates and makes wholesome the mental draught. The author * * 41 is the gifted writer of the " So-and-So Casket Company’s announcements." Elsewhere it tolls of a gentleman who " lived to the ripe old age ot 76, respected by all and surrounded by loving relatives and friends. He was laid at rest in one of the 1 Blank Company’s coffins’ with plush and oxidized handles and exquisitely trimmed." Another account in the same journal says that " in the casket line" a certain house " is jogging along at a good gait, gaining a patron here and there without losing a single customer anywhere," which seems to be impossible when the transitory nature of man is taken into account. But all "casket" men are not cheerful. Sometimes they take a depressed view of things when business is not good,__ and one of them writes from Winfield, in Kansas, in the following doleful words : “ We may brag about our climate all we please, but I want to tell you it is death to the undertakers. It Is hardjon them all the year, but this winter has been distressingly so. Here it is the 24th day of the month, and there has net been a sofiin delivered within 12 miles of Winfield during the month.” It is lucky for imperious Caesar that he died and turned to clay before the days of "caskets” and undertakers’journals. Otherwise advertisers might have turned his lugubrious corpse to a more singular use than that of stopping a hole to keep the wind »way.