COFFINS IN BRIGHT COLOURS.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XVII, Issue XXII, 28 November 1896, Page 122

COFFINS IN BRIGHT COLOURS.

They are distinctly progressive in California. It has long been suspected, but now there is no doubt of it, for the San Francisco Call announces, with manifest pride, a decided advance in funeral customs.

* For some time past,’ says the Call, * there has been a desire to make these ceremonies less dismal than formerly. Flowers and brightness have been demanded instead of darkness and a general effect of despair. The feeling seems to grow out of the teachings of some of the new ethical societies, which bold that the dead are only going to a better and happier life, and there is no need for friends to feel sad about an event that must bring joy to the departed.’ An undertaker by the name of Me'zler was the first to perceive the growing popu lar tendency. He lay awake nights devising means to meet the new demand, which did not seem to be satisfied with merely a lightening of the hitherto sorrowful services and the use of brighter coloured flowers. As a result of his much thinking he devised a cc flic, covered not with gloomy black, but with a handsome blue and grey cloth, the colours lying longitudinally in wide stripes. This, he concluded, would about express the popular notion, being neat and elegant and not too gaudy, for while the whole effect was light and airy, the colours chosen were still emblematic of the more sombre shades of human feeling. Still, it wes with some perturbation that the undertaker placed the novelty in his shop window. He was surprised and gratfied to have a customer for it the same day. The customer was fascinated. He would have nothing else that the undertaker, or, indeed, the city, had to <-ffer. It was not

so sad looking, he remarked, as those black coffins. At the funeral the undertaker noted the effect with anxious eye. The blue and gray coffin made a sensation, to be sure, but it looked well among the flowers (care fully selected to harmonize), and the undertaker heard no word or saw no look save of admiration. He immediately made another, which likewise sold the day it was put in the window. Then orders began to come in, and other undertakers began to copy. Metzler was at last emboldened to make one in sky blue and white stripes, and it was sold within an hour.