whatever are seen even among the nearest relatives; the service at church bespeaks triumph, and the organ mixes its enlivening sounds with the hymns, which thank death for snatching a tender soul, when through a slight and transient tribute of pain, it could obtain an exemption from the power of sorrow. Yet no funerals are graced with more tears; nor can dirges and penitential mournings produce even a shadow of the tender melancholy which seizes the mind at the view of the formal and affected joy with which a Catholic infant is laid in his grave. A young unmarried woman among us ----“is allowed her virgin crants,[47] Her maiden strewments, and the bringing home Of bell and burial.” [47] Garlands. In addition to the wreath of flowers, a palm-branch is put into a maiden’s hand; an emblem of victory against the allurements of love, which many a poor fair conqueror would have willingly exchanged for a regular defeat. They are dressed in every other respect like nuns, and the coffin is covered with a black velvet pall, as in all other funerals. The preceding passage in Hamlet begins with an allusion to a very ancient custom, which is still observed in Spain at the monumental crosses erected on the highways to those who have perished by the hands of robbers. “For charitable prayers, Sherds, flints, and pebbles, should be thrown on her.” This is literally done by every peasant when passing one of those rude and melancholy monuments. A heap of stones is always observed at the foot of the cross; not, however, _instead_ of prayers, as the passage would seem to imply, but as a tale by which the number of _Paternosters_ said by the compassionate passengers, might be reckoned. The antiquity of this _Christianized_ custom appears, from a passage in the Book of Proverbs, to be very great. The proverb or sentence, translated as it is in the margin of the English Bible, runs thus: “As he that putteth a precious stone in a heap, so is he that giveth honour to a fool.”[48] [48] Proverbs xxvi. 8.