In respect of such vaults, I do not consider that the mere cessation of burial in them will be sufficient; seeing that at the present moment they contain amongst them many thousand coffins, as yet tenanted by the materials of decomposition; and year after year, if left in their present state, these will be poisoning the air with successive instalments of their progressive decay. It seems to me quite indispensable that some comprehensive measure should be undertaken, for abolishing at once and for ever all burial within the City of London. Conjointly with the general application to Parliament, for prohibition of further intramural sepulture, I would recommend that authority be obtained by the City for its several parishes to procure the decent removal to extramural cemeteries of such coffins as already occupy their vaults; or, failing this measure, I would recommend that all coffins now lying within vaults, be walled up in their present resting-places with uniform impermeable masonry. For very obvious reasons, I should prefer the former plan to the latter.[22] [22] Probably the most successful attempt at hermetical enclosure of organic matters would not reach beyond effecting a postponement of their diffusion through the atmosphere. The true principles for burial of the dead lie rather in recognising their decomposition as inevitable, and in providing only lest it be offensive or injurious to the living. This is best attained by interment in a well-chosen soil, at a depth proportioned to the qualities of the ground; with no pretence of everlasting coffins and impenetrable cerements; but with ample vegetation above, to relieve the upper earth from whatever products of decay may mount and mingle there; and especially with thorough drainage below, so that down-currents of air and rainfall may freely traverse the putrefactive strata, ventilating and washing the soil, and diffusing its organic contents through deeper levels, till their oxidation is complete and their new inodorous combinations are discharged in watery solution.--J. S., 1854. Intramural burial is an evil, no doubt, that varies in its intensity according to the numbers interred; becoming appreciable in its effects on health, so far as the rough measure of statistics can inform us, only when many interments occur annually, or when ground is disturbed wherein much animal matter had previously been left to decay. But, be the evil large or little in any particular case, evil undoubtedly it is in all, and an unmitigated evil.