“You have laid a white-robed form within the rosy cylinder, and have turned away to think with gratitude that all is well. You have let your imagination dwell lovingly upon the pleasing sentiment that whatever may be left—beside the calcined bones, most pure and clean—has gone to mingle with the upper air and dwell with sunshine, birds, and flowers. The darkness and the dampness of the earth have been escaped, and so have the perils of grave-snatching, the indecencies of a possible dissecting-room, and the nameless horrors of putrefaction. You have pleasant memories to cherish of the ‘last sad hour,’ which, instead of ‘breathless darkness’ and the ‘narrow house’ and the dreadful thud of falling earth upon the coffin, presents to mind a lovely bed of rosy light, and a peaceful form clad in virgin purity resting within its soft embrace. If a lily had been laid upon a bed of pinks or roses, in the summer, and you had seen its fragrance and its beauty all exhale amid the shimmering beams or radiated heat beneath the touch of some invisible and gentle agency, you would have had a not dissimilar experience. And this is neither painful to the eye, nor distressing to the sensibilities, nor ungrateful to the memory.” The following beautiful description of a cremation of the future is from the _Modern Age_ for January, 1884, a journal which, alas! was discontinued for lack of support:— “It is not a disagreeable journey on which we now propose to take our readers. It is to witness the final disposition of a friend’s remains in the ideal crematory of the future—science having already perfected the mechanical appliances necessary in conducting it in the way we describe. Our friend has died, and through the usual announcements we learn that the last rites will be performed in the columbarium at a given hour. Repairing thither at the appointed time, we first pass through a grove of stately trees, the soothing murmur of whose rustling leaves brings peace and quiet into the hearts of those who mourn and gather to pay the last tribute. Within the grove stands a massive building of gray masonry whose architecture shows no striving after ornamental effect, and whose solid proportions give a sense of eternal permanency. A few small windows in a simple frieze which crowns its walls do not destroy this effect, and their plain stained glass clashes in nowise with the harmony of color between the sky, the trees, and the gray stone of the temple of rest. About the Doric pillars of its portico green vines twine fondly as if they, too, would do their share in robbing death of all its hideousness. To this place loving hands have borne the body of our friend. No coffin lends its horror to the journey from this earthly home to here, where eternal sleep awaits him. A flower-strewn bier gives poetic carriage for this short and final journey. Entering the broad portal, the soft, deep notes of an organ charm the ear. The eye takes in a most imposing sight.