I heard one rather peculiar story while in India in regard to the cremation of the dead. I sat at dinner beside an English official who had been many years in the Government service of India. In the course of the conversation I asked him what he thought about cremation. He said, with a smile: “Well, I am perhaps a little prejudiced in regard to the cremation of the dead. I had rather a peculiar experience.” I settled back in my chair, hoping I was to hear one of the many stories of Indian life which these old officials have to tell us if they find we are interested in the lives of the people amongst whom they work. He said: “I had an acquaintance once, a Scotchman, who died here in India, and asked in his will that I and another friend would cremate him, and not allow an Indian hand to touch him, but that we should personally attend to all the details. We were young then in things Indian, and made our first mistake in buying the wood for the pyre. Unfortunately for our friend, the wily wood-merchant sold us green wood, and for the first day he only smoked. By the second day the wood had dried out, and all would have been well if we had known that the skull of a person burned should be broken in order to allow the gases to escape. We did not know this—our friend blew up. We spent the remainder of the second day in gathering his remains and replacing them upon the fire. The third day the work was fully accomplished; his ashes were collected and now repose in a beautiful urn in his family chapel near Edinburgh.” Ceremonies are held and sacrifices are made for ten days by the members of a family in which there has been a death. If the deceased was a married man, it is on the tenth day that the widow is degraded into her state of widowhood. This rite is called “the cutting of the cord,” because then the tali, the symbol of wifehood, is cut, and the woman has no more place in Hindu society. The relatives and friends come to the house and deck the poor woman in all her festive clothing; jewels are put upon her, flowers, and sandal paste. Her friends mourn with her for a time, then her bright clothing is removed, her beautiful black hair is cut, and she must remain for ever close-shaven and clothed in a garment of white. She may attend no feast, is permitted to eat only one meal a day, and that should be prepared by her own hands, may not partake of meat, and if she is so unfortunate as to be poor in this world’s goods she becomes the drudge and servant of her husband’s family. She is considered unclean, a thing of ill-omen, so unlucky that if a man were starting on some business venture and on leaving his doorway should by chance meet a widow he would return to his house and say a few prayers to counteract his bad luck. [Illustration: INDIAN WOMEN SPINNING. To face p. 148.]