reserve the sacred soil from profane uses, games being prohibited,
and the improvements confined to paths and seats, levelling the ground
and planting with trees and flowers. The gravestones, though removed
to the sides of the enclosure, are numbered and scheduled, and all in
which any living person can claim an interest are left untouched. No
stones are ever destroyed in the process of reformation, but previous
ill-usage and natural decay have rendered very many of them illegible,
and in another century or so all these once fond memorials will
probably have become blank and mute.

To the middle of the nineteenth century may also be assigned the
change which we now see in the character of our gravestones. Quite
in the beginning of the century the vulgar and grotesque carvings and
Scriptural barbarisms of the eighteenth century had given place to a
simple form of memorial in which it was rare to find the least effort
at ornament; but, as soon as the Burial Acts were passed and the old
churchyards were succeeded by the new cemeteries, the tasteful and
elegant designs which are to be seen in every modern burial-ground
were introduced, founded in great measure upon the artistic drawings
of Mr. D.A. Clarkson, whose manifold suggestions, published in 1852,
are still held in the highest admiration.

CHAPTER IX.

PRESERVING THE GRAVESTONES.

Mankind in all ages and in all places has recognized the sanctity
of the burial-place. Among the New Zealanders, when they were first
revealed to Europeans as savages, the place of interment was _tapu_,
or holy. The wild and warlike Afghanistans have also a profound
reverence for their burial-grounds, which they speak of expressively
as "cities of the silent." Among the Turks the utmost possible respect
is paid to the resting-places of the dead, and nowhere, perhaps (says
Mrs. Stone in "God's Acre"), are the burial-places so beautiful.
The great and increasing size of Turkish cemeteries is due to the
repugnance of the people to disturbing the soil where once a body has
been laid. The Chinese and the inhabitants of the Sunda Isles
(says the authority just quoted) seem to vie with each other in the
reverence with which they regard the burial-places of their ancestors,
which almost invariably occupy the most beautiful and sequestered
sites. The graves are usually overgrown with long grasses and
luxuriantly flowering plants. In like manner the Moors have a
particular shrub which ov