CHAPTER XIV CEMETERY PRIVILEGES One Child out of Two Dies-Funerals without THE HE death-rate in the islands is very heavy. Among children it is fifty per cent. in Manila. The Health Board is doing everything possible to decrease that ratio, and with rigid enforcement of health laws and the introduction of American trained physicians, nurses and midwives, it is probable that a larger proportion of children born in the city will live. Vitality among the natives, young and old, is comparatively low. Few survive an attack of smallpox, cholera or plague; the same is true of Chinamen; and few Americans are immune from these three diseases. Funerals among the Filipinos vary with the wealth of the family and the age of the deceased person. In Iloilo we met a funeral procession on its way to the cemetery, consisting of a man carrying upon his shoulder a coffin containing the body of a child. Not only was there no hearse, but also no carriage and only one other person in sight. In Manila, on the other hand, the funeral procession may be an imposing affair. I passed one on the way to church one Sunday morning. There were six horses at tached to the hearse, three of which were ridden, and on either side of the hearse and horses were men dressed as footmen, wearing powdered wigs and cockaded hats and knee breeches. The sight would have been amusing had the circumstances not imposed solemnity. Soon after the military came here, in 1898, the natives learned that music was a proper adjunct of a funeral service. The class of music appropriate for such an occasion was not always duly considered, and one frequently heard the band in front of a hearse containing the body of a Filipino announcing: "There'll be a hot time in the old town to-night." Later the natives learned that light music was appropriate only when returning from the cemetery. One afternoon we were driving in Paco, one of the suburbs of Manila, and entered the churchyard. A little child had died and the priest was reading the service over the body. While this was in progress a number of men and women were walking toward the part of the yard where three or four men were opening a part of the wall which surrounds the churchyard. In a short time the coffin was carried from the church to the opening thus made and placed in the wall, much as one would place his box in a safe-deposit vault. The opening was then sealed, and the remains of the little child will be undisturbed for five years, the term for which the rental has been paid by the family. If, at the end of that time, the rent for another period is not forthcoming, and the vault is needed by a family that will pay for its use, the coffin will be taken out and the remains will be buried in the Potter's Field. The price for a vault for five RENTAL SYSTEM REMAINS 137 years is thirty-five pesos, about seventeen dollars; for two hundred pesos, paid at once, the vault is permanently endowed. Our guide explained that this was one of the changes made by the American Government. When Manila fell in 1898 there was a "boneyard," as he expressed it, and he showed us the place, filled with remains taken from the vaults and exposed to the elements. "No boneyard now," he added. "Americans put all the bones into the ground." But the rental system still remains. It seems a little hard, after one has met the landlord or agent monthly for fifty or sixty years, that his friends must continue to pay rent in order to instire a covering for his remains during the centuries to come. It is a satisfaction to know, however, that from this time on a man's body will always be under cover of one sort or another. |