After strolling round Naples for a couple of days we took the train for
Rome.
On one of these strolls I saw what seemed to me a curious funeral. There
were six horses with nodding plumes, hung with black robes, and driven in
three spans by a coachman who was a wonder in himself. He wore a hat
with an enormous yellow cockade; a purple coat; patent leather Hessian
boots, with tassels; green tights showing the shape of his fine calves
(of which he was evidently very proud), and on his whip he carried many
silk ribbon bows. "Beau Brummel" might have had a coachman like him--but
I doubt it. Through a pane of glass might have been seen, thoroughly
ornamented and painted for public inspection, the face of the principal
whom these proceedings interested no more. The hearse sported a forest
of plumes also, and behind it stalked six stalwart, high-class,
professional mourners, likewise in green tights and Tower-of-London hats,
all members of the Pallbearers' International Union (purple card), with
flowing beards and curling moustaches--probably the only men on earth
whom money causes to weep and pluck their beards in pretended sorrow when
in the throes of their commercial emotion. If paid enough money they do
not hesitate to use the onion freely to produce the real thing in tears.
Next followed a dozen of mere puling mutes, of no caste or distinction
whatever but that lent by a big brass badge on the breast of each. Then
came four rickety carriages of the Columbus era; they hadn't a soul in
them, but their cloth upholstered seats had been whitewashed with white
lead and showed by many cracks the risk any live human would take in
entering the vehicles. There were no relatives of the dead present--and
you could not blame them. The question arose, What is the meaning of it
all? It seemed as though they had consigned the man to the grave at the
least expense with no bother--a curious form of burial from our
standpoint; it was strictly professional.