(Vol. vi., pp. 53. 110. 205. 328.)
Although I have myself seen the natural mummies preserved at Kreuzberg on
the Rhine, I can say nothing more with regard to them, than vouch for the
accuracy of the accounts transmitted by your various correspondents under
this head. Your Querist A. A. however may, if curious on this subject, be
referred with advantage to Mr. T. J. Pettigrew's interesting _History of
Egyptian Mummies_. In chap. xvii. of this work, many instances are adduced
of the preservation of bodies from putrefaction by the desiccating
properties of the natural air of the place in which they are contained. He
says:
"In dry, and particularly calcareous vaults, bodies may be preserved
for a great length of time. In Toulouse, bodies are to be seen quite
perfect, although buried two centuries ago. In the vaults of St.
Michael's Church, Dublin, the same effect is produced; and Mr. Madden
says he there saw the body of Henry Shears, who was hanged in 1798, in
a state of preservation equal to that of any Egyptian mummy."
Garcilasso de la Veya, and more recent historians, may be referred to for
accounts of the mummy-pits of Peru, the dry air of which country is an
effectual preventive of the process of putrefaction. One of the most
curious spectacles, however, of this nature is to be found in the Catacombs
of Palermo, where the traveller finds himself in the midst of some
thousands of unburied bodies, which, suspended mostly by the neck, have
become so distorted in form and feature in the process of desiccation, as
to provoke an irrepressible smile in the midst of more solemn and befitting
contemplations. (Sonnini's _Travels_, vol. i. p. 47.; Smyth's _Memoirs of
Sicily and its Islands_, p. 88.)
Similar properties are also attributed to the air of the western islands of
Scotland. "To return to our purpose," says P. Camerarius (_The Living
Librarie_, translated by Molle, folio, London, 1625, p. 47.),--
"That which Abraham Ortelius reporteth after Gyrald de Cambren is
wonderfull, that the bodies of men rot not after their decease, in the
isles of Arran; and that therefore they bee not buried, but left in the
open ayr, where putrefaction doth them no manner of hurt; whereby the
families (not without amazement) doe know their fathers, grandfathers,
great-grandfathers, and a long race of their predecessors. Peter
Martyr, a Milannois, saith the same of some West Indians of Comagra.
These bee his words: 'The Spaniards being entered the lodgings of this
Cacick, found a chamber fulle of dead bodies, hanging by ropes of
cotton, and asking what superstition that was, they received this
answer, That those were the fathers, grandfathers, and
great-grandfathers of the Cacick of Comagra. The Indians say that they
keep such relikes preciously, and that the ceremonie is one of the
points of their religion. According to his qualities while he lived,
his bodie, being dead, is richly decked with jewels and precious
stones.'"
Many other instances might be adduced, but you will now think that at least
enough has been said on this subject.