“It is hard to have patience with people who say… ‘Death doesn’t matter.’ There is death. And whatever is matters. And whatever where to buy generic cialis forum happens has consequences, and it and they are irrevocable and irreversible. You might as well say that birth doesn’t matter.”
CS Lewis
Oh, young fellows, do take warning
While you this tale I tell
I tell it from a heart that’s sad and sore
Come and learn from me a lesson
As I have learned it well
From the crepe upon the little cabin door
Oh, I left my home and kindred
And those who loved me well
It broke my mother’s heart, the life I led
Then, from her there came a letter
To say she wished me well
Now I tell to you the pleading words I read
“I’m getting old and feeble
My hair will soon be grey
And every day I’m waiting at the door
Oh, my boy, come home to see me
Before I go away
Oh, I fear I’ll never see you anymore”
But I did not heed the warning
I’d hear it day by day
Just wasting time on women, wine and song
But this kind of sinful pleasure
Lasts only for a day
And the sorrows of repentance last so long
Then at last I journied homeward
And as I climbed the hill
I thought to see my mother’s face once more
But as I passed through the gateway
My aching heart stood still
There was crepe upon the little cabin door
Oh, young fellows, do take warning
You’ve heard this tale I tell
You’ve heard it from a heart that’s sad and sore
Come and learn from me a lesson
As I have learned it well
From the crepe upon the little cabin door
Thompson / Guernsey, sung by Vernon Dalhart, 1928
Muffle the bell, our ‘Nellie’s dying, soon she’ll close her soft blue eyes;
Kiss her pale lips now sweetly parted, kiss our darling e’er she dies;
How we’ll miss her little footsteps, and her voice we loved so dear.
Kiss our sweet darling, kiss her gently, e’er the angel forms draw near.
Chorus.
Muffle the bell our Nellie’s dying, soon she’ll close her soft blue eyes;
Kiss her pale lips now sweetly parted, kiss our darling e’er she dies.
Muffle the bell, our Nellie’s dying, softly tread upon the floor,
Speak low, for fear you’ll wake our darling, soon we’ll see her nevermore;
She was all that made home happy, with her little words of love.
Listen! the angels now are calling from their home in heaven above.
Chorus.
Muffle the bell, our Nellie’s dying, soft and lower prows her breath.
Only a little moment later she’ll be called away in death;
Angel forms are hov’ring near her, soft we hear their footsteps tread;
Hush! our sweet darling breathes no longer, darling little Nellie’s dead.
Muffle The Bell, Our Nellie’s Dying. Words and Music by James E Stewart 1881
Bouquet of Violets by Edouard Manet
Posted by Kathryn Edwards
AT no time does solemnity so possess our souls as when we stand deserted at the brink of darkness into which our loved one has gone. And the last place in the world where we would look for comfort at such a time is in the seeming artificiality of etiquette; yet it is in the moment of deepest sorrow that etiquette performs its most vital and real service.
So begins the chapter on Funerals in Emily Posts’ 1922 guide to etiquette here. Born into a privileged American home, Emily (1872–1960) had turned to writing after the divorce that resulted from her prominent banker husband’s extra-marital affairs with chorus girls.
The resultant industry under the Post banner continues to this day, with the 18th edition of the Etiquette book published last autumn, the ‘funerals’ chapter having morphed into ‘Loss, grieving and condolences’, and the locus of much activity to do with funerals now clearly taking place outside the home.
But back in 1922 the list of death-related functions in the home for which etiquette had a prescription includes ‘muffling the bell’, a notion so quaint that I turned to it at once. The practice is intended to signal to callers that the house is in mourning, so that the bell will not be rung unnecessarily nor long.
As a rule the funeral director hangs crepe streamers on the bell; white ones for a child, black and white for a young person, or black for an older person. …
If they prefer, the family sometimes orders a florist to hang a bunch of violets or other purple flowers on black ribbon streamers, for a grown person; or white violets, white carnations—any white flower without leaves—on the black ribbon for a young woman or man; or white flowers on white gauze or ribbon for a child.
This grace doesn’t last long, however: the instruction is that whoever is taking care of the house should remove this mourning emblem while the funeral cortege is at the cemetery. But while it lasts, what a lovely idea.
