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Show I UNDERTAKERS' SHOP FUNEJRAUS." - e . ' Many of Them Now and They Are Expected Ex-pected to Become- Yet More Common. I Successful undertakers in New York nowadays have to be prepared to flimish a clrarqh and clergyman along wfltli the other requirements for a funeral. Not very long ago it was an exceptional thing foe funeral services to be held in (B undertaker's un-dertaker's shop. Only the bodies at the friendless or of those whose friends were too poor to afford any better accommodations accommo-dations were then taken from the t Older-taker's Older-taker's direct to the grave. Of late, however, how-ever, the phrase: "The funeral wdl be held at the parlors of So-and-so, undertakers," under-takers," is frequently seen attach id to death notices, and oven more often the place where the funeral is to be helil la designated by Its street number cwly. Nine times out of ten the place so designated desig-nated is an undertaker's shop. ' ', The way this has come about has been chiefly through the increasing rellno-tance rellno-tance of hotel and boarding house kiiep- ers to have a funeral in their house. Friends of those dying tn such places are generally given to understand tltat an immediate removal of the body would be highly appreciated, or, if tha friends appear within a few hours, tho proprietor proprie-tor summons an undertaker and has the body removed. Unless the deceased per-- per-- Ban has near relatives in the city it is generally gen-erally a matter of difficulty- for tha friends to find a place in which to hold the funeral, unless', they wish to. go. to the expeneo of a church funeral, and have a claim upon some church of which they can make use. In this way it has naturally come about that bodies have been left to lie in the undertaker's rooms, and at the time set for tho funeral the friends have gathered there and listened ' to a brief service pronounced by some clergyman, supplied by the undertaker, too, perhaps, and thence have borne the body directly to the grave. With the increase of this custom the undertakers have beau compelled to increase in-crease the size of their rooms and to' fit them up better and differently from ordinary or-dinary shops of the sort One city undertaker un-dertaker has gone so far as to clear out tha whole front of his store and leave a large room nearly seventy-five feet deep, with paneled, church like ceiling and walls, which cau be filled with chairs if necessary, where tho services are held. It is not unusual for as many as two or three hundred persons to gather at funeral fu-neral services held in this shop. Some quite well known persons have been buried bur-ied from there. One, a woman, who had been in life a well known advocate of cremation, went from there to the) crematory only a few days ago. Gome undertakers think that this custom cus-tom will continually increase ia a city like New York, and that in time every undertaker wilt have to keep a sort of small chapel in connection with his shop for the use of his customers. At present those who have the facilities for allow-ins allow-ins services to be held in their shops make an extra charge for the use of the room for that purpose, but competition is already doing away with that. New Vork Sinn. |