Cape Breton's Magazine

Port Hood Island. March 9?? I89O Dear Ninas It is quite a time since I got a note from J'u, but it is so hard to write when you cannot write good. We are all pretty wel% at present. I am troubled with rheumatism. Sometimes I cannot walk but such is liae. Old age brings infirmi? ties to be ready for that life where God has gone to ;'6pare a place for loved ones that where he is they may be also. I want to be ready i(ith; my lamp trimmed and burn? ing and ready to go in and meet my loved ones that havexgoile before. They are happy and we soon their happiness shall see. Pray the battle r' never over till we enter the pearly gates. Richard is there. Grandfather is there. He left that old body here buried on the land but he has a beautiful mansion ov'r there. Oh what shall Jesus' Father when...our face like his shall shine. Oh what a glory when saints and angels join there. All are well on the island. I don't go out much this winter. There is no snow to make roads worse down to Aunt Phoebe's. John Fraser is married and got a son. Charles is married, went home the same night. Everything is quiet. You are coming home in the summer. Give my love to all the folks up there I know. From your affectionate grandmother, Anne Smith Mrs. Willie D. Deveau, Belle Marche: Then, they used to have the body right in the house. It would be the front room. If it had been that they had no front room, they'd take all the things from the bedroom and it'd be in the bedroom. There'd be noth? ing else • no furniture • maybe a table to put a lamp on it. We've only had the fun? eral home since a few years. Even some to? day, when they die, they say don't put me in the funeral home. Still, they get em? balmed. But before they weren't getting them embalmed. They used to keep the corpse two days. Me, I've always been in doubt. I've always said, if I die, be sure that I'm dead. When you're embalmed you're sure then. But it's not necessary. They only keep them a couple of days. Even if the person is very fat, well, you can keep the corpse a day anyway. If you see something change, you know very well that he's dead, the change shows you he's really dead. But in those days there was no embalming. Noth? ing at all. My mother-in-law and my father- in-law and my husband weren't embalmed. They were right here, in the front room. When they were making the coffin, used to keep them one day like to give people the time to make the coffin. There were certain men who did the coffin. And then the last night, well, they used to put them in the coffin. But after we used to buy the cof? fin • we had to go to Inverness for one 'cause I had a little girl that died • the embalmer of today had some coffins. He was selling. So we used to go and get them, and wash the person nice. Like my mother-in- law • you would never think she was dead. Put a little colour to her and ev.erything. We kept her two days: from the morning, all day ajid night and next day, and all night.