Between the two cemeteries is the house for the dead.  When I walked down the long central alle of the old ground, I saw at the farther end, beyond a fountain, twinkling lights.  Coming nearer, I found that they proceeded from the large windows of a building, which was a part of the arcade.  People were looking in at the windows, going and coming to and from them continually; and I was prompted by curiosity to look within.  A most unexpected sight met my eye.  In a long room, upon elevated biers, lay people dead:  they were so disposed that the faces could be seen; and there they rested in a solemn repose.  Officers in uniform, citizens in plain dress, matrons and maids in the habits that they wore when living, or in the white robes of the grave.  About most of them were lighted candles.  About all of them were flowers:  some were almost covered with bouquets.  There were rows of children, little ones scarce a span long,—­in the white caps and garments of innocence, as if asleep in beds of flowers.  How naturally they all were lying, as if only waiting to be called!  Upon the thumb of every adult was a ring in which a string was tied that went through a pulley above and communicated with a bell in the attendant’s room.  How frightened he would be if the bell should ever sound, and he should go into that hall of the dead to see who rang!  And yet it is a most wise and humane provision; and many years ago, there is a tradition, an entombment alive was prevented by it.  There are three rooms in all; and all those who die in Munich must be brought and laid in one of them, to be seen of all who care to look therein.  I suppose that wealth and rank have some privileges; but it is the law that the person having been pronounced dead by the physician shall be the same day brought to the dead-house, and lie there three whole days before interment.

There is something peculiar in the obsequies of Munich, especially in the Catholic portion of the population.  Shortly after the death, there is a short service in the courtyard of the house, which, with the entrance, is hung in costly mourning, if the deceased was rich.  The body is then carried in the car to the dead-house, attended by the priests, the male members of the family, and a procession of torch-bearers, if that can be afforded.  Three days after, the burial takes place from the dead-house, only males attending.  The women never go to the funeral; but some days after, of which public notice is given by advertisement, a public service is held in church, at which all the family are present, and to which the friends are publicly invited.  Funeral obsequies are as costly here as in America; but everything is here regulated and fixed by custom.  There are as many as five or six classes of funerals recognized.  Those of the first class, as to rank and expense, cost about a thousand guldens.  The second class is divided into six subclasses.  The third is divided into two.  The cost of the first of the third class is about four hundred guldens.  The lowest class of those able to have a funeral costs twenty-five guldens.  A gulden is about two francs.  There are no carriages used at the funerals of Catholics, only at those of Protestants and Jews.