After a little manoeuvring I learnt that two or three Mykoniotes were in extremis; that a young Mykoniote had lately died at Athens, and that the family were determined to have the customary lamentation for one who had died abroad (xódi ^gr or exodiós thrénos ^gr). Nobody could be kinder than Mrs. Monk when she had once warmed to the subject, evincing considerable pride in describing what I was pleased to call the speciality of her island; and from my conversation with her I learnt much about a Greek’s conception of death.

The idea of death in the mind of a modern Greek is distinctly pagan: death to them is solely the deprivation of the good things of this life; their minds do not seem to be capable of looking forward to a future beyond the ‘dark grave’ and the ‘black earth.’ Hades is the destination of the dead, Charon is their ever-watchful guardian; punishments for sin are carried on in Tartarus, in the fiery river (pýrinos potamós ^gr) the Phlegethon of antiquity. Christian teaching has adapted to itself rather than obliterated ancient myths. The great authority for all the horrid frescoes and ideas represented in the Greek Church is derived from that wonderful document entitled the Apocalypse of the Virgin, in which it is related how the mother of Christ was one day engaged in prayer on the Mount of Olives, and conceived a desire to see the chastened in hell. She asked St. Michael to take her, and as he conducted her he explained the punishments and crimes of each person they there met. The archangel Michael is the modern Hermes, the angel of death, and in the representations of him, usually to be seen over the door entering into the part of the church consecrated to the sacred mysteries, he is depicted as a warrior having in his right hand a naked sword, balances in his left, and trampling a sinner under his feet. Again the idea is prevalent that at a man’s birth the Fates fix the day of his death; consequently the pious believe that on November 8, the archangel’s day, he looks through the list and writes down on a tablet the names of those who during the ensuing year must fall victims to his two-edged sword.

From the lamentations (moirológiai ^gr) which are sung in Greece to-day we can learn much about the popular beliefs concerning the condition of the lower world. If you read in Passow’s collection the song of the dying ‘klepht’ Zedros your mind is at once carried back to the sentiments Sophocles puts into the mouth of the dying Ajax.

Charon, or Charos, to-day is a synonym for death. ‘Charon seized him’ is a common expression, and a clever popular enigma likens the world to a reservoir full of water at which Charon, as a wild beast, drinks; but the beast is never satisfied and the reservoir never exhausted. Imagination is the soul of these modern Greek death ballads; the ideas are beautifully poetical in many cases, though the language is crude and often difficult to follow from the complexity of patois expressions. They sing to you of feasts and banquets in Hades, where the dead are eaten for food; they tell you of the gardens of Hades, where the souls of the departed are planted and come up as weird plants.

King Charon is not the Death of the middle ages, the skeleton with a scythe in his hand; he is the Homeric ferryman ; he rows souls across to Hades in his caïque, and he is a hero of huge stature and flaming eyes of colour like fire (Cf. porphýreos ^gr ‘Il.’ v. 83); he goes round to collect the dead on horseback: so in olden days a horse was the symbol of death, as we see on so many tombstones. Charon, too, can lurk in ambush to surprise his victims, and can change himself into a swallow, like Athene, who perched on Ulysses’ house on the day of the murder of Penelope’s suitors. Charon’s palace in Hades is decorated with the dead, and the bones of the departed are used for every purpose of domestic use. The dead who haunt it are for ever planning to return to the upper air, and form schemes for so doing, which Charon always discovers; sometimes they even manage to steal his keys, but in vain.

There are traces of Lethe, too, in the lamentations of to-day — a river of which the dead drink, and forget their homes and their orphan children. There is found, too, a parallel case in animal life; a shepherd will tell you that there grows on the mountains a herb called ‘the grass of denial,’ arid when the flocks have eaten thereof they forget their young.

On the second morning after our arrival at Mykonos we heard that young Parodos was no more; that he had left a wife and several small children. A very sad case it was, carried off, as he had been, in the prime of life by a, consumption, of some years’ standing, which had been brought to a climax by this damp and windy winter. Mrs. Monk, with feminine minuteness, entered into details of his last hours. He had received the prayer oil (euchélaion ^gr), she said, in the middle of the night, with the customary attendance of seven priests to bless it. Very early in the morning, feeling that he was sinking, he summoned his family around him and sprinkled them, as is their wont in Mykonos, with water in which salt had been cast, saying, ‘As the salt has melted so may my curses melt.’

‘The agonies of death were short; he passed away as a burnt-out candle’ said Mrs. Monk with a contented sigh; ‘so we have no fear of his dying unpardoned.’ ‘Why so?’ I asked; and she spoke disdainfully of a religion which does not teach that, if the agony of death is prolonged, all know that the sufferer has been unpardoned for some injustice, in which case, if possible, the injured man, if alive, must be summoned to forgive, or if dead, the man in the death agony must be fumigated with the smoke made by burning a portion of the other’s shroud.

The bells of Mykonos were tolling mournfully, to tell of the death of the young man; and I shuddered involuntarily now that I knew that my desire was to be realised. I was to be present at a moerologia over the dead.

‘The women are preparing the corpse now; by ten o’clock all will be ready’ Mrs. Monk gaily suggested as we were discussing some eggs and boiled milk for breakfast. ‘The moerologista Zachara is engaged to sing, and no one is better suited than she for her occupation.’

We then talked about these women: how they practise their dirges when working in the fields; how they have certain verses and certain stock ideas for nearly every emergency; and how by constant practice it comes quite easily to them to make impromptu verses about the special case in question. A few years ago they used to send to Mykonos from all the islands round when a death occurred at which a special honour was desired to be shown to some deceased magnate; but lately this custom has been abandoned. It must have been a weird sight to see the woman dressed in the peculiar costume of Mykonos, the tall makramades head-dress, on her way to a neighbouring island to sing her wail.

The makramades when black is a peculiarly hideous and forbidding headgear, being a tall block of wood or stiff canvas, which is placed on the top of the head and bound round with a towel; round the forehead is wound another towel^note or handkerchief, which secures the head-dress firmly, and the ends of which stick out curiously on either side of the face. Two curls appear on the cheeks from under this. Of course, as suited to her calling, the moerologista has to wear this black; other women have coloured and embroidered ones, which are by no means so repulsive, especially when worn with the dress to match it. They have blue jackets edged with ermine, a red handkerchief round the neck, a gold triangular stomacher, and yellow wristbands, a common cotton petticoat and velvet shoes with white lace edges. This costume is, alas! now a rarity; we saw just a few old women wearing it, but when they are dead there will be no one to take their place. In a few years the makramades of Mykonos, the tourlos of Amorgos, the pina of Siphnos — the last relics of those costumes which were different in every island — will be swept away and forgotten.

‘We Mykoniotes are deeply attached to our moerologiae’, remarked Mrs. Monk with pride. ‘My uncle, who was a merchant at Marseilles, and who died there, was determined to have one at his death, and he asked his wife to sing one over his corpse. She, poor woman! pleaded that she had been so many years in a foreign country that she had quite forgotten what to say and do. “Go fetch my ledger,” said the dying man sternly; “there you will find put down all I have earned. Sing that!” ’

In answer to my enquiries Mrs. Monk told me how they treated a corpse in Mykonos: the funeral takes place as soon as possible after death — generally within a few hours — the dead body is washed in water and wine, then the deceased is wrapped either in a shroud or dressed in his best clothes and placed, on a bier in the middle of the outer or reception room of the house, his face is turned towards the east, his hands across his breast, and his feet are bound together with black bands; and at his head and feet stand two lamps adorned with coloured ribands. The bier is covered with flowers, out of which the wax-like face of death peers in hideous contrast.

When everything was prepared the kinsmen and friends of the deceased man were summoned to attend the lamentation by the bellman, and amongst the others I wended my way to the house of mourning, feeling heartily ashamed of myself for intruding on their grief; but at the same time I was fortified by a consciousness that the Mykoniotes were flattered at the notice taken of their custom.

The moerologista Zachara came in shortly after we arrived; the kinswomen were all seated around the corpse; the afflicted widow and her children were groaning audibly on the divan, and had their hair down ready for the customary tearing and shaking. The entrance of Zachara was the signal for the commencement of that demonstrative grief in which the Greeks love to indulge: they all set to work to sing in mournful cadence about the merits of the deceased, keeping time with their feet and beating their knees with their hands; then suddenly, with a fearful shriek, the widow went off into an ecstasy of grief. She tore her hair, she lacerated her cheek, she beat her breast, she scratched her bare arms, until at length two or three women rushed forward to restrain her in her extravagant grief; her poor little children lay crouching in a corner, terrified beyond measure at what was going on and screaming with all their might.

At length Zachara, who hitherto had taken no part in the proceedings, but had stood in a statuesque attitude with a well-feigned face of poignant grief, as if contemplating the misery before her to inspire her muse, now rushed forward, fell on the corpse, kissed it, and rose to commence her dirge in that harsh and grating voice which the Greeks love, but which is so distasteful to Western ears. Thus she began:—

As she reached the end of this stanza her voice trembled, she paused for a moment, as if to regain her composure, during which time nothing was heard but stifled sobs.

There was a dead silence now, the widow’s groans were hushed, the beating of the feet was stopped, the pause was one of half-curiosity, half-suspense, for all knew that the terrible climax was coming as Zachara lifted up her voice again and wailed :—

This was Zachara’s prologue, and after it the grief and lamentations were renewed with fresh vigour. So far doubtless, many of the mourners had heard before on similar occasions, for it was one of her stock pieces; after this she had to deal with the special case of the deceased. She sang of the loneliness of the living, of the horrors of death, and in that strange language of hyperbole she wondered how the sun could venture to shine on so lamentable a scene as the present. During all this time the widow, the kinswomen, and the children were wild with grief. Nature at length asserted herself and demanded a pause, during which the company refreshed themselves with raki, biscuits, figs, and other small refections which had been laid out on a table in the corner of the room.

Then the tide of grief flowed on again; in fact, a Greek lament is one of the most heart-rending scenes that can be witnessed if one were not somewhat fortified all the while by an inward consciousness that much of it had been got up for the occasion, and that mourning such as this, which is repugnant to our stolid northern nations, is usually as evanescent as it is intense.

Presently another well-known moerologista dropped in, who, we learnt, was a relative of the deceased; but why she had not joined the company previously remained a mystery. She and Zachara then sang verses alternately, and together they reminded one forcibly of the Carian women of antiquity who were hired for the same purpose; and one’s mind wandered back to a Greek chorus — that of Aeschylus especially — where the virgins at the gate of Agamemnon indulge in all the most poignant manifestations of grief, beating their breasts, lacerating their cheeks, and rending their garments; and I could not but admire the prudence of Solon, who forbade the excessive lamentations of women (Plut. ‘ Sol.’ xii. and xxi.)

This prolonged agony of mourning continued for two long hours; occasionally to relieve the paid lamenters, some of the kinswomen would take up their parable and sing a verse or two, sending messages of love and remembrances to friends who had gone before to the shades of Hades; and great was my relief when the priests arrived with their acolytes bearing the cross and the lanterns to convey the corpse to the grave.

Before leaving the house it is customary to break a jug of water on the threshold: they spill water when anyone goes for a journey as an earnest of success; now the traveller had gone on his long journey, and the jug was broken.

It was not far to the church, so that the funeral procession did not take long. The bier, with the corpse exposed, was carried by four bearers; the priests chanted the offices as they went; and occasionally the lamenters, who headed the procession, broke forth into their hideous wails. And as it passed by women came forth from their houses to groan in chorus with the others. It was, indeed, a painful sight to witness.

On reaching the church the corpse on the bier was laid just inside the porch; and when the priests began the liturgy the mourners ceased to wail for a time. Then came the impressive and very solemn stichera of the last kiss, which was chanted by all the priests together — ‘Blessed is the way thou shalt go to-day, &c.’ — whereat each mourner advanced and gave the last kiss to the cold face of the corpse, after which all with one accord burst forth again into extravagant demonstrations of grief. Finally, the corpse was lowered, without a coffin, into its shallow grave, and each bystander cast a little soil into the tomb. Only the rich have coffins; in fact, the poor have a prejudice against them, for three years after interment the bones are dug up again, washed, and cleaned, and put into the charnel house; and if by any chance the flesh is not decayed off them the people think it a terrible proof that the owner of the bones has not been allowed to rest in peace — he is still a poor wandering ghost.

When a death has occurred in a house they thoroughly purify the place, and on the return of the mourners from the funeral they wash their hands. Many superstitions concerning death still exist, but they are becoming fewer year by year; for example, the dying must not have a goat’s hair coverlet over the bed — it will impede his departure — and a child should not sneeze whilst a lamentation is being sung, for it is considered as a portent of its approaching death; only by tearing off a portion of its dress can this disaster be averted.

In most places it is considered wrong to cook or perform household offices in the house of mourning, so friends and relatives come laden with food and lay the ‘bitter table’ as they call it (just like the nekródeipna ^gr of ancient days); and for three nights after a death, on the pillow which the departed used they burn a dim lamp, because it is thought that for three days after burial the soul loves to revisit those in his old home, and busies himself with his usual avocations.

On the day following the burial they prepare the kóllyba ^gr at Mykonos; that is to say, boiled wheat adorned with sugar plums, honey, sesame, basil, or whatever other delicacy may suggest itself to the survivors. Sometimes they call these ‘blessed cakes’ (makária ^gr) — out of euphony, no doubt — and on the third day the friends and relatives reassemble, again being summoned by the bellman, fresh moerologiae are sung, the grief scenes are re-enacted around the delicacies they have prepared, and after a sufficiency of lamentation they repair to the tomb, put the kóllyba ^gr upon it, lament a little more, and finally distribute the eatables to the poor at the church door.

The same ceremony is gone through again on the ninth and fortieth days after death, and again also on the memorial festivals at the expiration of six and twelve months, and rarely, too, on the second anniversary; in some places I have often seen tall pots like chimneys dotted about in churchyards where incense is burnt in honour of the departed on stated occasions. These and other ceremonies, recalling the ancient feasts to the dead, are still extant in the islands. At Thermià, after a funeral at the tomb, they distribute sweetmeats and raki, and again they do the same after the distribution of the kóllyba ^gr: this they call sinchórion ^gr, or ‘pardon.’ Sometimes, also, on the Saturday after the death, when the bread-baking takes place, warm bread with cheese or oil is distributed to poor women at the ovens in memory of the departed, and if the death has occurred during Lent or Easter Day flesh of lambs and wine are given in charity by wealthy mourners.

Such was the death and burial that I witnessed at Mykonos; a scene which, for its intense painfulness, will never be effaced from my memory. For days after the cries of grief rang in my ears and haunted my dreams, but Mrs. Monk, in her matter-of-fact way, said, ‘Everyone must die, and everyone at Mykonos, when he or she dies in the prime of life, must have a moerologia sung over the corpse. It is different when a worn-out old man or woman dies; nobody thinks it worthwhile to mourn for them. You must go to-morrow and hear the other lamentation over the poor young fellow who died at Athens.’

I rather demurred; one moerologia will last a long time, I thought; but Mrs. Monk persuaded me by saying that when anyone dies in foreign parts, unaccompanied to his tomb by his relatives, it is a solemn duty to show extra attention to his manes at home. Formerly a lamentation such as this could last forty days, but now it is limited; they wail and cry for a few days, and when they are exhausted they give it up like sensible people, and do not wear themselves to death with grief, as once they used to do.

It was to a little back street of Mykonos to which I was conducted next morning, and long before reaching the house we heard their wails and lamentations; and as I entered my breath was almost taken away by a young girl, with her black hair streaming over her back, her face distraught with grief, rushing violently at me, screaming, ‘Bring me back my brother!’ With difficulty her kinsfolk persuaded her to leave me alone and to resume her seat, and as soon as I recovered composure after this rather embarrassing adventure I recognised that she was the chief mourner, whose duty it was to exhibit every possible excess of woe. She screamed at the top of her voice, she gave violent tugs at her hair, she beat her breast with crossed hands, she stamped her feet, she scratched her arms until they bled; and all the while her kinswomen sat around her singing dirges in a low, monotonous voice, as if they had to squeeze them out by pressing their hands to their sides and beating their knees vigorously, and then pausing every now and again for a good, honest cry. When the poor sister’s grief was too violent, when she bade fair to do herself some serious bodily harm, the others rushed forward to soothe and restrain her; and a poor little girl of about ten, a younger sister of the deceased, would rush up from time to time and clutch at her dress in a terrified manner, asking her if she did not love her just a little, if all her affections had been centred on the departed.

Now and again the grief would subside, and then it was the moerologista’s turn to do her part to rouse up fresh anguish in their breasts.

The one redeeming feature in this scene was the absence of the corpse; the women were just seated round the room on chairs, with an empty space in the middle where the bier would have stood. There were no men there, and some few I spoke to outside seemed, I thought, to sneer a little at this lamentation for a dead man who had died away from home. And I do not think Demarch Monk was pleased with his wife for inciting me to go.

Now for a few words about Mykonos. In itself it is one of the least interesting islands of the archipelago. ‘ Lowly Mykonos,’as Pliny described it, is a fair description still. There are next to no remains of antiquity upon it, and now it is scarcely possible to make out where the two cities mentioned by Skylax stood. One must have been where the present town now stands, judging from the slight traces of walls and graves; and the other very likely was near the harbour of Panormos, a bay which runs right into the centre of the island, and near which there was a necropolis. Beside these insignificant traces, and the remains of a watchtower, all the glory of Mykonos is reflected. Every possible piece of antiquity comes from Delos, even the pillars down by the harbour to which the sailors moor their boats are from a temple at Delos.