CREMONA
483
CREMONA
timps of epidemic. In answer it has been urged that
cemeteries are not a cause of the infection of the air.
In any well-ordered cemeterj- putrefaction takes place
six or seven feet below the surface. In the open air,
with abundance of o.Yj-gen, corruption proceeds more
quickly, with continuous discharge of noxious gases
in large quantities highly deleterious to health, but
it is not so in the grave. Mantegazza, a celebrated
bacteriologist, has shown ("Civilta Cattolica", Ser.
IX, Vols. X-XII) that, where there is but a small
supply of o.xygen, bodies will decompose without the
cni.mation of any odour whatever. Often, too, the
human body is so reduced before death that in the
earth it suffers little or no corruption at all, but is
first mummified and then slowly reduced to dust.
Again, earth-pressure prevents chemical decomposi-
tion to a great extent, producing in the place of gas a
liquid which enters into various combinations with
the materials in the soil, without the slightest danger
to the living. Earth is a powerful agent of disinfec-
tion. Even were noxious gases to escape in any
quantity, they would be absorbed on their way up-
wards, so that a very small part would ever reach the
surface, or were the soil not fit for absorption (as was
said to be the case at Pere-Lachaise, Paris) the process
would be taken up by the vegetable matter on the
surface. It is held, also, that, it is no more true to
say that cemeteries are a menace to water wells.
Charnock, Delacroix, and Dalton have proved that
of three parts of rain water only one penetrates the
soil, the other two either evaporating or flowing into
rivers. Now corpses in cemeteries are not so placed
as to form continuous strata, but a moderate distance
intervenes between any two bodies or rows of bodies.
Of the third part of rain, then, which penetrates the
soil of a graveyard a very little will touch the bodies
at all, and what does will not all reach the water
streams, but will be absorbed by the earth, so that
the remaining drops that would ultinmtely trickle into
the stream would have absolutely no effect, were the
stream large or small. Two experiments have proved
this. The doctors above mentioned selected a tank
6i feet high, filled it with sand, and for many month.s
filtered through it sewer water taken from the drain-
age pipes of Paris. The water received at the bottom
of the vessel was always found pure, clear and drink-
able. .\ like experiment was made with a smaller
vessel with like results. To anticipate the difficulty,
that what held for an experiment with small quanti-
ties would prove untrue were the amoimt of water
verj- great, a large tract of ground near Genvillers w.as
inundated for many months with the same putrid and
reeking waters of the Seine after they had passed
through the sewers of Paris. The result was the same.
Wells were dug in the inundated portion, and the
water was again found pure and clear, purer, as it
chanced, than that of other wells outside the boundary
of the place of experiments. In like manner, the
waters in the cemeteries of Leipzig, Hanover, Dresden,
and Merlin were examined and found purer and freer
from organic matter than the wells of the town.
In conclusion, it must be remembered that there is nothing directly oppo.sed to any dogma of the Church in the practice of cremation, and that, if ever the leaders of this sinister movement so far control the governments of (he world as to make this custom uni- versal, it would not be a lapse in the faith confided to her were she obliged to conform.
In .iddilion to tlip authorities cited in the body of this artide, con.-ull Corpus Jtirin Cnnonin: HARnoriN, Coll. Cone, VI, 44.1; Wkhvz, Juh Dicrrliilium, III, 405; Howe, Sli,du.i in Ihc Ch'it
Law, :i02.
WiLLUM Devlin.
succumbed, however, to Hannibal. After the vic-
tory of Octavian over Antony, the territory was di-
vided among the veterans of the conqueror. Caius
ViteUius defended it unsuccessfully against Vespasian,
by whom it was pillaged, but it rose again from its
ruins. About a. d. 600 Cremona, until then Byzan-
tine, was captured by the Lombard king, Agilulf.
Under the Emperors Otto (I-III) its bishops ac-
quired temporal sovereignty, but in 990 the people
expelled Bishop Olderico and adopted a republican
form of government. The Emperor Henry IV (10.56-
1106), however, confirmed Bishop Landulf in all im-
perial grants made to his predecessors. On the other
hand Henry V (1106-25) restored to the people their
Cremona, DrociwE or (Cremonexsi.s), suffragan
of Milan. Cremona is a city (.31,661 in 1901) in the
Province of Lombardy. Italy, on the left bank of the
Po. It was built by the Cenomanni Gauls, but later
became a Koman colony and a frontier fortress; it
D ToRR.\zzo, Cremona
communal rights. Thenceforth Cremona became a
citadel of Ghibellinism and was greatly favoured by
Frederic Barbarossa and Frederick II. though for the
same reason frequently at war with the neighbouring
cities. In later medieval times it had many lords or
"tyrants", the Pallavicini, the Bovara, the Caval-
cabo, the Visconti, the Sforza, until it became part
of the Duchy of Milan (132S). In 1702 it was taken
by imperial troops, and in 1796 and 1800 fell into the
hands of the French.
The people of Cremona venerate St. Sabinus as their first missionary and first bishop; he is said to have lived in the first century of our era. Among the better-known early bi.shops are St. Syrinus (c. 340), a vaUant apologist of the Faith against the Arians, and St. Silvinus (733); the latter is held in great veneration. Liudprand of Cremona was sent (946) as amba.s.sador to Constantinople by the Em- peror Otto II, and is the most famous historical writer of the tenth centurj'. Other important bishops were (iualtiero (lOSti), in whose time the cathedral was be- gun; Sicardo (1185), author of a chronicle; Caccia- conte da Somma (1261), under whom wtus erected the belfrj' of the cathednil; Nicolo Sfondrati (1.560), later Pope Gregory XIV; his nephew Paolo (1607); also the zealous and charitable Omobonodi Offredi (1791). The cathedral of Cremona is a splendid specimen of
