Each article of
clothing found upon them, or any trinket, or other property, which
might lead to the discovery of the name and friends of the dead, is
carefully preserved. Bodies properly identified are surrendered to the
friends of the deceased. Those unclaimed are interred at the expense of
the city, and their effects are preserved a much longer time for
purposes of identification.
It is a gloomy looking building, this Morgue, and it is rarely empty.
In a dark, cheerless room, with a stone floor, there are rows of marble
slabs supported by iron frames. Over each one of these is a water jet.
Stretched on these cold beds, are lifeless forms, entirely covered with
a sheet except as to their faces, which stare blankly at the dark
ceiling. A constant stream of fresh water falls on the lifeless
breasts, and trickles over the senseless forms, warding off decay to
the latest moment, in the vain hope that some one to whom the dead man
or woman was dear in life may come and claim the body. It is a vain
hope, for but a few bodies are claimed. Nearly all go to the potter's
field, where they sleep well in their nameless graves.
The dark waters of the rivers and bay send many an inmate to this
gloomy room. The harbor police, making their early morning rounds, find
some dark object floating in the waters. It is scarcely light enough to
distinguish it, but the men know well what it is.
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