John Galt - Buried Alive

 I am pleased to say that the title of the post does not in any way refer to the death or burial of John Galt here in the Inverkip Street Cemetery in Greenock, but rather to a curious short story written by Galt in 1821.

Buried Alive was first printed in Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine in 1821 and also included with others in Galt's The Steam Boat, a collection of stories related on a steamboat trip from Glasgow to Greenock and Helensburgh.  The story is narrated by "a young man with a white face and a slender habit of body" and is a strange tale of death and burial.

The pale young man recalls "… I heard the sound of weeping at my pillow - and the voice of the nurse say, "He is dead."  I cannot describe what I felt at these words.  I exerted my utmost power of volition to stir myself, but I could not move even an eyelid.  After a short pause my friend drew near; and, sobbing and convulsed with grief, drew his hand over my face, and closed my eyes.  The word was then darkened, but I could still hear, and feel, and suffer."

The narrator then goes on to recall his misuse by the undertakers who "treated what they believed a corpse, with the most appalling ribaldry."  Next comes the horrific tale of funeral and burial.  The earth is thrown on his coffin - he can hear the sound, but can do nothing about it.  He thinks about how his flesh will rot and decay, buried in the earth …

"In the contemplation of this hideous thought, I heard a low and undersound in the earth over me, and I fancied that the worms and the reptiles of death were coming - that the mole and the rat of the grave would soon be upon me.  The sound continued to grow louder and nearer."  I love this passage!

But the tale is not finished, John Galt has a couple of surprises for the reader.  Suddenly the buried man feels hand about his neck and he is dragged from his coffin, his body is thrown into a carriage.  He has been taken by the body-snatchers or resurrection men!  He is carried into a room, stripped of his shroud and placed on a table.  He is in an anatomy theatre where galvanic experiments are to be made on his body - "The first shock vibrated through all my nerves; they rung and jangled like the strings of a harp."  And then …..?!

Well you can read the remainder of the story online here.

John Galt - brilliant author and teller of tales!