If your correspondent on this subject in Vol. iii., p. 125., would ask an old inhabitant of his parish which is the _backside_ of their church, and why it is so called? he would probably come at the fact. I would refer him to Burn's _History of Parish Registers_, page 96., foot-note, where he will find it stated that "a part of the churchyard was sometimes left unconsecrated, for the purpose of burying excommunicated persons."
_North Side of Churchyards._--Your correspondents seem to be agreed as to the facts, not as to the origin of the objection. I suspect MR. HAWKER (Vol. ii., p. 253.) is nearest the truth; and the following, from _Coverdale on Praying for the Dead_, may help to strengthen his conjecture:
"As men die, so shall they arise: _if in faith_ in the Lord _towards the south_, they need no prayers; they are presently happy, and shall arise in glory: _if in unbelief_ without the Lord _towards the north_, then are they past all hope."
_North Side of Churchyards_ (Vol. ii., pp. 253. 346.).--The subjoined extract from Bishop Wilkins's _Discourse concerning a New Planet, tending to prove that it is probable our Earth is one of the Planets_, 8vo., 1640, pp. 64-66., will serve to illustrate the passage from Milton, of the north being "the devoted region of Satan and his hosts:"
"It was the opinion of the Jewish rabbies, that man was created with his face to the east; therefore the Hebrew word signifies _ante_, or the east; _post_, or the west; _dextra_, or the south; _sinistra_, or the north. You may see all of them put together in that place of Job xxiii. 8, 9.: 'Behold I go forward, and he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him: on the left hand, where he doth work, but I cannot behold him. He hideth himself on the right hand, that I cannot see him.' Which expressions are, by some interpreters, referred unto the four coasts of heaven, according to the common use of those original words. From hence it is that many of the ancients have concluded hell to be in the north, which is signified by the left hand; unto which side, our Saviour tells us, that the goats shall be divided. Which opinion likewise seems to be favoured by that place in Job xxvi. 6, 7., where it is said, "Hell is naked before God, and destruction hath no covering.' And presently it is added, 'He stretcheth out the north over the empty place.' Upon these grounds, St. Jerome interprets that speech of the Preacher, Eccles. xi. 3.: 'If the tree fall toward the south, or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth, there shall it be,' concerning those who shall go either to heaven or hell. And in this sense also do some expound that of Zechariah (xiv. 4.), where it is said that 'the Mount of Olives shall cleave in the midst: half of it shall remove toward the north, and half of it toward the south.' By which it is intimated, that amongst those Gentiles, who shall take upon them the profession of Christ, there are two sorts: some that go to the north, that is, to hell; and others to the south, that is, to heaven. And therefore it is, say they, that God so often threatens evil out of the north: and upon this ground it is, saith Besoldus, that there is no religion that worships that way. We read of the Mahometans, that they adore towards the south; the Jews towards the west; Christians towards the east; but none to the _north_."