At its simplest, an everyday ramble round a graveyard subliminally corrects any tendency to assume ourselves immortal, a trait that has blighted humankind all the way back to Achilles in ancient Greece, and before him Gilgamesh in Babylonia, but which is arguably more pronounced than ever in our scientific, secular and sceptical times when even talk of death is taboo.

With the decline of organised religion, we no longer seem to have the language, let alone the ritual and context, with which to contemplate the day that will inevitably come when we won't be here any longer. We prefer instead to fret about our life insurance — what Philip Larkin labelled "the costly aversion of the eyes from death".

As an antidote, casual cemetery-visiting (not the right phrase for it, but I've struggled and failed to find one to describe those I have met on my travels who have developed the habit) is anything but costly. It even has proven benefits this side of death. 

A 2008 study by social psychologist Matthew Gailliot of Florida State University attempted to quantify how visiting a cemetery, or living next door to one, affects behaviour. Actors engaged with those they found walking in graveyards, or in the streets around them, and sought their help with a practical dilemma. They then repeated the exercise away from the burial ground. They reported that the first group was 40 per cent more likely to offer assistance than the second.