Page:Mexico as it was and as it is.djvu/293

228 In April last, Madame Santa Anna, the wife of the President, was dangerously ill, and on the 19th of the month her life was in imminent peril. Early in the morning it was rumored that she was to receive the last sacrament, and, in all probability, would not survive the service. About noon, notes of invitation were sent from the Foreign Office to all the members of the Diplomatic Corps, requesting their presence at the ceremony of the Viaticum; and at seven o'clock we repaired, in uniform, to the Palace, where we were provided with massive wax torches, and ranged round the walls of the audience-chamber with the invited citizens, strangers, and friends of the suffering lady.

It was already quite dark. Presently the large bell of the Cathedral began to toll mournfully; and; being near a window overlooking the great square, I could perceive a solemn procession, with torches, issue from the door of the sacred edifice, preceded by a military band performing appropriate music. Slowly it advanced to the Palace gates—the jewelled robes of the Archbishop and attendant priests, flashing in the blaze of a thousand lights, as they approached the portals. They mounted the steps; entered the apartment; and, as the prelate passed through, chanting a hymn, the crowd knelt to the sacred elements. The Cabinet Ministers and Chiefs of the army then accompanied the priests into the chamber of the lady, where the required functions were performed. Returning again, through our saloon, they issued into the square, and, after making a tour around it, entered the Cathedral. The effect of this procession—with its torches blazing in the night like so many diamonds—its solemn military music, and its melancholy hymn-was solemn and picturesque.

There was a similar display (though not with so much magnificence,) at the death of General Moran, ex-Marquis of Vivanco. His dwelling was directly opposite my hotel, and I saw the whole of the preparations for his funeral from the windows.

Having been a patriotic soldier in his day, the Government undertook the arrangement of the last rites in his honor, and he was escorted by the flower of the troops.

His body was embalmed by the process of Ganal. It was laid on an open bier, dressed in the full uniform of a Major-general, with boots, spurs, plumed hat, sword, and even the cane by his side, as is usual with Spanish officers. So perfectly had the operation been performed on the body, that it presented in these equipments, a horrid and unnatural mockery of sleep; nor shall I ever forget the stony gaze of the glass eyes, as the dead body of the General issued from his gate-way.

To the sound of solemn music the procession moved along the streets of Espiritu Santo and San Francisco, toward the great church near the Alameda. The bier was placed on a lofty catafalque before the altar, hung with black velvet and lighted with tapers. A solemn service was performed with every aid of ecclesiastical splendor—and a multitude of