Page:Pictures of life in Mexico Vol 1.djvu/226

198 The man in the cloak of water-flags is the sufferer's husband; and the two youths are their children. They are alacran hunters; and the nets which they use for capturing the detestable vermin hang over their arms. All the family have repeatedly suffered from the attacks of their dangerous prey; the mother—who had long been sinking under disease, brought on by filth and destitution, and unable to rise from her bed upon the floor—has been twice stung by them within a short period: the double shock has proved fatal, and she now lies languishing in pain, with no hope of recovery.

In a very few days afterwards, the Indian and his two sons bore the remains of the poor woman to their last depository, in an obscure corner of a neglected burying-ground, near the city of Durango.

In highly civilized countries, the rites of sepulture, even among the humblest people, are accompanied by an absurd parade of state and frippery; but in Mexico the case is widely different. The poor have no prospect of being laid in some sweet, secluded resting-place, hallowed by the memory of friends and companions gone before, and sanctified by the