Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/433

Rh the city. Among the embarrassments which in the first instance presented themselves, the principal were the general opposition of all the classes of citizens, and the want of the funds necessary to defray the expences of the erection. The narrowness of his own fortune, and the impracticability, under such circumstances, of having recourse to voluntary contributions, would have prevented the accomplishment of the undertaking, if it had not been directed by an unchangeable constancy. All that economy, personal co-operation, the influence of authority, and a promptness of execution, can contribute to advance the progress of a public monument, concurred in the construction of this one. At the close of the year 1789, the project was formed to build a cemetery: and at the middle of the following year, 1790, it was completed. Its figure is a parallelogram, the length of which is fifty-four geometrical paces, and its breadth thirty. It is situated to the W. N. W. of the city, at the distance of two musket shots, and lies on the left, on entering by the above-mentioned route. Its position is highly advantageous, inasmuch as it receives the benefit of the little ventilation the city enjoys, and is on a kind of eminence which facilitates the evaporation of the contagious and noxious effluvia. Fronting the entrance is a chapel in which the funeral rites are performed, and which is opened on all occasions when the relatives are desirous to solemnize the memory of any of the defunct who are there interred. The ornaments of the building, and the judicious choice of the site, do honour to the talents and taste of Don Juan de Galves.

The sepulchres within the church have been closed; and all the corpses, without distinction, interred in the cemetery. The