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34

A Mexican Wake.

company to which Perico had introduced me presented a very singular appearance. About twenty men and women of the lowest class were seated in a circle, chatting, bawling, and gesticulating. A dank, cadaverous smell pervaded the apartment, which was hardly smothered by the smoke of cigars, and the fumes of Xeres and Chinguirito. In a corner of the room stood a table loaded with provisions of every sort, with cups, bottles, and flasks. Some gamblers, seated at a table a little farther off, jingling copper money, and shouting out the technical terms of monte, were quarreling, with drunken excitement, over piles of cuartillas and tlacos. Under the triple excitement of wine, women, and play, the orgie, which had only commenced when I arrived, seemed likely to mount to a formidable height; but what struck me most was precisely that which seemed to engage the attention of the assembly least. A young child, who seemed to have scarcely reached his seventh year, was lying at full length on a table. His pale brow, wreathed with flowers faded by the heat of the stifling atmosphere, his glazed eyes, and shriveled, sunken cheeks, already tinged with a violet hue, plainly showed that life had left him, and that it was some days, probably, since he had slept the eternal sleep. The mere sight of the little corpse was heartrending amid the cries, the