[9] The name of the viceroy who presented it to the town.
CHAPTER III.
A Mexican Wake.
The 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[10] 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 gambling, and the noisy conversation; the men and women meanwhile laughing and singing like savages. The flowers and jewels which decorated him, far from stripping death of its gloomy solemnity, only made the appearance more hideous. A general silence followed our entrance. A man, in whom I soon recognized the master of the house and the father of the dead child, rose to receive us. His face, far from being oppressed with sadness, seemed, on the contrary, radiant with delight, and he pointed with an air of pride to the numerous guests that had assembled to celebrate the death of his son, an event considered as a favor from heaven, since God had been pleased to call the child to himself before he was old enough to displease him. He assured us that we were welcome to his house, and that to him, on such an occasion, strangers became friends. Thanks to the loquacity of Perico, I had become the focus on which all eyes were centred. I had a difficult part to play, Perico thinking it right to make it appear to all who would listen to him that no one could kill people with a better grace than I. To enable me to act my part properly, I hastened to put my gloves in my pocket, and affect the most cavalier assurance, convinced that it was prudent to follow the fashion.
"What do you think of the lodging I have found you?" asked Perico, rubbing his hands; "is not this better than what I could offer you? besides, you will now know what a velorio is; it will be a resource in the evenings when you are low-spirited, and have nothing to do. Thanks to me, you will thus acquire a title to the eternal gratitude of this worthy father, whose child, having died before its seventh year, is now an angel in heaven."
And Perico, anxious, no doubt, to have a share in this tribute of gratitude, seized, without ceremony, an enormous glass of chinguirito, and swallowed it at a draught. I witnessed for the first time this barbarous custom, which compels the father of a family to cloak his sorrow beneath a smiling face, and to do the honors of his house to the first vagabond who, under the guidance of a sereno, comes to gorge himself with meat and drink before the corpse of his son, and share in that profuse liberality which often brings want to the family on the morrow.
The orgie, which had been disturbed a moment by our entrance, now fell in its usual course, and I began to cast my eyes about a little. In the midst of a circle of excited females, who esteem it a duty never to neglect a night-wake, I perceived a pale face, lips attempting to smile in spite of eyes full of tears, and, in this victim of a gross superstition, I had little difficulty in detecting the mother, for whom an angel in heaven could not compensate for the angel she missed on earth. The women about her seemed vying with one another as to who should increase the sorrow of the poor woman by their ill-timed but well-meant importunities. The different stages of the disease, and the sufferings of the dead child, were described by one woman; another enumerated infallible remedies that she would have applied if she had been consulted in time, such as St. Nicholas's plasters, moxas, the vapor of purslane gathered on a Friday in Lent, decoctions of herbs strained through a bit of a Dominican's frock, and the poor credulous mother turned her head away to wipe her eyes, thoroughly convinced that these remedies, if applied in time, would have saved her child. Sherry and cigarettes were rapidly consumed during these discussions; then all the innocent games in use in Spanish America were proposed and played, while the children, weary and sleepy, lay down to rest in every corner of the room, as if envying him whose discolored face protested, beneath the withered flowers, against this odious profanation of the dead.