"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.