444 REAL DEL MONTE MINES. 



Thus you may with impunity bestow a box on the ears on one of 

 your servants, according to his deserts or your own discretion ; whereas 

 his fellow, whose look would seem to imply an equal degree of hu- 

 mility, will be ready, like Kenneth of the Mist, to " pay a yard of 

 leathern scourge with a foot of tempered steel." The district of Real 

 del Monte is notorious for such catastrophes. One day, very shortly 

 after my arrival in the place, just as I had sat down at dinner, I heard 

 a cry of women, proceeding apparently from the next house. I in- 

 quired the cause from my cook, an old woman, who just then brought 

 in a dish, and she informed me, scarcely deeming it worth while to 

 turn her head, as she made the communication, that a murder was 

 committed in the adjoining house. Such an affair occurring among 

 one's immediate neighbours being rather more exciting to me than it 

 appeared to this old lady, I quitted my meal, and hastened to the 

 spot. There I saw the body of a man, lying quite dead on the 

 ground, in a pool of its own blood, Several persons standing near 

 were also besmeared in a hideous manner, and a lean dog, having 

 tasted the purple flood, began to lap it up eagerly. I looked at the 

 face of the victim. He was of a very swarthy complexion, and the 

 brows closely bent, gave him an expression dark as night, such as 

 might seem rather to suit the author than the victim of the crime by 

 which he had recently suffered. The act had been committed in the 

 most deliberate manner. Two carpenters, employed in the repairs of 

 the dwelling, quarrelled about a dollar, in consequence of which one 

 of them, grinding his chissel as sharp as possible, watched an oppor- 

 tunity of striking it up to the hilt in the heart of the other, as he 

 leaned against a wall. Death followed instantaneously. The size of 

 the weapon accounted for the great effusion of blood. None of the 

 spectators seemed much shocked at the circumstances, with the ex- 

 ception of two poor women, who, as I have before mentioned, were 

 crying ; not, I dare say, from any particular interest in the sufferer, 

 further than the abhorrence which deeds of violence and bloodshed 

 naturally excite in the bosoms of the softer sex. The assassin was 

 subsequently apprehended and imprisoned at Pachuca, a town at a 

 league distance. In eight days afterwards he had escaped. It was 

 unnecessary to inquire into the particulars, as I heard that he was in 

 some way related to the alcalde of the place. 



Jealousy, " the injured lover's hell/' is not very prevalent among 

 the Mexicans, at least in their intercourse with each other, and we 

 may exclaim, with the Portuguese poet in a similar case : 



" Ditosa condif;ao, ditosa gente, 

 Que nao sao de ciumes offendidos." 



Lusiad, can. vii. st.41. 



It is only against foreigners that its flames are excited. I have, on 

 more than one occasion, remarking an unusual degree of gravity and 

 reserve in the manner of a young person, elicited, on pressing for a 

 reason, the discovery that she had recently " confessed" and that the 

 padre had forbidden her to be on terms of familiarity with heretics. 

 The effects of such exhortations I have known to last about three 

 days, but, I believe, seldom longer. The Mexican women, like most 



