136 SIX MONTHS IN MEXICO. 



is in the cloyster of the Dominicans a lampe 

 hanging in the church, with three hundred 

 branches wrought in silver, to hold so many 

 candles, besydes a hundred little lampes for 

 oyle set in it, every one being made of se- 

 verall workmanship, so exquisitely that it is 

 valued to be worth 400,000 duckats ; and 

 with such-like curious workes are many streets 

 made more rich and beautiful by the shops 

 of goldsmiths. To the by- word touching the 

 beauty of the women, I must add the liberty 

 they enjoy for gaming, which is such, that 

 the day and night is too short for them to 

 end a primera when once it is begun ; nay, 

 gaming is so common to them, that they 

 invite gentlemen to their houses for no other 

 end: — to myself it happened that, passing 

 along the streets with a fryer that came with 

 me the first yeere from Spain, a gentle- 

 woman of great birth knowing us to be cha- 

 petans (so they call the first yeere those that 



