38 



TOWN OF EUENOS AIRES. 



place. Of late years, a few of the principal people 

 have been buried in coffins, but generally the dead 

 are called for by a hack hearse, in which there is a 

 fixed coffin, into which they are put, when away 

 the man gallops with the corpse, and leaves it in 

 the vestibule of the Recolata. There is a small 

 vehicle for children, which I really thought was 

 a mountebank's cart; it was a light open tray, on 

 wheels painted white, with light blue silk curtains, 

 and driven at a gallop by a lad dressed in scarlet, 

 with an enormous plume of white feathers in his 

 hat. As I was riding home one day, I was over- 

 taken by this cart, (without its curtains, &c,) in 

 which there was the corpse of a black boy nearly 

 naked. I galloped along with it for some dis- 

 tance ; the boy, from the rapid motion of the 

 carriage, was dancing sometimes on his back and 

 sometimes on his face ; occasionally his arm or leg 

 would get through the bar of the tray, and two or 

 three times I really thought the child would have 

 been out of the tray altogether. The bodies of the 

 rich were generally attended by their friends ; but 

 the carriages with four people in each were seldom 

 able to go as fast as the hearse. 



