NOTICES OF PERU. 



239 



it was allowed, as a sort of consolation, which every nation, 

 savage and civilized, seeks in its religion, in times of adversity, 

 and was afterwards maintained as lucrative to the convents and 

 churches to which they resorted. 



In 1791, there were sixteen of these brotherhoods, that held 

 meetings, over which a corporal presided as president ; and 

 they were extremely jealous of rank on these occasions. They 

 had their dances and their feasts, and when any one of them 

 died, they watched over the body during the night, the rela- 

 tives sitting round, and frequently breaking forth in apostro- 

 phes of grief. When a widow put off mourning, or ceased to 

 mourn for her husband, and was about to marry again, she 

 was carried in a chair to the house of the brotherhood, where 

 she made demonstrations of the deepest sorrow, and if she fail- 

 ed to enact her part satisfactorily, she was castigated without 

 mercy. As she entered the door, a lamb was slain upon one 

 of the seats in the apartment ; and she presented, on a tray, all 

 the old shoes she had worn during widowhood. Having made 

 this sacrifice to the manes of her husband, the preliminaries of 

 the marriage were settled, and the ceremony concluded in fes- 

 tivity. 



When a negro, however, lost his wife, he made no sacrifice 

 of the kind ; <^ for" said he, " a man is contemptible who shows 

 sorrow for the death of a wife, when, for one thus lost, an hun- 

 dred may be found !"* 



The convent of St. Francis, which stands on the banks of 

 the Rimac, is amongst the oldest, and is the largest in Lima. 

 Its buildings, church, and cloisters, cover two squares of ground. 

 It has its gardens and fountains ; its statues and paintings. The 

 church is next in size to the cathedral, and at one time was the 

 richest in Peru. Its interior is divided by three naves, tra- 

 versed by two aisles, forming a double cross. It contains many 

 chapels, shrines, and altars, which are gorgeously decorated 

 with gold, silver, ebony, marble, precious stones, velvet, and 

 damask, disposed in good taste. On the great altar, in a silver 

 sagrario, are deposited the reliques of San Francisco Solano, 



* Mercurio Peruano. torn. 2. 1791. 



