shrouded female with a long wand, leaning over a tablet, on which the name of the dead is graven.
Santa Clara, where my astonishingly-named mozo goes, is the most ornate structure. Such a profusion of gilding I have seen nowhere else. Five altars from floor to ceiling are covered with figures and carved work, all thick with gold, while the arches around and above the door-way are, if possible, even more overlaid. It is astonishing what an outlay of precious leaf has been made on these shrines. This church was crowded at vespers to the pavement without, where many sat, joining with the voices that took up the refrain from within. These were all the poorest of the poor. Rags and beggary and utter penury knelt on the floor or sat on the benches of this gilded chapel that cost more than any church, probably, in the United States. When shall we equal them by our equality?
The Church of the Virgin of Gaudalupe was almost equally adorned with gold, but had only a few worshipers. Its convent has become a hospital, and exquisite flowers fill its courts with beauty of odor and of sight. Its front is of the Moorish type, more so than any in the capital or Puebla, and its graceful minaret and very quaint buttresses, flying out from the wall like a scroll, are proofs of the influence Grenada had over Madrid.
The churches and priests are the chief characteristic of Queretaro. No wonder it is such a church-town. It is more completely filled with these structures than any city I have seen—than any, probably, in the land, except Guadilajara. Puebla has far less, proportionately to its inhabitants, and far inferior ones, excepting its cathedral, which here is cheap and poor. One I strolled into (I forget its name) had five altars, with ornaments carried to the roof, most elaborately and profusely carved and gilded. Statues, globes, hearts, and even the coils of the entrails, are perched on every possible spot, and covered thick with gilt. The door-way to the sacristy was remarkably adorned in this fashion. Only those of Santo Domingo chapel, in Puebla, were equally brilliant at the time of their execution. They make none such nowadays. Gold
