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PICTURES OF LIFE IN MEXICO.
appropriation are, therefore, of very rare occurrence. But in the case to which I allude, the temptation to plunder had been too strong for the prudence of an unlucky Indian, whose duty it was to superintend the furnaces. In an unguarded moment, he had approached the vat with a long pole in his grasp, and raised the cover, believing the metal to be cool enough to admit of his abstracting a small portion for his own especial use. The vapour from the sublimating mercury must have suffocated him in a moment, for he fell back upon the earth below the furnace quite dead; and his body was found by his companions directly afterwards, still grasping the wooden instrument of his intended robbery, in its stiffened hand.
