cano--a "heretico"--for in this
far corner of the earth fanaticism was as fierce as in the Seven-hilled
City itself during the gloomiest days of the Inquisition!

Mayhap it was as well for Carlos that the sports were now ended, and the
fiesta about to close.

In a few minutes the company began to move off. The mules, oxen, and
asses, were yoked to the carretas--the rancheros and rancheras climbed
inside the deep boxes; and then, what with the cracking of quirts, the
shouts of drivers, and the hideous screaming of the ungreased axles, a
concert of sounds arose that would have astonished any human being,
except a born native of the soil.

In half-an-hour the ground was clear, and the lean coyote might be seen
skulking over the spot in search of a morsel for his hungry maw.

CHAPTER NINE.

Though the field-sports were over, the fiesta of San Juan was not yet
ended. There were still many sights to be seen before the crowd
scattered to their homes. There was to be another turn at the church--
another sale of "indultos," beads, and relics,--another sprinkling of
sacred water, in order that the coffers of the padres might be
replenished toward a fresh bout at the _monte_ table. Then there was an
evening procession of the Saint of the day (John), whose image, set upon
a platform, was carried about the town, until the five or six fellows
who bore the load were seen to perspire freely under its weight.

The Saint himself was a curiosity. A large wax and plaster doll,
dressed in faded silk that had once been yellow, and stuck all over with
feathers and tinsel. A Catholic image Indianised, for the Mexican
divinities were as much Indian as Roman. He appeared bored of the
business, as, the joinings between head and neck having partially given
way, the former drooped over and nodded to the crowd as the image was
moved along. This nodding, however, which would have been laughed at as
supremely ridiculous in any other than a priest-ridden country, was here
regarded in a different light. The padres did not fail to put their
interpretation upon it, pointing it out to their devout followers as a
mark of condescension on the part of the Saint, who, in thus bowing to
the crowd, was expressing his approbation of their proceedings. It was,
in fact, a regular miracle. So alleged both padres and cura, and who
was there to contradict them? It would have been a dangerous matter to
have said nay. In San Ildefonso no man dared