which would be torture if endured in general, may be experienced at other
times without any sense of suffering. A travelling man one winter's evening
laid himself down upon the platform of a lime-kiln, placing his feet,
probably numbed with cold, upon the heap of stones newly put on to burn
through the night. Sleep overcame him in this situation; the fire gradually
rising and increasing until it ignited the stones upon which his feet were
placed. Lulled by the warmth, he still slept; and though the fire
increased until it burned one foot (which probably was extended over a vent
hole) and part of the leg, above the ankle, entirely off, consuming that
part so effectually, that no fragment of it was ever discovered; the
wretched being slept on! and in this state was found by the kiln-man in the
morning. Insensible to any pain, and ignorant of his misfortune, he
attempted to rise and pursue his journey, but missing his shoe, requested
to have it found; and when he was raised, putting his burnt limb to the
ground to support his body, the extremity of his leg-bone, the tibia,
crumbled into fragments, having been calcined into lime. Still he expressed
no sense of pain, and probably experienced none, from the gradual operation
of the fire and his own torpidity during the hours his foot was consuming.
This poor drover survived his misfortunes in the hospital about a
fortnight; but the fire having extended to other parts of his body,
recovery was hopeless.

* * * * *

GAMING.

Gambling, the besetting sin of the indolent in many countries, is ruinously
general throughout South America. In England, and other European states, it
is pretty much limited to the unemployed of the upper classes, who furnish
a never-ending supply of dupes to knavery. In South America the passion
taints all ages, both sexes, and every rank. The dregs of society yield to
the fascination as blindly as the high-born and wealthy of the old or of
the new world. It speaks much in favour of the revolution, that this vice
is sensibly diminishing in Peru, and to the unfortunate Monteagudo belongs
the honour of having been the first to attempt its eradication. A noted
gambler was once as much an object of admiration in South America as a
six-bottle man was in England fifty years ago. The houses of the great were
converted into nightly hells, where the priesthood were amongst the most
regular and adventurous attendants. Those plac