Legends of the city of Mexico / collected by Thomas A. Janvier ; illustrated by Walter Appleton Clark.
- Thomas Allibone Janvier
- Date:
- 1910
Licence: Public Domain Mark
Credit: Legends of the city of Mexico / collected by Thomas A. Janvier ; illustrated by Walter Appleton Clark. Source: Wellcome Collection.
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![windows have been shut fast for a very long time. But the Padre had matters more im¬ portant than bad smells to attend to, and all that he did about it was to hold his hand¬ kerchief close to his nose. One little poor candle, stuck on a nail in a board, was set in a far corner; and in another comer was a man lying on a mat spread upon the earth floor; and there was nothing else whatever—excepting cobwebs everywhere, and the bad smell, and the old woman, and the Padre himself—in that room. That he might see him whom he was to confess, Padre Lanchitas took the candle in his hand and went to the man on the mat and pulled aside the ragged and dirty old blanket that covered him; and then he started back with a very cold qualm in his stomach, saying to the woman: “This man already is dead! He cannot confess! And he has the look of having been dead for a very long while!” And that was true, Senor—for what he saw was a dry and bony head, with yellow skin drawn tight over it, having shut eyes deep sunken. Also, the two hands which rested crossed upon the man’s breast were no more than the same dry [87]](https://iiif.wellcomecollection.org/image/b31349043_0129.jp2/full/800%2C/0/default.jpg)
