son at the table had before him or her a paper about a foot
square, covered with figures in rows, and a small pile of grains of
corn, and by its side a thumping stick some eighteen inches long, and
one in diameter; while, amid all the noise, hubbub, and confusion, the
eyes of all at the tables were bent constantly upon the papers before
them. In that hot place, they seemed like a host of necromancers and
witches, some of the latter young and extremely pretty, practising the
black art.

By degrees we were passed out into the corridor, and here we were
brought to a dead stand. Within arm's length was an imp of a boy,
apparently the ringleader in this nocturnal orgy, who stood on a
platform, rattling a bag of balls, and whose unintermitted screeching,
singsong cries had throughout risen shrill and distinct above every
other sound. At that moment the noise and uproar were carried to the
highest The whole house seemed rising against the boy, and he,
single-handed, or rather single-tongued, was doing battle with the
whole, sending forth a clear stream of vocal power, which for a while
bore its way triumphantly through the whole troubled waters, till,
finding himself overpowered by the immense majority, with a tone that
set the whole mass in a roar, and showed his democratic principles, he
cried out, "Vox populi est vox Dei!" and submitted.

Along the corridor, and in the whole area of the patio, or courtyard,
were tables, and benches, and papers, and grains of corn, and ponderous
sticks, the same as in the sala, and men and women sitting as close
together. The passages were choked up, and over the heads of those
sitting at the tables, all within reach were bending their eyes
earnestly upon the mysterious papers. They were grayheads, boys and
girls, and little children; fathers and mothers; husbands and wives;
masters and servants; men high in office, muleteers, and bull-fighters;
senoras and senoritas, with jewels around their necks and roses in
their hair, and Indian women, worth only the slight covering they had
on; beauty and deformity; the best and the vilest in Merida; perhaps,
in all, two thousand persons; and this great multitude, many of whom we
had seen but a few minutes before on their knees in the church, and
among them the fair bevy of girls who had stood by us on the steps,
were now assembled in a public gambling-house! a beautiful spectacle
for a stranger the first night of his arrival in the capital!

But th