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But the common people were the gainers ultimately by the expulsion of the Spaniards, though the whole country suffered for a time by the withdrawal of the capital of the Spaniards. The benefit derived by the peons from this revolution was the political importance which it gave them. The Parian and the lepero perished together.
Each had a coarse hair halter held in the hand of a lepero driver, also fantastically dressed in the same black stuff. Behind each stood a lepero similarly attired, and carrying "cuartos" of buffalo-skin. By the side of each ass was one of the padres of the mission, and each of these held in his hand the implements of his trade book, rosary, and crucifix. The priests wore an official look.
The French have the words compère and commère; and it is curious to observe that the name of compère is given to the confederate of the juggler, who stands among the crowd, and slyly helps in the performance of the trick. We went one day to the Hospital of San Lazaro. I have mentioned the word "lepero" as applied to the poor and idle class of half-caste Mexicans.
Now the lepero took delight in visiting upon the present occupants of this building a fearful punishment for the crime committed there twenty years before, and among the guilty crowd there was to be found many an innocent sufferer.
But wheresoever you enter a Mexican iglesia during prayer-time, I promise you the view of an extensive assortment of backs. Not classified, however. Quite the contrary. The back of the shawled lady may be inclusive between two greasy rebosos, and the striped or speckled back of the lepero may rise up alongside the shining broad-cloth of the dandy!
It was not a superfluous precaution that we had taken, in leaving our valuables in a place of safety, for, on our exit from the first church, we found that Pepe had lost his handkerchief and a cigar-case, which he had stowed away in an inner pocket, and Mr. Christy had been relieved of one of his mamei seeds by some "lepero" who probably took it for a snuff-box.
All at once I became conscious of being under the surveillance of a large and very fierce-looking lepero, a regular pelado, who followed us with his eyes, and sometimes in persona, to every part of the room. The expression of his swarth face was a mixture of jealousy and vengeance, which my partner noticed, but, as I thought, took no pains to soften down. "Who is he?"
The neglect and oppression which had reduced a laboring man to a lepero had not made him insensible to the unequal laws which elevated above him a race of beings destitute of that manly courage which oftentimes gives plausibility to oppression.
Driven forth at the end of pikes, the girl was pushed towards the boat. With all the spirit of Spain in her rotting body she flashed triumphant glances on her captors. "Perros! Perros Ingleses! Lepero, Lepero!" she cried in exultation, as they thrust her over into the boat. "Good luck, captain!
Here and there a muffled lepero whisked round the corner of a grass-grown street before the ringing hoofs of his horse.
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