"In 1761 Ilarione da Bergamo, a Capuchin friar, journeyed to Mexico to gather alms for foreign missions. After harrowing voyages across the Mediterranean and Atlantic, he reached Mexico City in 1763. Ilarione's account reveals the squalor, crime, and other perils in the viceregal capital, and gives details about daily life: food, public hygiene, sexual morality, medical practices, and popular diversions. His observations about religious life are particularly valuable. Based on a four year residence in the silver mining town of Real del Monte, fifty miles north of the capital, Ilarione describes mining and refining techniques and recounts a bitter and bloody miners' strike. Ilarione also traveled across bandit-infested wilderness to Guadalajara."--Jacket.