ople with final impunity. The time
came when they not only said something must be done, but actually did
something. It was by the hand of one of the _amigo's_ sweetest and
kindest friends, namely, that elderly captain, off duty, who was going
out to be assigned his ship in Hamburg. From the first he had shown
the affectionate tenderness for the _amigo_ which was felt by all
except some obdurate hearts at the conversational end of the table;
and it must have been with a loving interest in the _amigo's_ ultimate
well-being that, taking him in an ecstasy of mischief, he drew the
_amigo_ face downward across his knees, and bestowed the chastisement
which was morally a caress. He dismissed him with a smile in which the
_amigo_ read the good understanding that existed unimpaired between
them, and accepted his correction with the same affection as that
which had given it. He shook himself and ran off with an enjoyment of
the joke as great as that of any of the spectators and far more
generous.

In fact there was nothing mean in the _amigo_. Impish he was, or might
be, but only in the sort of the crow or the parrot; there was no
malevolence in his fine malice. One fancied him in his adolescence
taking part in one of the frequent revolutions of his continent, but
humorously, not homicidally. He would like to alarm the other
faction, and perhaps drive it from power, or overset it from its
official place, but if he had the say there would be no bringing the
vanquished out into the plaza to be shot. He may now have been on his
way to France ultimately to study medicine, which seems to be
preliminary to a high political career in South America; but in the
mean time we feared for him in that republic of severely regulated
subordinations.

We thought with pathos of our early parting with him, as we approached
Plymouth and tried to be kodaked with him, considering it an honor and
pleasure. He so far shared our feeling as to consent, but he insisted
on wearing a pair of glasses which had large eyes painted on them, and
on being taken in the act of inflating a toy balloon. Probably,
therefore, the likeness would not be recognized in Bogota, but it will
always be endeared to us by the memory of the many mockeries suffered
from him. There were other friends whom we left on the ship, notably
those of the conversational end of the table, who thought him simply a
bad boy; but there were none of such peculiar appeal as he, when he
stood by