ridor. His knife cut a long rift in the canvas, and in a moment they
stood upon the rocks. The shrieking crowd was on the other side of the
Custom-house.

"Marcos!" he called to his boatman, "Marcos!"

No answer came but the waves tugging at the rocks not two feet below
them. He could see nothing. The fog was thick as night.

"He is not here, Ysabel. We must swim. Anything but to be torn to pieces
by those wild-cats. Are you afraid?"

"No," she said.

He folded her closely with one arm, and felt with his foot for the edge
of the rocks. A wild roar came from behind. A dozen pistols were fired
into the air. De la Vega reeled suddenly. "I am shot, Ysabel," he said,
his knees bending. "Not in this world, my love!"

She wound her arms about him, and dragging him to the brow of the rocks,
hurled herself outward, carrying him with her. The waves tossed them on
high, flung them against the rocks and ground them there, playing with
them like a lion with its victim, then buried them.

THE EARS OF TWENTY AMERICANS

I

"God of my soul! Do not speak of hope to me. Hope? For what are those
three frigates, swarming with a horde of foreign bandits, creeping about
our bay? For what have the persons of General Vallejo and Judge Leese
been seized and imprisoned? Why does a strip of cotton, painted with a
gaping bear, flaunt itself above Sonoma? Oh, abomination! Oh, execrable
profanation! Mother of God, open thine ocean and suck them down! Smite
them with pestilence if they put foot in our capital! Shrivel their
fingers to the bone if they dethrone our Aztec Eagle and flourish their
stars and stripes above our fort! O California! That thy sons and thy
daughters should live to see thee plucked like a rose by the usurper!
And why? Why? Not because these piratical Americans have the right to
one league of our land; but because, Holy Evangelists! they want it! Our
lands are rich, our harbours are fine, gold veins our valleys, therefore
we must be plucked. The United States of America are mightier than
Mexico, therefore they sweep down upon us with mouths wide open. Holy
God! That I could choke but one with my own strong fingers. Oh!" Dona
Eustaquia paused abruptly and smote her hands together,--"O that I were
a man! That the women of California were men!"

On this pregnant morning of July seventh, eighteen hundred and
forty-six, all aristocratic Monterey was gathered in the sala of Dona
Modeste Castro. The hostess smiled sa