ittle the party resumed its former tranquillity. Other
guests had come in, among them a lame old Spaniard of mild and
inoffensive aspect leaning on the arm of an elderly Filipina,
who was resplendent in frizzes and paint and a European gown. The
group welcomed them heartily, and Doctor De Espadana and his
senora, the _Doctora_ Dona Victorina, took their seats among our
acquaintances. Some newspaper reporters and shopkeepers greeted one
another and moved about aimlessly without knowing just what to do.

"But can you tell me, Senor Laruja, what kind of man our host
is?" inquired the rubicund youth. "I haven't been introduced to
him yet."

"They say that he has gone out. I haven't seen him either."

"There's no need of introductions here," volunteered Fray
Damaso. "Santiago is made of the right stuff."

"No, he's not the man who invented gunpowder," [24] added Laruja.

"You too, Senor Laruja," exclaimed Dona Victorina in mild reproach,
as she fanned herself. "How could the poor man invent gunpowder if,
as is said, the Chinese invented it centuries ago?"

"The Chinese! Are you crazy?" cried Fray Damaso. "Out with you! A
Franciscan, one of my Order, Fray What-do-you-call-him Savalls,
[25] invented it in the--ah the seventh century!"

"A Franciscan? Well, he must have been a missionary in China, that
Padre Savalls," replied the lady, who did not thus easily part from
her beliefs.

"Schwartz, [26] perhaps you mean, senora," said Fray Sibyla, without
looking at her.

"I don't know. Fray Damaso said a Franciscan and I was only repeating."

"Well, Savalls or Chevas, what does it matter? The difference of
a letter doesn't make him a Chinaman," replied the Franciscan in
bad humor.

"And in the fourteenth century, not the seventh," added the Dominican
in a tone of correction, as if to mortify the pride of the other friar.

"Well, neither does a century more or less make him a Dominican."

"Don't get angry, your Reverence," admonished Padre Sibyla,
smiling. "So much the better that he did invent it so as to save his
brethren the trouble."

"And did you say, Padre Sibyla, that it was in the fourteenth
century?" asked Dona Victorina with great interest. "Was that before
or after Christ?"

Fortunately for the individual questioned, two persons entered
the room.

CHAPTER II

Crisostomo Ibarra

It was not two beautiful and well-gowned young women that attracted
the attention of all, even including Fray Sib