e to
myself out of the event. For the Mexicans are not blood-thirsty,
though they are very warlike. When Bravo was here, what balls, what
bull-fights, what visiting among the ladies! Indeed there was so much
to tell, the tertulia was as necessary as the dinner. To be sure, the
Mexicans are not barbarians; they made a war that had some refinement.
But the Americans! They are savages. With them it is fight, fight,
fight, and if we try to be agreeable, as we were to that outrageous Sam
Houston, they say thank you, madam, and go on thinking their own cruel
thoughts. I wonder the gentle God permits that such men live."

"Dear mother, refinement in war is not possible. Nothing can make it
otherwise than brutal and bloody."

"Antonia, allow that I, who am your mother, should know what I have
simply seen with my eyes. Salcedo, Bravo, Martinez, Urrea--are they not
great soldiers? Very well, then, I say they brought some pleasure with
their armies; and you will see that Santa Anna will do the same. If we
were only in our own home! It must have been the devil who made us leave
it."

"How truly splendid the officers looked, mi madre. I dare say Senora
Valdez will entertain them."

"That is certain. And as for Dorette Valdez--the coquette--it will
certainly be a great happiness to her."

Isabel sighed, and the Senora felt a kind of satisfaction in the sigh.
It was unendurable to be alone in her regrets and her longings.

"Yes," she continued, "every night Senora Trespalacios will give a
tertulia, and the officers will have military balls--the brave young
men; they will be so gay, so charming, so devoted, and in a few
hours, perhaps, they will go into the other world by the road of the
battlefield. Ah, how pitiful! How interesting! Cannot you imagine it?"

Isabel sighed again, but the sigh was for the gay, the charming Luis
Alveda. And when she thought of him, she forgot in a moment to envy
Dorette Valdez, or the senoritas of the noble house of Trespalacios. And
some sudden, swift touch of sympathy, strong as it was occult, made
the Senora at the same moment remember her husband and her sons. A real
sorrow and a real anxiety drove out all smaller annoyances. Then both
her daughters wept together, until their community of grief had brought
to each heart the solemn strength of a divine hope and reliance.

"My children, I will go now and pray," said the sorrowful wife
and mother. "At the foot of the cross I will wait for the ho