y
companions than many gifts of a more brilliant order; and, lastly,
my skill in cookery, which I derived from my education on board the
"Firefly," won me high esteem and much honor. My life was therefore far
from unpleasant. The monotony of the tract over which we marched was
more than compensated for by the marvellous tales that beguiled the way.
One only drawback existed on my happiness; and yet that was sufficient
to embitter many a lonely hour of the night, and cast a shade over
many a joyous hour of the day. I am almost ashamed to confess what that
source of sorrow was, the more as, perhaps, my kind reader will already
fancy he has anticipated my grief, and say, "It was the remembrance of
Donna Maria; the memory of _her_ I was never to see more." Alas, no! It
was a feeling far more selfish than this afflicted me. The plain fact
is, I was called "The Lepero." By no other name would my companions
know or acknowledge me. It was thus they first addressed me, and so they
would not take the trouble to change my appellation. Not that, indeed, I
dared to insinuate a wish upon the subject; such a hint would have
been too bold a stroke to hazard in a company where one was called
"Brise-ses-fers," another, "Colpo-di-Sangue," a third, "Teufel's Blut,"
and so on.

It was to no purpose that I appeared in all the vigor of health and
strength. I might outrun the wildest bull of the buffalo herd; I might
spring upon the half-trained "mustang," and outstrip the antelope in
her flight; I might climb the wall-like surface of a cliff, and rob the
eagle of her young: but when I came back, the cry of welcome that met me
was, "Bravo, Lepero!" And thus did I bear about with me the horrid badge
of that dreary time when I dwelt within the Lazaretto of Bexar.

The very fact that the name was not used in terms of scoff or reproach
increased the measure of its injury. It called for no reply on my
part; it summoned no energy of resistance; it was, as it were, a simple
recognition of certain qualities that distinguished me and made up my
identity; and at last, to such an extent did it work upon my imagination
that I yielded myself up to the delusion that I was all that they styled
me,--an outcast and a leper! When this conviction settled down on
my mind, I ceased to fret as before, but a gloomy depression gained
possession of me, uncheered save by the one hope that my life should not
be entirely spent among my present associates, and that I sho