a lesson in the broadsword, I had to make
my will. The reader will probably smile at the notion of Con Cregan
leaving a testament behind him; but the over-scrupulous Seth would have
it so, and assured me, with much feeling, that it would "save a world of
trouble hereafter, if anything were to go a bit ugly."

I therefore bequeathed to the worthy Seth my mustang and his equipments
of saddle, holsters, and cloak-bag; my rifle and pistols and bowie-knife
were also to become his, as well as all my movables of every kind. I
only stipulated that, in the event of the "ugly" termination alluded to,
he would convey the letter with his own hands to Guajuaqualla,--a pledge
he gave with the greater readiness that a reward was to be rendered for
the service. There was some seventy dollars in my bag, which, Seth
said, need not be mentioned in the will, as they would be needed for the
funeral. "It 's costly hereabouts," said he, growing quite lively on the
theme. "They put ye in a great basket, all decked with flowers, and they
sticks two big oranges or lemons in your hands; and the chaps as carry
you are dressed like devils or angels, I don't much know which,--and
they do make such a cry, My eye for it, but if you was n't dead, you 'd
not lie there long and listen to 'em!"

Now, although the subject was not one half so amusing to me as it
seemed to Seth, I felt that strange fascination which ever attaches to a
painful theme, and asked a variety of questions about the grave and
the ceremonies and the masses, reminding my executor that, as a good
Catholic, I hoped I should have the offices of the Church in all
liberality.

"Don't distress yourself about that," said he; "I 'll learn a lot of
prayers in Latin myself,--' just to help you on,' as a body might say.
But, as I live, there goes the chaps to the 'Molino';" and he pointed
to a group of about a dozen or more, who, wrapped up in their large
cloaks, took the way slowly and silently through the tall wet grass at
the bottom of the garden.

I have ever been too candid with my kind reader to conceal anything from
him. Let him not, therefore, I beg, think the worse of me if I own
that, at the sight of that procession, a strange and most uncomfortable
feeling pervaded me. There seemed something so purpose-like in their
steady, regular tramp. There was a look of cold determination in their
movement that chilled me to the heart. "Only to think!" muttered I,
"how they have left their be