st, he proceeded to the stable, followed by
all who were present, and going up to Dapple embraced him and gave him a
loving kiss on the forehead, and said to him, not without tears in his
eyes, "Come along, comrade and friend and partner of my toils and
sorrows; when I was with you and had no cares to trouble me except
mending your harness and feeding your little carcass, happy were my
hours, my days, and my years; but since I left you, and mounted the
towers of ambition and pride, a thousand miseries, a thousand troubles,
and four thousand anxieties have entered into my soul;" and all the while
he was speaking in this strain he was fixing the pack-saddle on the ass,
without a word from anyone. Then having Dapple saddled, he, with great
pain and difficulty, got up on him, and addressing himself to the
majordomo, the secretary, the head-carver, and Pedro Recio the doctor and
several others who stood by, he said, "Make way, gentlemen, and let me go
back to my old freedom; let me go look for my past life, and raise myself
up from this present death. I was not born to be a governor or protect
islands or cities from the enemies that choose to attack them. Ploughing
and digging, vinedressing and pruning, are more in my way than defending
provinces or kingdoms. 'Saint Peter is very well at Rome; I mean each of
us is best following the trade he was born to. A reaping-hook fits my
hand better than a governor's sceptre; I'd rather have my fill of
gazpacho' than be subject to the misery of a meddling doctor who me with
hunger, and I'd rather lie in summer under the shade of an oak, and in
winter wrap myself in a double sheepskin jacket in freedom, than go to
bed between holland sheets and dress in sables under the restraint of a
government. God be with your worships, and tell my lord the duke that
'naked I was born, naked I find myself, I neither lose nor gain;' I mean
that without a farthing I came into this government, and without a
farthing I go out of it, very different from the way governors commonly
leave other islands. Stand aside and let me go; I have to plaster myself,
for I believe every one of my ribs is crushed, thanks to the enemies that
have been trampling over me to-night."

"That is unnecessary, senor governor," said Doctor Recio, "for I will
give your worship a draught against falls and bruises that will soon make
you as sound and strong as ever; and as for your diet I promise your
worship to behave better, and let