lours of my country, I
snatched at paper and blood. Can you not understand the ancient
sanctity of colours? The Church has her symbolic colours. And think of
what colours mean to us--think of the position of one like myself, who
can see nothing but those two colours, nothing but the red and the
yellow. To me all shapes are equal, all common and noble things are in
a democracy of combination. Wherever there is a field of marigolds and
the red cloak of an old woman, there is Nicaragua. Wherever there is a
field of poppies and a yellow patch of sand, there is Nicaragua.
Wherever there is a lemon and a red sunset, there is my country.
Wherever I see a red pillar-box and a yellow sunset, there my heart
beats. Blood and a splash of mustard can be my heraldry. If there be
yellow mud and red mud in the same ditch, it is better to me than
white stars."

"And if," said Quin, with equal enthusiasm, "there should happen to be
yellow wine and red wine at the same lunch, you could not confine
yourself to sherry. Let me order some Burgundy, and complete, as it
were, a sort of Nicaraguan heraldry in your inside."

Barker was fiddling with his knife, and was evidently making up his
mind to say something, with the intense nervousness of the amiable
Englishman.

"I am to understand, then," he said at last, with a cough, "that you,
ahem, were the President of Nicaragua when it made its--er--one must,
of course, agree--its quite heroic resistance to--er--"

The ex-President of Nicaragua waved his hand.

"You need not hesitate in speaking to me," he said. "I'm quite fully
aware that the whole tendency of the world of to-day is against
Nicaragua and against me. I shall not consider it any diminution of
your evident courtesy if you say what you think of the misfortunes
that have laid my republic in ruins."

Barker looked immeasurably relieved and gratified.

"You are most generous, President," he said, with some hesitation over
the title, "and I will take advantage of your generosity to express
the doubts which, I must confess, we moderns have about such things
as--er--the Nicaraguan independence."

"So your sympathies are," said Del Fuego, quite calmly, "with the big
nation which--"

"Pardon me, pardon me, President," said Barker, warmly; "my sympathies
are with no nation. You misunderstand, I think, the modern intellect.
We do not disapprove of the fire and extravagance of such
commonwealths as yours only to become more extravaga