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ne break-down on the Thames, opposite the outlet of the main-drainage pipes. That, intensified by strange oaths and slop-basins, was the passage by the _Alcorta_. But dreary, lonely San Sebastian was not to be endured. Those poor fellows above, accustomed to the wild freshness and freedom of the sea, how they must mourn and repine! By some means or other I must get back to the world that is not petrified. No diligences dare to affront the dangers of the short journey to the Irun railway-station, since three were stopped some days before, the traces cut, the horses stolen, the windows shattered, the woodwork burned, and the charred wreck left on the roadside, a terror to those who neglect to obey the commands of the Royalist leaders. "Royalist prigants, serr!" shouted a corpulent German doctor, connected with mines in the neighbourhood, who retained fierce recollections of having been robbed of a "boney, capitalest of boneys for crossing a mountain." I told the doctor I was about to trust to luck, and set out on foot if I could persuade nobody to provide me with a vehicle. "Serr, you air mad, foolish mad," said the doctor. "Those horrid beebles, I tell you, are worse than prigants; if you hayff money, they will dake it; if you hayff not money, they will stroke your pack fifty times, pecause you hayff it not. They will cut your ears off; they will cut your nose off; they are plack tevils!" I determined to trust to luck all the same. The black devils might not be all out so black as they were painted. CHAPTER X. Belcha's Brigands--Pale-Red Republicans--The Hyena--More about the _San Margarita_--Arrival of a Republican Column--The Jaunt to Los Pasages--A Sweet Surprise--"The Prettiest Girl in Spain"--A Madrid Acquaintance--A Costly Pull--The Diligence at Last--Renteria and its Defences--A Furious Ride--In France Again--Unearthing Santa Cruz--The Outlaw in his Lair--Interviewed at Last--The Truth about the Endarlasa Massacre--A Death-Warrant--The Buried Gun--Fanaticism of the Partisan-Priest. THERE is fine scope for exaggeration in civil war; but he who wants the truth about the Montagues does not consult the Capulets. There must be bad characters amongst the Carlists, I reflected; and when they are on outpost duty at a distance from officers, and have taken a drop of aguardiente too much, they may sometimes fail to appreciate the nice distinction between _meum_
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