eir game of chivalry ought to
be pretty well "played out;" but to the folly of the vain man, as to the
appetite of the lean pig, there is no limit.

By Jove! There is a clatter; the casement is blown open, and the light
is blown out, and through the gap whistles the cool, briny breath of the
Atlantic, and I can almost feel the wash of the white spray in my hair.
Better a stable cell in the Castle of the Mota to-night than a tumbling
berth in the _San Margarita_. This was the close of my interview with
myself, and I turned over on my pillow and fell precipitately into a
profound dreamless sleep.

CHAPTER XIII.

Nearing the End--Firing on the Red Cross--Perpetuity of
War--Artistic Hypocrites--The Jubilee Year--The Conflicts of a
Peaceful Reign--Major Russell--Quick Promotion--The Foreign
Legion--An Aspiring Adventurer--Leader's Career--A Piratical
Proposal--The "Ojaladeros" of Biarritz--A Friend in Need--Buying a
Horse--Gilpin Outdone--"Fred Burnaby."

AND now I take up the last chapter of this book, and I have not half
finished with the subject I had set before myself at starting. By the
figures at the head of the last page I perceive that I have almost
reached the orthodox length of a volume, and perforce must stop. For
some weeks past I have been looking and longing for the end, for I have
been ill, weary and worried, and my labour has become a task. Slowly
toiling day by day, I knew I must be nearing the goal; yet, like the
strenuous Webb on his swim from Dover to Calais, the horizon seemed to
come no closer. The land in sight grew no plainer, although each
breast-stroke--the pleasure of a while agone, but oh! such a tax
now--must have lessened the distance. Even to that excursion there came
an hour of accomplishment and repose; but to this, of pen over paper, I
cannot flatter myself that the hour is yet. I have to abandon the work
incomplete. As it has happened to me before, the theme has expanded
under my hands, and I shall have to rise from my desk before I penetrate
to the Carlist headquarters, of which I had to say much, or have
experiences of that strangest of Communes in Murcia, with its sea and
land skirmishes and its motley rabble of mutineers, convicts, and
nondescripts, of which I had to say much likewise.

Whether I shall have the privilege of recounting my adventures at the
court and camp of Don Carlos, and by the side of the General directing
the siege of Carta