ich the further experience
of life, of more than fifty years, has done nothing to diminish." He
looked round as if to make sure of our attention, and, in a changed
voice: "I am, as you know, a republican, son of a Liberator," he
declared. "My incomparable mother, God rest her soul, was a Frenchwoman,
the daughter of an ardent republican. As a boy I fought for liberty;
I've always believed in the equality of men; and as to their
brotherhood, that, to my mind, is even more certain. Look at the fierce
animosity they display in their differences. And what in the world do
you know that is more bitterly fierce than brothers' quarrels?"

All absence of cynicism checked an inclination to smile at this view of
human brotherhood. On the contrary, there was in the tone the melancholy
natural to a man profoundly humane at heart who from duty, from
conviction and from necessity, had played his part in scenes of ruthless
violence.

The General had seen much of fratricidal strife. "Certainly. There is no
doubt of their brotherhood," he insisted. "All men are brothers, and
as such know almost too much of each other. But "--and here in the
old patriarchal head, white as silver, the black eyes humorously
twinkled--"if we are all brothers, all the women are not our sisters."

One of the younger guests was heard murmuring his satisfaction at the
fact. But the General continued, with deliberate earnestness: "They are
so different! The tale of a king who took a beggar-maid for a partner of
his throne may be pretty enough as we men look upon ourselves and upon
love. But that a young girl, famous for her haughty beauty and, only
a short time before, the admired of all at the balls in the Viceroy's
palace, should take by the hand a guasso, a common peasant, is
intolerable to our sentiment of women and their love. It is madness.
Nevertheless it happened. But it must be said that in her case it was
the madness of hate--not of love."

After presenting this excuse in a spirit of chivalrous justice, the
General remained silent for a time. "I rode past the house every day
almost," he began again, "and this was what was going on within. But how
it was going on no mind of man can conceive. Her desperation must
have been extreme, and Gaspar Ruiz was a docile fellow. He had been an
obedient soldier. His strength was like an enormous stone lying on the
ground, ready to be hurled this way that by the hand that picks it up.

"It is clear that he would