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care not to drink chocolate and dance in his house. One hand washes the other, and one cousin should help another."

66

'Why did he refuse you?”

"Who can tell?" but Luis shrugged his shoulders expressively, and added, "He gave the office to Blas-Sangre."

“Ah!”

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'Yes, it is so-naturally ;-Blas-Sangre is rich, and when the devil of money condescends to appear, every little devil rises up to do him homage."

"Let it pass, Luis. Suppose you sing me that last verse again. It had a taking charm. The music was like a boat rocking on the water."

"So it ought to be. I learned the words in New Orleans. The music came from the heart

of my mandolin.

46 6 'Row

Listen, Señor!

young oarsman, row, young oarsman,
Into the crypt of the night we float:
Fair, faint moonbeams wash and wander,
Wash and wander about the boat.

Not a fetter is here to bind us,

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Love and memory lose their spell;
Friends that we have left behind us,

Prisoners of content,-farewell!'"

"You are a wizard, Luis, and I have had a

sail with you. Now, come with us, and show those dandy soldiers from the Alamo how to dance."

"Pardon! I have not yet ceased to cross myself at the affront of this morning. And the Señora Valdez is in the same mind as her husband. I should be received by her like a dog at mass. I am going to-morrow to the American colony on the Colorado."

"Be careful, Luis. These Austin colonists are giving great trouble-there have been whispers of very strong measures. I speak as a friend."

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My heart to yours! But let me tell you this about the Americans-their drum is in the hands of one who knows how to beat it."

"As a matter of hearsay, are you aware that three detachments of troops are on their way from Mexico?"

"For Texas?"

"For Texas."

"What are three detachments?

Can a few

thousand men put Texas under lock and key? I assure you not, Señor; but now I must say adieu!"

He took the doctor's hand, and, as he held

it, turned his luminous face and splendid eyes upon Antonia. A sympathetic smile brightened her own face like a flame. Then he went silently away, and Antonia watched him disappear among the shrubbery.

"Come, Antonia! I am ready. We must not keep the Señora waiting too long."

"I am ready also, father." Her voice was almost sad, and yet it had a tone of annoyance in it—“ Don Luis is so imprudent," she said. "He is always in trouble. He is full of enthusiasms; he is as impossible as his favorite, Don Quixote."

"And I thank God, Antonia, that I can yet feel with him. Woe to the centuries without Quixotes! Nothing will remain to them butSancho Panzas."

CHAPTER II.

ANTONIA AND ISABEL.

"He various changes of the world had known,
And some vicissitudes of human fate,
Still altering, never in a steady state :
Good after ill, and after pain delight,
Alternate, like the scenes of day and night."

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"But who the limits of that power shall trace,
Which a brave people into life can bring,
Or hide at will, for freedom combating
By just revenge inflamed ?”

OR many years there had never been any

FOR

doubt in the mind of Robert Worth as

to the ultimate destiny of Texas, though he was by no means an adventurer, and had come into the beautiful land by a sequence of natural and business-like events. He was born in New York. In that city he studied his profession, and in eighteen hundred and three began its practice in an office near Contoit's Hotel, opposite the City Park. One day he

was summoned there to attend a sick man. His patient proved to be Don Jaime Urrea, and the rich Mexican grandee conceived a warm friendship for the young physician.

At that very time, France had just ceded to the United States the territory of Louisiana, and its western boundary was a subject about which Americans were then angrily disputing. They asserted that it was the Rio Grande; but Spain, who naturally did not want Americans so near her own territory, denied the claim, and made the Sabine River the dividing line. And as Spain had been the original possessor of Louisiana, she considered herself authority on the subject.

The question was on every tongue, and it was but natural that it should be discussed by Urrea and his physician. In fact, they talked continually of the disputed boundary, and of Mexico. And Mexico was then a name to conjure by. She was as yet a part of Spain, and a sharer in all her ancient glories. She was a land of romance, and her very name tasted on the lips, of gold, and of silver, and of precious stones. Urrea easily persuaded the young man to return to Mexico with him.

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