After leaving the President, I passed the remainder of the day, and slept, at the house of my friend Mendiburu. As I was preparing to go to bed, I heard a gentle knock at my room door; I opened it, and a servant of the house came timidly in. He told me that he was a Spaniard, and had been a sailor on board a frigate captured by the Chilians, and that his present master had taken him into his service, when a prisoner of war. He then gave me, under the most earnest injunctions not to betray him, the same caution which I had before received, adding some curses on the Chilian Government and people, whom he declared to be altogether a set of vagabonds and thieves. This repeated warning was too striking not to excite some apprehension. I took all the circumstances into consideration; and though the motive for such a proceeding remained perfectly incomprehensible, I still resolved to take measures for my security, in case it should be really attempted. I passed a sleepless night, and early in the morning bade adieu to my kind host, to whom I was unable to impart my new cause of anxiety, and hastened back to Talcaguana. On my arrival there, I found cards inviting myself and all my officers to a ball on the following evening: so far, therefore, the information I had received was correct. To avoid the appearance of suspicion, I accepted the invitation, and went to the ball accompanied by a few of my officers. The rest remained on board the ship, having placed her so as to bring her guns to bear upon the house in which the ball was given, and to command the respect of the neighbourhood. Thus Talcaguana was at our mercy; nor had we any thing to fear, either from the armed corvette, or the battery on shore; the former being so situated that it must needs have struck to our first broadside, and the latter mounting only six guns quite unfit for use, and resting upon broken carriages. We had also removed our observatory, and conveyed all our effects on board. These imposing preparations did not in all probability remain unobserved; at all events, the ball passed off quietly enough; but it was remarkable that very few of the officers who had given it were present; and instead of the gaiety which had reigned on the two former occasions, the greatest constraint was evident in the deportment of the company, who separated at an unusually early hour.