been considered the first doctor in the Philippines. One day I touched upon this delicate topic. "Senor Captain," said I, "what are you thinking about, to remain thus shut up between four walls, and why do you not resume your old habits? You must go and visit your friends, your acquaintances." "Doctor," interrupted Don Juan, "how can I show myself in public with an eye the less? When I pass along the street all the women would say: 'There goes Don Juan the One-eyed!' No, no; before I leave the house you must get me an artificial eye from Paris." "You don't mean that? It would be eighteen months before the eye arrived." "Then here goes for eighteen months' seclusion," said Don Juan. I persisted for upwards of an hour, but the Captain would not listen to reason. He carried his coquetry so far that, although I had covered the empty orbit with black silk, he had his shutters closed whenever visitors came; so that, as they always found him in the dark, none would credit his cure. I was very anxious to thwart Don Juan's obstinacy, as may well be imagined; I had not the time to waste, during eighteen months, in dancing attendance at fortune's door; therefore I determined to make this eye myself, without which the coquetish captain would not be seen. I took some pieces of glass, a tube, and set to work. After many fruitless attempts, I at last succeeded in obtaining the perfect form of an eye; but this was not all--it must be coloured to resemble nature. I sent for a poor carriage-painter, who managed to imitate tolerably well the left eye of Don Juan. It was necessary to preserve this painting from contact with the tears, which would soon have destroyed it. To accomplish this I had made by a jeweller a silver globe, smaller than the glass eye, inside which I united it by means of sealing-wax. I carefully polished the edges upon a stone, and after eight days' labour I obtained a satisfactory result. The eye which I had succeeded in producing was really not so bad after all. I was anxious to place it within the vacant orbit. It somewhat inconvenienced the Senor Don Juan, but I persuaded him that he would soon become accustomed to it. Placing across his nose a pair of spectacles, he examined himself in the looking-glass, and was so satisfied with his appearance that he decided on commencing his visits the following day.