"Ah, ah, ah, ah!" the irate priest could at last articulate. "It is for this that I have preached to you all the morning! Savages! You respect nothing! Behold the work of the incontinence of the century!" And launched again upon this theme, he preached a half hour longer. The alcalde breathed loud. Maria Clara, having studied all the pictures in sight, had dropped her head. Crisostomo had ceased to be moved by the sermon. He was picturing a little house, high up among the mountains, with Maria Clara in the garden. Why concern himself with men, dragging out their lives in the miserable pueblos of the valley? At length the sermon ended, and the mass went on. At the moment when all were kneeling and the priests bowed their heads at the "Incarnatus est," a man murmured in Ibarra's ear: "At the blessing of the cornerstone do not separate yourself from the curate; do not go down into the trench. Your life is at stake!" It was the helmsman. XXVI. THE CRANE. It was indeed not an ordinary crane that the Mongol had built for letting the enormous cornerstone of the school into the trench. The framework was complicated and the cables passed over extraordinary pulleys. Flags, streamers, and garlands of flowers, however, hid the mechanism. By means of a cleverly contrived capstan, the enormous stone held suspended over the open trench could be raised or lowered with ease by a single man. "See!" said the Mongol to Senor Juan, inserting the bar and turning it. "See how I can manipulate the thing up here and unaided!" Senor Juan was full of admiration. "Who taught you mechanics?" he asked. "My father, my late father," replied the man, with his peculiar smile, "and Don Saturnino, the grandfather of Don Crisostomo, taught him." "You must know then about Don Saturnino----" "Oh, many things! Not only did he beat his workmen and expose them to the sun, but he knew how to awaken sleepers and put waking men to sleep. Ah, you will see presently what he could teach! You will see!" On a table with Persian spread, beside the trench, were the things to be put into the cornerstone, and the glass box and leaden cylinder which were to preserve for the future these souvenirs, this mummy of an epoch. Under two long booths near at hand were sumptuous tables, one for the school-children, without wine, and heaped with fruits; the other for the distinguished visitors. The booths were joined by a sort of bower of leafy branches, where were chairs for the musicians, and tables with cakes, confitures, and carafes of water, for the public in general. The crowd, gay in garments of many colors, was massed under the trees to avoid the ardent rays of the sun, and the children, to better see the ceremony of the dedication, had climbed up among the branches.