"What do I hear?" exclaimed Don Fabricio with surprise. "What can have disgusted you with your native land, and caused you to look with hate on that which all men love so fondly?" "After what has occurred to me," replied the Toledan, "my country is to me unbearable, and to leave it, for ever, my only desire." "Ah! Signor Cavalier," cried Mendoza, affected with compassion, "I am impatient to learn your misfortunes! If I cannot relieve them, I am at least disposed to share them. Your appearance from the first prepossessed me in your favour, your bearing and manners charmed me, and already I feel deeply interested in your destiny." "You afford me, Signor Don Fabricio," replied the Toledan, "the greatest consolation I could receive; and in return for the kindness you are pleased to express for me, it delights me to be able to say, with truth, that on seeing you with Don Alvaro Ponza my heart inclined towards yourself. A feeling, with which I never was inspired at the first sight of any one before, made me fear lest Donna Theodora should decide in favour of your rival; and it was with joy I heard her state her preference for you. Since then, you have so gained upon that first impression, that, far from desiring to conceal my griefs, I seek with a sort of pleasure to unbosom them to you: Learn then my misfortunes. "I was born in Toledo, and my name is Don Juan de Zarata. I lost my parents while almost in my infancy; so that at an early age I found myself in the enjoyment of a yearly income of four thousand ducats, which I inherited from them. As my hand was at my own disposal, and as I was rich enough to be able to bestow it where my heart should dictate, I married, early, a maiden of exquisite beauty; careless that she added nothing to my fortune, and that her rank was inferior to my own. I loved her, and I was happy; and that I might enjoy to the full the pleasure of possessing one so dear to me, I had not been long married before I sought with her a small estate which I possessed a few leagues from Toledo. "We lived there, for some time, in unity and bliss; when it chanced that the Duke de Naxera, whose seat was in the neighbourhood, came one day, when he was hunting, to refresh himself at my house. He saw my wife, and unfortunately became enamoured of her. I suspected his passion from the first; and was not long before I was too certainly convinced of its existence by the eagerness with which he sought my friendship, that up to this time he had wholly neglected. His hunting parties were now never complete without me; he loaded me with presents, and still more with his offers of service.