"Ah, he was beautiful, señor; he was beautiful, he was beautiful, he was beautiful! He was tall and straight like the coco tree; his hair curled like the waves upon the sand, and his eyes were deep and soft like the pools of the Cabancalan. He came to me from over the seas, señor; from far-away Spain. I was standing on the beach, right over there. There were many boat-loads of soldiers landing, and he was on the foremost prao. It came straight to me, foaming with eagerness, its wings spread out like those of a butterfly, flying over the waves, and he stood at the bow. His cap was in his hand; the wind blew his hair of gold into a halo like that of the Christ of the Santa Iglesia; the sun beat down upon his white suit and he glistened like a god. Straight for the spot where I stood, señor; straight as your compass needle points to the north, the prao steered from afar, and not a palm's breadth either way did it turn as it foamed toward me. And when, heeling over like a wounded bird, it grounded in the shallows, and ten men jumped out into the water to carry him ashore, he motioned them off, sprang himself into the waves waist-deep, and impatiently, as a horse paws, he forced his way toward me. Then a fear entered my heart and I fled, fled back into the woods, to my hut, and threw myself upon the floor panting, panting and dreaming. "I was not ugly, then, señor; ah, no, I was not ugly; age and sorrow had not yet knotted me like the roots of the banyan. I was Queen then, señor; the Queen of Beauty among my own people. At the procession it was I that stood on a pedestal, clad in gold and silk, the picture of the Mother of God. At the bailes it was I that the young men sought, and it was for me, señor, that Juan Perez had a knife plunged between his shoulders, one dark night, long ago. It was long ago, señor; it was long ago. "I was beautiful, señor, and I knew my beauty. I was proud, proud of my dark eyes, of my golden shoulders, of the hair that fell about me like a garment to the ground when I unrolled it in the sun, after the bath at the spring. I was loved, señor; I was desired; my fame was all over Negros and had no boundaries but the sea; but I, I loved no one; I railed and scoffed at all; I loved no one, till he came.