As soon as I was on my feet again, the cause of this brutal conduct became evident, without question, as my good friend, the trooper, from Lerida, was the first person that met my eyes. "Ha! ha!" cried he, coming before me, while the others pinioned my arms behind, and shaking his clenched hand in my face, with a grin of unutterable rage--"Ha! ha! we have thee now; and, by the soul of a Castilian, I would pluck thy heart out with my own hands, did not the viceroy wish to examine thee himself. But never fear! before two hours be over, thou, too, shalt have a flight from a cannon's mouth!" My situation was not a very agreeable one, but yet it was not one that impressed me with much fear. Indeed, it was never any circumstances of mere personal danger that much agitated me. Anything that touched me through my affections, or through my imagination, ever had a great and visible effect upon my mind; but to all which came in the simple form of bodily danger, I was, I believe, constitutionally callous. While the soldiers were engaged in pinioning my arms with cords, which they drew so tight as almost to tear my flesh, some of their companions dismounted my trembling little companion, and as his excessive fear and non-resistant qualities were very evident, they did not think it necessary to decorate his wrists with the same sort of strict bracelets which they had adapted to mine, but simply led him along after me in a kind of procession towards the arsenal; whither, it seems, the viceroy had removed from his own palace the night before, on the news of the insurrection at Lerida. The way was long, and I believe the brutal Castilians found a sort of pleasure in parading us through the various streets, and showing to the populace a new instance of the height to which the daring authority they assumed might be carried. Their insolence, however, seemed to me, even from the glances of the people as we passed, to be likely to receive a check sooner than they imagined. Not a Catalonian did we approach, but I recognised that flash in his eye, which told of a burning and indignant heart within; and though they suffered themselves to be shouldered by the licentious and ill-disciplined soldiers as we went along, it was with a bent brow and clenched teeth, which seemed to say, "The day of retribution is at hand!" As we approached the arsenal, I caught a glimpse of the wide, grand ocean; and there was something in the sight of its vast free waves, which seemed to reproach me with the bonds I suffered to rest upon my hands. I believe, involuntarily, I made an effort to burst them asunder, for one of the guard, seeing some movement of my hands, struck me a violent blow with the pommel of his sword, exclaiming, "What! trying to escape! Do so again, and I will send a ball through your brains!"