Then intervened a brief campaign in the mountains of the Isla Margarita; Torre went there to take command. This is the famed old island of pearls; they lie there in the reefs amid the bones of men and ships. Torre found no pearls, but he defeated the royal troops in the first engagement resembling an open battle he had ventured fight. This matter settled, he lay awake at night, and thought about his new ward. Further tidings reached him from Carácas, of his nephew. It was said young Ramon boasted he would marry her. Then the King, as is the royal way after defeat in battle, made further concessions to the “Liberals,” as the revolutionists were called; and in the coaxing amity of the time, Torre was permitted, nay, invited, to return to the capital. He did so, and was immediately tendered a banquet by the royal Governor, and a ball at which his ward was present. The royal Governor and his lady sat beneath a pavilion, webbed of the scarlet and gold of Spain. The Countess Dolores came and curtsied deeply to them; then she rose the taller for it, and as she turned haughtily away they saw that she was almost robed in pearls; three strands about her neck and six about her waist; and the ribbon in her mantilla was pale green, white, and red. El Gobernador only smiled at this, the liberal tricolor, and made a pretty speech about it; but the vice-regal lady made some ill-natured reference to the pearls, as spoils from Margarita. Don Ramon was standing by and heard it. The General saw it not. After the formal dance the General went up to compliment his ward. This was the first time he had seen her since his return; for even he could not call save in the presence of the family; and she had no other family than himself. He could not call on her until--unless--he married her. He said, “I am glad my lady Countess is kinder to our colors than my nephew.” He watched her as he said this; she started, and at the end of the sentence blushed. He saw her blush. Then he bowed, as if to retire. “The pearls,” she said, hastily, “are all I have; see!” And the Marquis, bowing, saw that the neck-strands were not a necklace, but after passing thrice around her neck, descended to be lost in the laces of her dress. The Marquis ended his bow, and went back to camp. Next week there came an Indian soldier to Dolores with a box of island pearls; they were large as grapeshot, and went thrice about her waist. But the General no longer contradicted her engagement to his nephew. V. THE General had never known women; he had only known what men (and women, too) say of women. At Paris, and Madrid, he had seen his friends see dancers, figurantes; he did not confound other women with these, but he had known none other. Of girls, in particular, he was ignorant. A man of Latin race never sees a girl; in America, North America, it is different, and one sometimes wonders if we justify it.