been detained in the presidio. [22] See ante, p. 194. Another alien convict to whom Relosillas pays a high tribute was his own Chinese servant, a convict known as "Juan de la Cruz, the Asiatic." He seems to have been unceasingly loyal and devoted in his service, an admirable cook, an indefatigable nurse, a faithful watchman who guarded his effects and secured his privacy. Juan had many accomplishments; he could weave shade hats of the finest palm fibre, he was as clever as any seamstress with his needle; he was a first-class housemaid and laundress; he could make a dollar go further in the market than the most economical housewife. He drove the most astonishing bargains with the hucksters and purveyors of food, fish and game, with which Ceuta was plentifully supplied. He had been condemned to a long term for a murder committed in Havana at a hotel, of which he was the chief cook. In appearance he was younger than his years, tall, thin, anæmic looking, shortsighted, with jet black hair and oblique eyes. He was a man of great intelligence, a dramatic author in Chinese and was released before his time to accompany the Director General of Prisons to Madrid as his cook. In the end he started a fruit shop in the capital and prospered greatly. An entirely different class of prisoners came to Ceuta in considerable numbers from time to time,--those exiled for political misdeeds. A whole discipline battalion was composed of military offenders, among them a number of artillerymen condemned for the rising in Barcelona and crowds of Carlists and those concerned in the so-called cantonal risings. One or two politicals were strange characters, such as the old soldier named "_el Cojo_" (the lame man) of Cariñena, a conceited veteran very proud of his many campaigns in which he had served, and who went everywhere on donkey back, being infirm and crippled. Another was the ex-curé of Berraonda, a Biscayan priest of ferocious aspect, tall, corpulent, dark-skinned, with an abundant snow white bushy beard, which grew to his waist and which was left untouched by the prison barber.