A French landowner by name Armand Carron, a resident of a small town in the Department of Finistère, received, some time ago, a letter from Ceuta, signed Santiago (or James) Carron. The writer explained that he was a native of Finistère where the Frenchman resided; that he was a namesake and a member of the landowner's family, son of a first cousin of his who had left France many years before and settled in Spain with wife and three sons, of whom he, Santiago Carron, now alone survived. This Santiago, the letter went on, had been placed by his father in the military college at Segovia, had served through all the subaltern grades as an artillery officer, had risen to the rank of brigadier and in that capacity had been sent out in command of the district of the Cinco Villas in Cuba, where he had married the daughter of Don Diego Calderon, a wealthy Havana merchant, and the owner of vast sugar plantations. His wife had brought him a dowry of four million reales (£40,000) and had died leaving him a daughter called after her mother, Juanita, now about 17 years old. This girl, the only object of her father's love and care, had been by him sent to Europe and placed for her education at the convent of the Sacre Coeur at Chamartin near Madrid. His career in the army had been for many years very fortunate and his wedded life in Cuba exceedingly happy. He had been laden with honours by a grateful Government and received many proofs of his country's trust, but lately the officer in charge of the chest of the military district at Cinco Villas had absconded and run away to New York with a sum of two million reales. As he, the brigadier, was answerable for his subaltern's conduct and was not willing to sacrifice one half of his wife's--now his daughter's--fortune to pay for the defaulter, he had been summoned to Spain and then relegated, or sent as a prisoner on parole to the fortress at Ceuta to take his trial before a court martial, which owing to the dilatoriness of all things in Spain might sit till doomsday.