There was a sort of tacit consent to their swaggering among the Poblanos; as a punishment to the latter for the trouble, which _their_ swaggering had caused to us. It was only for a time, however; and, when things appeared to be going too far, the good old Anglo-American morality--inculcated by the _township school_--resumed its sway over the minds of our soldiers; and the Red Hats were coerced into better behaviour. CHAPTER TWELVE. "UN CLAVO SACA OTRO CLAVO." Now that its streets were no longer obstructed by the fear of mob violence, or midnight assassination, we had an opportunity of exploring the "City of the Angels." A fine old town we found it--with its grand cathedral, of which, according to monkish legend, _real_ angels were the architects; its scores of _capillas_ and _parroquias_; its hundreds of massive stone and stuccoed houses; and its thousands of _adobe_ dwellings. Besides those standing, we discovered whole streets that had fallen to decay; _barrios_ of uninhabited ruins, covered with a weed-tangle of convolvuli, cowage, and other creepers, growing in green luxuriousness over the chaos of crumbling walls. No other evidence is needed to prove that La Puebla, still the third city of Anahuac, was once much grander than it is to-day. I sought distraction in wandering through its streets; though there was one into which I never went--the Calle del Obispo. I shunned it with as much zeal as if there had been a plague in it; though I knew it contained _una cosa muy linda_--the fairest thing in the city of Puebla. And it was for this that I shunned it. Since I had no longer the slightest hope of possessing Mercedes Villa-Senor, I was acting in accordance with the counsel of a friend, sager than myself, to whom I had communicated the story of my illusion. The course advised by him was to forget her,--if I could. "Don't go near again, nor see her on any account," were the words of my wise counsellor. "It's the only plan with a passion like yours-- suddenly conceived, and, perhaps, founded on a mistaken fancy. She may not be such perfection, after all. You've had but a poor chance of judging. Beauty in the balcony is sometimes wonderfully changed when it descends into the street. No doubt this damsel at close quarters would turn out very different from what you describe her. It's only imagination." "No imagination could create such a form--such a face--such--" "Such fiddlesticks! Come, old fellow! Don't give way to this confounded romancing. I venture to say, that, if you could see her at six feet distance, and under a good strong light, you'd be completely disenchanted. The same tripe-coloured skin all these Spanish women have--that won't bear the sun upon it. I wouldn't give one of our fair-haired Saxon girls for a whole shipload of them."