“Bear your cross with patience; for that is the only way to make it lighter. Be a reed to all storms, but an oak to temptation. Never turn from the right path, though it be steep and sown with thorns. Always look straight before you, for he that does not do this never knows where he will stop. As for this woman who is going to be your father’s wife, give her the wall; but remember that she is bad, and neither join yourself to her nor talk with her, except with reserve and when you must.” “Shall you do the same, Lucas?” “I--I shall act as God gives me understanding.” Nothing was seen of Lucas on the day of Juan’s marriage, and it was in vain that they looked for him: he had disappeared. Juan, who left no means untried to ascertain his son’s whereabouts, learned some days later, from a muleteer who come from Tevilla, that he had enlisted. The father felt indignant at the contempt thus shown for his authority, and sorry to lose an assistant in his son: but found consolation in freedom from the immediate presence of an interested witness whose censure like the fog, without form, voice, or action, penetrated him with an uncomfortableness from which there was no escape. Lucia went to live with her stepmother, and it is hardly necessary to relate what she had to endure; in particular from the daughters of the latter, who, being both foolish and ugly, naturally disliked one who was beautiful and wise; for she had commenced by playing with sweetness the role of Cinderella that her brother had recommended. But, little by little, the continual friction was wasting her patience, and indignation, repressed discontent, and rancor were beginning to find place in her heart. She wished, sometimes, to humiliate, by her advantages, those who were continually humiliating her, and grew presuming and fond of admiration. So it is that evil seeds spread and multiply with prodigious rapidity: one suffices to open the way and prepare the ground for the rest. While these things were passing, a regiment of cavalry, commanded by one Colonel Gallardo, came, and took up its quarters in Arcos.