His example and the lure of the gold had their sure effect. In a moment the officer was busy with his pen, while an eager group leaned over the table to watch as he wrote their names and answers to his brisk questions. Their enthusiasm spread among the loungers outside, and before it subsided a dozen or more enlisted for the expedition. Most of the recruits were half-starved fellows who had idled about the colony for months, unable to secure employment for their swords since the rebellion in Nicaragua had been suppressed, and disdainful of work less honorable. A few were fully equipped, but many had sold, pawned, or gambled away their arms and armor, and had only their rapiers, which they retained as a necessity. During this first day of recruiting, a score had been sent to the temporary quarters, with instructions first to gather up or locate whatever of equipment they could find. Candles had been brought, the room had nearly emptied, and the officer was arranging his papers, when he heard the sound of hoofs and the voice of the halberdier, evidently addressing a rider. "_Hola_, Pedro! Blessed Faith! Is it thou?" The response was not immediate, and the creaking of the saddle, with sundry grunts and adjurations to the animal, indicated that the newcomer was dismounting. The operation was made difficult by the fact that he had a wooden leg, the left having been taken off at the knee. He puffed as he finally stood, but presently answered the soldier in a voice of much volume and with uncommon blandness and fluency. "It is I,—that is, my solid parts. Of the rest, those volatile are volatilized; those meltable, melted and bedewing the grass along my trail. Thou seest but a parboiled residuum. Wilt hold my mule?" "Hold thy mule!" replied the halberdier, with proper soldierly scorn. "Not I, by the fiend!" "Nay! Keep thy temper, my lusty buck soldier," said the other, with suavity. "I meant no flattery." "Flattery!" "In offering thee the privilege.—Here, boy," he called to a half-breed urchin, "guard my steed. But keep in front of him, for he hath a twofold nature,—tender-hearted to a fault as far as the saddle-girth; behind it, maleficent as the powers of evil." He turned again to the soldier. "Is this thy recruiting office, _Señor Alabardero_?" "Ah!" assented the halberdier. "But, _Sacramento_! Dost think to enlist, Pedro?" "And why not?" demanded Pedro. "Why, if I can count, thou hast legs too few by half." "Then thou canst not count, for I have three. Two I have with me,—one mine by right of birth, the other by right of purchase, and of as good wood as that of which thy head is made. The third lieth in Italy, four feet under ground, but still mine, _nihilo minus_,—which is Latin, my friend, and meaneth ’nevertheless.’ But dost require more legs in thy recruits, halberdier? If so, it must be a running game, this campaigning in Peru."