"Ha, ha! Good opposition. I welcome such an antagonist--these fat-brained peasants about here are too simple to stimulate me to good work. I have been growing dull and commonplace--I am almost out of training, as they call it in the bull-ring." "Come then, and I will give Pedro some money to buy drinks for the stupid dolts,--they can drink my health: it is none of the best these days, Robledo. My American trip was wearing. It is a wretched, unromantic hole--not a country, just a great mob of people." "I can well believe your Excellency. This way, sir." They returned to the big room of the tavern, and Dolores retired from the temporary confessional box. Her face showed mixed emotions--but predominating over any other influence was the great desire to serve the rulers of her family. Curiously loyal are these humble peasants of the inland Latin districts. Their lives follow the monotonous example of the generations before them: as their grandsires, their fathers were tradesmen of a certain calling, so do they follow the strata, contented to exist with the conventional beginning, moderately happy middle era, and inevitably stupid ending of their lives. It is this which is so pleasing to the European aristocrats: no matter how bankrupt, incompetent, disreputable, the class theory which is recognized by the masses is, "Once a gentleman, always a gentleman." It is inconceivable upon the Continent for a peasant's or even a tradesman's son or daughter to aspire to a higher level than that of the family. Exceptions to the rule are looked upon with distrust by superiors as well as the lowly equals: too much ambition is a temptation to the gods which is hardly respectable. There is a smug contentment, then, in the feudal countries which is the surest bulwark of the "divine right of kings"--and courtiers! A pleasantly distended belly, a mellow thrill from cheap wine, a certainty about the repetition of regular meals and drinks, with enough clothes and shelter to maintain relative positions with the neighbors--this year, next year, and twenty years from now ... these things are the mess of pottage for which the Esaus of the kingdoms and principalities sell their birthrights and their souls!