"Come, gentlemen, to horse!" cried the general, turning aside to conceal his emotion. CHAPTER XX. THE SOIRÉE. The cabildo of San Miguel de Tucumán was gay with excitement, and brilliantly lighted up. The people collected on the Plaza Mayor saw through the open windows the crowd of guests, men and women, in their most magnificent costumes, and their most brilliant toilets. The governor was giving a tertulia a gala (soirée) to celebrate, in official style, the brilliant victory gained by the celebrated and valorous partisan chief, don Zeno Cabral, over the troops of the King of Spain. Joy burst forth and overflowed all parts of the cabildo on to the square, and from the square into the streets, where the people, picking up the crumbs which fell from the official fête, amused themselves in their own way, laughing, singing, dancing, and here and there exchanging--so great was their delight--a few blows of the knife. The soirée had acquired new lustre from the arrival of M. Dubois, who--although everybody knew his title of Duc de Mantone--preferred to preserve the modest name which he had adopted on his arrival in America; saying with charming good humour, to those who reproached him with this obstinate incognito, which deceived no one, that the name of Dubois reminded him of the best years of his youth, when he fought on the benches of the National Convention to conquer for his country the republic and liberal institutions; and that he thought it well to resume this name now, when, in the decline of life, he came to another hemisphere, to maintain, with all the influence that his experience could give, the same principles. At this the questioners could find nothing to answer, and withdrew, charmed with the spirit and manners of the old member of Convention, and--let us hasten to state--secretly flattered at possessing in their ranks one of those Titans of the National French Convention who, from their curule chairs, had made the world tremble, and whom the storm had been powerless to annihilate. About half past nine, at the moment when the fête was at its height, Captain Don Louis Ortega, the painter, Émile Gagnepain, and the Count de Mendoza entered the cabildo, and made their appearance in the saloons. Thanks to the captain, the French artist had changed his costume of a gaucho, rubbed and worn in use, for a splendid Buenos Airean chacrero, which almost rendered him unrecognisable. The presence of the newcomers was little remarked in the whirlwind of the fête, and they could, without attracting attention, mingle in the crowd of guests which literally encumbered the reception rooms. The French painter had a few minutes' happiness in contemplating the fête, the entire appearance and arrangements of which so little resembled what, under similar circumstances, we are accustomed to see in Europe.