However hard service was to me, who had hitherto been accustomed to be waited upon myself, I was at first tolerably well contented with my situation. Very few gentlemen passed that way in the course of the day, so that, generally, I had nothing to do but to eat and drink until night, when the muleteers arrived. I soon learnt all the manœuvres of inns: how to swell the corn to three times its quantity with boiling water, and how to measure it out afterwards to the best advantage. There was no occasion to point out to me more than once the peculiar construction of the mangers, for, after one attempt, I well knew how to watch my opportunity to deprive the passengers of at least a third part of the corn they paid for; and even the muleteers did not always escape; but when by chance any young cavaliers, distinguished by their insignia and the nice cut of their whiskers, happened to stop at our house without servants, we were particularly assiduous in our attentions. No sooner did we perceive them than we ran out to assist them to alight. These young gentlemen, for the most part, affecting to be persons of great importance, would not condescend to enter the stable, but were content to recommend their horses or mules to our care; which recommendation had so powerful an effect that we never failed to lead the poor beasts where there was neither hay nor a single grain of corn. We tied them to the rack, and left them to their meditations. Occasionally, however, out of pity, we gave them a handful of corn, just by way of a bon-bouche, before their departure, though of this scanty pittance the poultry in the yard caught up half, and sometimes even the jackass got his share of it. In this manner were all those cavaliers served who relied upon our honesty; and if we made them pay well for what their beasts had never eaten, judge in what manner we charged them for their own expences. I was overjoyed when it fell to my lot to reckon with them: “your bill amounts to so many reals,” said I, “and so many maravedis,” adding in a graceful manner: _Y haga les buen provecho_,--“Much good may it do you:”--a compliment which always procured me something for myself. You will very easily believe that we always charged this sort of customers twice as much as they owed, in spite of all the regulations of the Police, to which my master paid little attention, though they were fixed up all over his house. He was satisfied with having them in his possession, and so long as he was able to pay the officers their dues, he cared but little about observing their ordinances.