arrival at the capital, I went out with him in his carriage. In all the streets and from all the windows, we were saluted with great show of affection, and the children began to jump for joy, and to cry out, "Good afternoon, father." The tears started to my eyes, and I said: "Ah, simple people, how little do you know the blessing that you enjoy! Neither hunger, nor nakedness, nor inclemency of the weather troubles you. With the payment of seven reals per year, you remain free of contributions. You do not have to close your houses with bolts. You do not fear that the district troopers will come in to lay waste your fields, and trample you under foot at your own firesides. You call 'father' the one who is in command over you. Perhaps there will come a time when you will be more civilized, and you will break out in revolution; and you will awake terrified at the tumult of the riots, and will see blood flowing through these quiet fields, and gallows and guillotines erected in these squares, which never yet have seen an execution." "But is it not true also," I reflected later, "that this present happiness may be transitory up to a certain point, and that a changing of the captain-general or of the alcalde can cause great evils, and change the aspect of so pleasing a picture? Yes, it is a lamentable truth; and I shall do what is in my power so that your lot may be less precarious, and so that the government which rules you may be so organized that you may be as little as possible subject to the injustice and avarice of men; and so that, wherever you see a Spaniard, you may salute him with love and call him father."