“Yes, I will gladly make that agreement,” I replied. “It will be a new kind of paradise, and of the fruit of every tree I may eat except of this tree only.” She laughed gaily. “I will now leave you,” she said. “You are suffering pain, and are very tired. Perhaps you will be able to sleep.” While speaking she brought a second cushion for my head, then left me, and before long I fell into a refreshing doze. I spent three days of enforced idleness at the Casa Blanca, as the house was called, before Santa Coloma returned, and after the rough experience I had undergone, during which I had subsisted on a flesh diet untempered by bread or vegetables, they were indeed like days spent in paradise to me. Then the General came back. I was sitting alone in the garden when he arrived, and, coming out to me, he greeted me warmly. “I greatly feared from my previous experience of your impatience under restraint that you might have left us,” he said kindly. “I could not do that very well yet, without a horse to ride on,” I returned. “Well, I came here just now to say I wish to present you with a horse and saddle. The horse is standing at the gate now, I believe; but, if you are only waiting for a horse to leave us I shall have to regret making you this present. Do not be in a hurry; you have yet many years to live in which to accomplish all you wish to do, and let us have the pleasure of your company a few days longer. Doña Mercedes and her daughter desire nothing better than to keep you with them.” I promised him not to run away immediately, a promise which was not hard to make; then we went to inspect my horse, which proved to be a very fine bay, saddled with a dashing native _recado_. “Come with me and try him,” he said. “I am going to ride out to the Cerro Solo.” The ride proved an extremely pleasant one, as I had not mounted a horse for some days, and had been longing to spice my idle hours with a little exhilarating motion. We went at a swinging gallop over the grassy plain, the General all the time discoursing freely of his plans and of the brilliant prospects awaiting all those timely-wise individuals who should elect to link their fortunes with his at this early stage of the campaign.