Ronald would have contemplated with delight the varying of the landscape as he rode along, but for the sorrow which pressed heavy upon his heart, intermingled with certain fears of what his reception might be at the regiment after so unaccountable a desertion, and in what light it might be viewed by his brother-officers. Full of these exciting ideas, at times he drove his horse furiously forward, as if he strove to leave his thoughts behind him, and shorten as much as possible the distance between himself and his comrades. He longed to behold the embattled towers, the slender spires and belfries of Truxillo, where he hoped to find his comrades, and explain his singular disappearance; but Truxillo was yet leagues distant. As the road plunged down among the green woodlands through which it wound, he enjoyed the cool shadow which the tall chesnuts cast over the otherwise hot dusty road, which shone glaring and white in the rays of the meridian sun. A faint chorus came floating on the breeze towards him as he rode along, and swelled out into a bold and merry strain on his nearer approach. The cracking of whips and jingle of innumerable bells announced a train of muleteers, who came in view a few seconds afterwards, and gave a boisterous cheer at sight of the scarlet uniform. According to the custom of the muleteers during hot weather, they all wore large cotton handkerchiefs, knotted round their heads, under their sombreros; their tasselled jackets were flying open, and their broad shirt-collars, stiff with flowers and needlework, were folded over their shoulders, displaying every bare and brawny neck. The train halted, and Ronald recognised his old acquaintance Lazaro Gomez, the master muleteer, who took off his beaver with one hand, while he reined-in the leading mule with the other. Lazaro’s speculations appeared to have been successful. His jacket was now of fine green velvet, covered with tinsel lace and garnished with about six dozen of those brass bell-buttons, with which the muleteers are so fond of adorning their garments. "Well, Micer Lazaro," said Stuart, "why do you drive your cattle so fast during the heat of the day, when they should be enjoying a _siesta_ under the greenwood? They are likely to drop before you reach the forest of Jarciejo." "_Par Diez_! I hope not, senor," replied the muleteer, in evident trepidation at the idea. "They shall reach Jarciejo,—we are ruined else; and I trust, in this perilous time, that the gracious senora, our Lady of Majorga," crossing himself and looking upwards, "will not forget the honest muleteer, that never passed her shrine without bestowing on it a handful of maravedis. She will put mettle in the legs of his mules, and enable them to save his hard-earned goods and chattels." "How, Micer Gomez,—what is the matter? You seem much excited."