under the table occurred to his cowardice. It was

too late; his officers had rushed in tumultuously, in a great clatter of scabbards, clamoring with astonish- ment and wonder. But since they did not imme- diately proceed to plunge their swords into his breast, the brazen side of his character asserted itself. Pass- ing the sleeve of his uniform over his face he pull* himself together. His truculent glance turned slowlj here and there checked the noise where it fell; anc the stiff body of the late Señor Hirsch, merchant, aft swaying imperceptibly, made a half turn and came a rest in the midst of awed murmurs and uneasy shuffling. A voice remarked loudly, "Behold a man who will never speak again." And another, from the back ro of faces, timid and pressing, cried out: "Why did you kill him, mi coronel?" "Because he has confessed everything," answere Sotillo, with the hardihood of desperation. He felt himself cornered. He brazened it out on the strength of his reputation with very fair success. His hearers thought him very capable of such an act. They were disposed to believe his flattering tale. There is no credulity so eager and blind as the credulity of covet- ousness, which, in its universal extent, measures the moral misery and the intellectual destitution of man- kind. Ah! he had confessed everything, this factious Jew, this bribon. Good! Then he was no longer wanted. A sudden dense guffaw was heard from the senior captain a big-headed man, with little round eyes and monstrously fat cheeks which never moved.

The old major, tall and fantastically ragged, like a