MORTON

Contents

Bel and the Dragon's chaplains wereMore moderate than these by far:For they, poor knaves, were glad to cheat,To get their wives and children meat;But these will not be fobb'd off so,They must have wealth and power too;Or else with blood and desolationThey'll tear it out o' th' heart o' th' nation.—Hudibras.

Notwithstanding the success of the many daring and lawless adventurers who visited the Pacific Ocean, or "Great South Sea," as it is called in the maps and travels of the period, and who reaped many a golden harvest there, about the time of the first James and Charles of England, the coasts washed by its waves were but seldom visited, and its waters seldom ploughed by any other keels than those of discovery ships for many years. Chili, Peru, Mexico, and California, after having been definitively ceded to the Spanish crown, constituted an El Dorado, whosegates could only be opened by a formal declaration of war. Spain was generally considered by the other European powers to have a double right to South America, namely, that of discovery and conquest; and after an ineffectual struggle to wrest the golden prize from the grasp of its legitimate possessor, England, and the rest of the "high contracting powers," acquiesced in her possessing it, the more readily because they wished the same kind of title should be acknowledged in their own case. Accordingly discovery and conquest have, to this day, been considered as good and lawful titles, and a sort of deed of conveyance, on the part of the natives, to their discoverers and conquerors of all and sundry their lands and landed estates, together with their goods and chattels, when of any value.

His Most Catholic Majesty, then, finding his claim to the New World fully established, set about civilizing his new conquest in good earnest, and sending out swarms of priests, backed of course by the military portion of the secular arm, with glory to God on their lips, and hatred to his creatures in their hearts, with the sword in one hand and the crucifix in the other, soon convinced the unhappy natives of their damnable heresies. Their simple religion was destroyed, millions perished by the sword or the tender mercies of the Holy Inquisition, and as many more in the mines; and civilization and religion kissed each other, and rested from their labors of love.

This was the most received method of converting whole nations at once, then in vogue—we Protestants of the present day are far more humane; we only distribute among the newly discovered nations of the earth, rum and Calvinism, gunpowder and the venereal disease, and with these powerful agents our missionaries and merchants, have succeeded in causing Dagon to bow down before them—over all the civilized world. New Holland seems to be the only uncivilized part of this watery ball, but New Holland holds out no temptations to the missionary; the inhabitants are a little too cannibally given, and martyrdom is altogether obsolete; besides, it is doubted by our soundest theologians whether Christianity was ever intended for a people so brutal and debased.

Spain, at the time I refer to, was renowned in arts and in arms; her commerce extended from the East to the West Indies, and she was for a time one of the most powerful of the kingdoms of Europe. Her priests, finding the New World a land overflowing, not exactly with milk and honey, but with what in all ages and in all countries is considered infinitely better, gold and silver, and abounding in every thing that could pamper the pride and gratify the sense, founded churches and monasteries, while her viceroys built cities and forts, and South America became the richest jewel in the diadem of His Catholic Majesty. To secure this jewel entirely to himself seems to have been his chiefanxiety, and accordingly all foreigners were rigidly excluded from its sea-ports, and although the "Assiento," or contract for supplying the colonies with African slaves, was enjoyed successively by the English and French, both of whom successively abused it by smuggling immense quantities of their respective manufactures into those colonies, the duty of supplying them with European merchandise was carried on finally solely by means of register ships, as they were called, Cadiz being the only European port where they were permitted to load and discharge.

The whaling ships were only permitted to procure supplies, or "recruit," as our unctuous brethren of Nantucket call it, at certain fixed and well-fortified ports. Still even these managed to carry on quite a respectable business in the smuggling way, especially with the ports of Mexico and California.

But a new flea was about getting into Don Diego's ear—the peace of 1783, while it added an infant giant to the catalogue of earthly "principalities and powers," also liberated from the fetters of commercial, as well as political restraints, a people active, restless, daring, prying, and enterprising to the last degree; a people whose skill in navigation and swift-sailing vessels rendered them absolutely intangible to an enemy that took occasion to chase them, while their courage, when they thought proper to "stand to it," as dame Quickly says, made them dangerous antagonists. This the reader probably"guesses" must be brother Jonathan, and he guesses about right. The same spirit of restless curiosity that prompts a cat, when she sets up her Ebenezer in a new house, to examine every portion of it, from cellar to garret, seemed to have possessed our grandpas more strongly than it does us of the present age.

This national character of ours is owing doubtless to our having been placed by the hand of Heaven in an immense unexplored region, and was no doubt much increased by the spirit-stirring scenes of the revolutionary war, which beheld our "old continentals" one day ferreting out the long-tailed Hessians from the woods of Saratoga, and another "doing battle right manfullie" on the plains of South Carolina.

While they of the land service were pushing their advanced posts to the foot of the Rocky Mountains, our seamen were carrying our striped bunting into every portion of the navigable world. Such were the people whose arrival in the Pacific the Spanish commandantes and viceroys awaited with no small fear and trembling. They knew vaguely that we had just come off victorious from a long, fierce, and bloody struggle with powerful England, and while they consigned us pell-mell to the devil, as "malditos Americanos," they doubted whether we had the additional claim to go there upon the strength of being heretics. The captains of the guarda-costas redoubled their vigilance, and sailed in chase of not afew albatrosses and whale-spouts, such was the zeal that animated them.

I should have described these redoubtable crafts, the guarda-costas, before—they were armed vessels of different classes, varying from light frigates down to mere gunboats, and were distributed along the coasts to protect trade, and prevent smuggling.

When however these formidable strangers did arrive, the readiness with which they conformed to the numerous, and in most cases vexatious, port regulations, their quiet behavior on shore, and the many novelties and luxuries that they freely distributed to the port officers, completely blinded them to the instinctive disposition to trade that characterizes my beloved countrymen, especially the New Englanders, who were the first to carry our flag into the Pacific, as they were also the first to display it in Europe.

I have made these long-winded and apparently uncalled-for remarks partly to show my learning, but chiefly in conformity with the fashion of the day, that requires that every story, long or short, should be ushered in by at least one chapter of prefatory remarks. I do not intend to be so unreasonable; but before this my first chapter is finished, shall give my readers an idea of my purposed principal scene of operations.

If then, the reader will turn to the proper map, he will find in about the latitude of twenty-one north, Cape Corrientes; and not far from thisthree islands, called Las Tres Marias; the Three Marys, that is, so named after the three Marys of the New Testament.

Geographers, when they make maps, seem to start with the notion that there must be a certain number of islands, &c. inserted in each map; and when they have located the larger and more important ones within fifteen or twenty degrees of latitude and longitude of their proper places, which is as near as they commonly come to the truth, they proceed to distribute the remainder according to their own taste. In compliance with this fashion of theirs, they have laid down upon all modern maps, especially those that are called the best, and in nearly the latitude that I have above mentioned, and longitude that I have not, namely, about one hundred and fifteen west from Greenwich Observatory, a little island which they call Revalligigedos. I have passed twice over the spot where this little island with the big name "stays put," in all maps by them, and have conversed with many whalemen and others, who, taken collectively, have sailed over every square inch of salt water in that place, and none of them have seen it. So too, they have studded the ocean off Cape Horn so thickly with islands, that a landsman wonders how a ship of any size can manage to squeeze through into the Pacific. I have passed that cape three times, and have been working to windward off them some weeks, but although we always kept a bright look-out for iceislands and strange vessels, we never, to use a vulgar expression, saw "hide or hair" of these supererogatory islands.

But to return; in a direction nearly east from the Three Marys, the reader will find, on most maps, a small river, called by the Spaniards, in their usual style of bombast, El Rio Grande, or the Great River; though the identical legs that I now stand upon have waded across it at low water, and, except cutting my foot with an oyster-shell, there was nothing very remarkable in the exploit. At the mouth of this mighty stream is an island on which stands the town of St. Blas.

The Spaniards, as it is well known, when they discovered America, christened every cape, bay, mountain, river, island, rock, or shoal after some saint or other, but the learned are somewhat puzzled to know who this St. Blas can be. In my poor opinion, the difficulty is easily enough got over—the word Blas is only a corruption of Blast, and accordingly we shall find that St. Blast, properly so called, is neither more nor less than our old friend Æolus, of the heathen mythology, smuggled into the calendar, who, being the god of blasts and puffs, might well be canonized under the name of St. Blast, without doing violence to the tender consciences of the good Catholics. In this way, according to Dean Swift, Jupiter became Jew Peter, and by a natural transition,SaintPeter. Whether he is right or not, one thing is certain, that sundry temples, of which the veritable Jupiter has been"seized in fee tail," I think lawyers call it, from time immemorial, have quietly become "St. Peter's churches," to the great edification of the Christian world, and incredible advancement of religion and piety.

The island, upon which St. Blas is perched, slopes off gradually to the eastward, but to the south and west descends in a sheer precipice of two or three hundred feet in height. The town was taken and retaken several times during the sanguinary war of the Mexican revolution. The last time it was in the hands of the royalists, they compelled all the male inhabitants, and, report says, not a few women and children besides, that they suspected of favoring the Patriot cause, to leap off this precipice. Soldiers were stationed at the foot of the cliff, to despatch those who reached the bottom with any signs of life. This piece of information I had from a widow who kept a shop in thePlaza, and who also told me, "with weeping tears," that her husband was one of the number who took the fearful leap.

Rather on the north-west side, the hill is surmountable by a zig-zag path, up which a loaded mule can climb with some difficulty. On the west, or seaward, side, is a strip of flat land, of considerable width, on which formerly stood the royal arsenal, rope-walks, and warehouses, the ruins of which were standing in 1822, when I visited the place. On the western extremity of this level land is a small village, called, asusual in such cases, the Porte, or landing place. The bay, which is a fine harbor, sweeps far to the eastward, when the land, trending away to the southward, with a slight inclination westerly, becomes lost in the distance. The more immediate, or inner, harbor, is formed by a point of land opposite the Porte, on the southern extremity of which is a battery, formerly of considerable dimensions, and strength, but since suffered to decay, and is much reduced in effectiveness. It was intended to command the harbor and anchorage; but with Spanish artillerymen, a mile offing, and reasonably good weather, a ship would be as safe from its fire, for three months at least, as though she was all the while in London Docks.

At the distance of two or three miles from the usual anchorage, and forming an excellent leading mark for the bay, is Pedro Blanco, or the White Rock, of two hundred feet height, perfectly precipitous and inaccessible, and resembling a huge tower, rising abruptly from the sea.

Taken altogether, the bay of St. Blas forms a very beautiful prospect, with the Andes in the back ground, which, with their

"Meteor standard to the winds unfurl'd,Look from their throne of clouds o'er half the world;"

its white sand beach, fading gradually away to the south and east, itstown roosting on its barren rock, and indistinctly seen; its low lands covered with a luxuriant growth of lime and other trees; and lastly, by way of seasoning, its moschetoes and sand-flies.

A knight he was, whose very sight wouldEntitle him mirror of knighthood.Hudibras.

Tropical climates have certainly one advantage over all others, that is not to be held in light esteem. They have rainy and dry seasons, that are exclusively rainy and dry. During six months, or nearly as long, the windows of heaven stand wide open, by night and by day, and the liquid blessing descends upon the thirsty earth beneath "in one lot," as auctioneers say; while on the other hand, the dry season has its great and manifold advantages and pleasures. With us in the temperate zone, as geographers call it, I suppose, for want of another name, a man does not think of riding twenty miles without India rubbers, a great coat, boots, and an umbrella, to say nothing of an entire change of raiment, if he is a prudent, cautious old bachelor, or widower; and even then he is as likely to get a ducking as to have fine weather.

During a tropical dry season, on the contrary, a journey of two hundred miles may be safely undertaken, without any of these encumbrances; with two or three clean shirts, a man may scamper about for months, like aRoman light-infantryman, "impedimentis relictis," unless he should be so ill advised as to carry his wife and children with him.

Throughout the rainy season, many diseases arise, and make great destruction among those who remain on the sea-coast; those who can afford it, retreat to the more salubrious mountain regions, while, as aforesaid, those who stay behind, being generally the poor, the worthless, and the useless part of the community, fall victims to the numerous diseases generated by the excessive rains, and the then swampy condition of the country. This annual purgation of society, is perhaps another blessing of a tropical country. I know of more than one community, whose moral, and in some measure physical health, would in my mere mortal and short sighted notion of the fitness of things, be vastly benefited by the visitation of an energetic, wide sweeping epidemic. Human society is very like a grate full of ignited anthracite coal, those parts of it that have lost their combustibility, and become worthless, are constantly filtering down through the bottom of the grate; and so in society, those individuals, who are daily falling from a state of grace in the eyes of their fellow-worms, either as regards fashion, or property, or reputation, go to swell the number of the outcasts from the ranks of "good society;" a convenient phrase that has recently been invented, and signifies the speaker's own particularfriends and acquaintances, though he and they may be at that very moment getting out stone on Blackwell's Island. So you see, reader, that it is fore-ordained, for I am a good deal of a fatalist, that one of the ingredients of civilized society should be a certain proportion of poor miserable devils, such as you and I both know.

It was just at the close of the rainy season, when Nature looked infinitely better and fresher for having her face washed, though she had been six months about it; the air seemed purer and more healthful, and the sky looked clearer and of a richer blue, for the half year's drenching; it was at this particular time of the year, that we have thought proper to raise the curtain, and introduce the reader into the business part of the story.

It was between ten and eleven o'clock in the forenoon, the land breeze had done blowing, and the usual interregnum of calm, previous to the commencement of the sea-breeze, had taken place—the broad bay lay like a huge mirror, varied indeed by the long and regular undulations of the swell from the main ocean, which, though perhaps sufficient to discompose a landman's stomach, would not affect that of a sailor, who would probably testify under oath, that the water was "just as smooth as a mill-pond." The pelican, that grave and contemplative bird, sat on the rocks near the water's edge, with his neck coiled up and stowed away in some recess in his capacious crop, the fish forgetting, or sailed onlazy wings across the bay, to seek some sequestered spot to doze away the time, and digest his huge breakfast—the graceful white crane of Mexico was wading about, flapping her wings, to drive the small fish into shoaler water, where she might pick them up at her leisure—the gaudy Spanish ensign, resembling three flannel petticoats, two red and one yellow, hung lifeless by its staff, as though said petticoats had just got through a hard day's washing—a soldier, with a paper segar in his mouth, was lounging backwards and forwards on that part of the parapet of the battery next the sea, while another, his counterpart, was "doing military duty" in the same soldierly manner on the quay opposite.

I may as well explain to the reader now as at a future time, that every collection of houses in South America, however small, has an open space in the centre, called the Plaza; and an American Spaniard could no more conceive of a town or village without such plaza, than he could form one of Mr. Locke's abstract ideas of a horse, which ceases to be an abstract idea the moment it becomes invested with a body, head, legs, mane, tail, saddle, bridle, belly-band, or crupper.

In the plaza of the Porte before mentioned was a multifarious assemblage: the barrack for a captain's guard, with the arms of the guard piled in front of it, formed one side, and the others were bounded by the quay or different buildings; a detachment of idlers were sunningthemselves, and engaged in relieving each other from certain troublesome companions, thatinvariablyinfest the clothes and hair of all Spaniards and Russians, from the king to the beggar; jackasses, boys, and dogs occupied the rest of the square, and were differently engaged. At this moment a sergeant ran into the square, exclaiming, "el Commandante!" The military guard fell into their ranks at the tap of the drum, the idlers and boys took up a strong position in one corner, the jackasses were cudgelled into a retreat, while the dogs, like the pigs in New York, being free of the city, provided for themselves. A moment or two elapsed after these preparations had been made, when a party of mounted officers dashed into the square at full gallop, as the South Americans always ride. The guard presented arms, the dogs barked their congratulations, and the party, having lighted fresh segars, walked down to the quay, directly opposite which lay an old dismantled Spanish frigate, and moored alongside her was a schooner, whose formidable length of main boom, and raking masts, announced her both a clipper and a Yankee. She was indeed an American schooner, that had been taken "flagrante delicto," in the very act of smuggling, for which she was condemned, and her crew sent to the mines. Such was the jealousy of the "authorities," that they unshipped the rudder, and unrove the running rigging, for fear she might go to sea of her own accord, and resume hersmuggling voyage without the assistance of human agency.

The party whom we have left smoking on the wharf, consisted of the military commandant, or governor, of St. Blas, Don Gaspar de Luna, Don Diego Pinto, the commander of a guarda-costa of eighteen guns, that lay in the offing, and which, to the most unpractised eye, bore about the same resemblance to an English or American man of war of the same class, as an old, worn-out jackass does to a handsome, high spirited, well groomed race-horse. The rest of the group was made up of young officers "of no mark or likelihood," and with whom we have nothing to do, with the exception of Don Gregorio Nunez, a dashing young cavalry officer, related to the viceroy, report said his natural son, and report said too that he was soon to marry the lovely niece of the governor; but the destinies were altogether of a different way of thinking. His character may be despatched in a few words—he was a vain coxcomb, his whole soul lay in his gorgeous uniform, and he had a mortal antipathy to any thing like duty.

Don Gaspar de Luna, the redoubted governor of St. Blas and its "dependencies," bore the rank of colonel in the Spanish army. He had seen some service, having been present at the memorable siege of Gibraltar, that excited first the astonishment and then the ridicule of all Europe—astonishment at the immensity of the armament prepared, and ridicule on account of its inefficiency, in wasting years before theplace without doing any thing. An advanced party commanded by Don Gaspar, then a captain, had the good fortune to get soundly thrashed by a sallying detachment from the garrison; and the king of Spain was so delighted thatsomethinghad been done, that he promoted the fortunate captain to a colonelcy.

In early life he had been in America with his regiment, where he had married a native Peruvian woman, by whom he had two daughters. In person he was about the middling height, and so far resembled an ellipse as this, that his transverse diameter nearly equalled his conjugate, or, in plain English, he was about as broad as long. He prided himself not a little upon being a "Castiliano," or genuine old Spaniard, and professed, and probably felt, the most implacable hatred to all heretics, especially English and Americans; but it was evidently an abstract feeling, for the moment a vessel of either nation arrived, which happened very often during the dry season, and the commanders began to make those little presents that they always found it for their interest to make, his orthodox zeal began, like Bob Acres' courage, "to ooze away through his fingers."

Although in the main a kind and indulgent father, his affections were centred in his niece, of whom we shall have occasion to speak more at large, whom he preferred to his daughter, and with good reason. He was fond of punch, such as he used to find in plenty and perfection on boardthe strange ships, and which he could drill none of his household into the art and mystery of making, except his niece; fonder of flattery, and compliment, and salutes, from the heretical captains; and perhaps fondest of all of invitations to dine on board such ships as seemed to hold out hopes of good cheer. When a foreign vessel arrived, one would think, from his parade and flourish, that he expected an invasion; but it was all show. He was fond of telling long stories, and of sitting long over the bottle, foregoing the usual luxury of thesiesta, or nap after dinner, to enjoy the greater one of drinking; but, although his capacious stomach would contain an incredible quantity of wine, no one could say that he had ever been seen "the worse for liquor."

The duties of his station were but trifling; for, although St. Blas was a royal naval depot, the commanders of his majesty's ships almost invariably preferred Callao, on account of its vicinity to the viceregal court at Lima. Any other person would have pined to death in such a remote and solitary corner of the earth, without society and without employment; but Don Gaspar was one of those peculiarly constituted individuals, who, having neither the faculty to communicate or receive new ideas, are as happy and contented in one place as another. He had come down to the water side at full gallop, and at the imminent risk of his neck, in consequence of a report, that a large, armed English ship,that was known to be on the coast trading, was approaching the Bay of St. Blas.

The nautical commander, Don Diego Pinto, was a man of upwards of sixty years of age, who had grown grey in the navy of Spain, without seeing any service of consequence. He had followed one of the viceroys, to whom he was recommended, to Peru, and the viceroy thought he had sufficiently done his duty to hisprotégéby appointing him to the command of a guarda-costa of eighteen guns, stationed at St. Blas, and including in her cruising ground St. Josef, Mazattan, and the entrance to the Gulf of California. His prey was good, and his duty was light; but all his hopes of promotion were cut off by being stationed at what was generally considered the "ultima Thule," the very extremity of the navigable world.

The Yankees, to be sure, scorned any such fanciful restrictions, and had long since penetrated to Nootka Sound and Behring's Straits, "the hunters of the mighty whale;" but then the Yankees were a very singular and peculiar race, and nobody in their senses cared to imitate them in their wild, and sometimes lawless, rambles over the face of the ocean—lawless, I wish to be understood, no farther than in sometimes forgetting to inquire, in a strange port, whether there was any custom-house there or not, and in most ports conceiving it to be the duty of the collectors of the customs to come on board and secure the duties, and if said collectors did not bear a hand and attend to theirbusiness, why then Jonathan, who is always in a hurry, was apt to land his cargo without the knowledge and without the leave of the custom-house officers.

Don Diego's hatred to heretics and foreigners, unlike that of the illustrious governor, was cordial and sincere, and by no means a general or abstract principle—he hated every individual as heartily as he did the whole species. He would never accept or even reply to an invitation from an English or American commander; and in the case of the American schooner already mentioned, he had treated the crew with such savage barbarity, that, but for the interference of Don Gaspar, they would have perished from starvation and ill treatment. He was by no means a favorite guest at the governor's house; the ladies of the family detested him, not so much for his cruelty, for they heard but little of that, but for his morose and churlish disposition, and, perhaps more than either, on account of the general belief that his wife, a lovely woman, and much younger than himself, had fallen a victim to his unkindness and cruelty.

Women, the dear creatures, have an infinitely larger share ofesprit du corps, if I may so call it, or rather a community of feeling, than men. Nothing will ruin a man's character and good name among the females of his acquaintance so soon or so effectually as the reputation of ill treatment or unkindness to his wife, while the men would think but little or nothing of it. Women think, and feel, and act most correctlyand justly, and in a manner that does them infinite honor, upon this subject; indeed, I am fully convinced, that on most questions of social morality, the feelings of women are more pure and right than those of men. But they have a thousand ingenious methods of making known their contempt and detestation of the cowardly scoundrel that would raise his hand against one of their sex, and every method cuts like a two-edged sword. I have known, and do at this moment know, many men who have endured the contempt and hatred of their fellow-menwith the most stoical indifference—they went on hated and despised to the grave, but they made money at every step, and they cared for nothing else; but I never, in all my life, and in all my wanderings—and I have not travelled about this watery ball, nor so far through life, with my eyes and ears shut—I never knew a man who did not wince and writhe under the hatred and contempt of the other sex. I am not a profound believer in innate ideas, if they are such ridiculous ones as metaphysicians talk of—namely, that two and two make four, and such sort of nonsense—but I do believe in certain innate principles and feelings, that govern our thoughts and actions as powerfully and irresistibly as instinct impels the brute creation; and that one of those principles is an innate desire to please and secure the good opinion of the opposite sex, born with every man and woman, or at least developed, more or less strongly, invery early childhood, and that too without any instruction or hint from others.

While the party stood on the quay, puffing their segars with all the gravity and silence that was becoming their rank and birth as officers of his Catholic Majesty and natives of old Spain, a subaltern officer approached, and, with abundance of parade and obsequiousness, informed the governor that there was a ship in the offing, becalmed at that time, but apparently bound in. The officer proceeded to inform him farther, that there were two American ships at St. Josef, one at Monteny, and that a fourth had been seen the day before at sea, standing to the southward. His excellency, though not particularly indignant at the idea of his principality being visited by a foreign vessel, thought proper to appear "brimful of wrath" at the intelligence.

"Ah! those accursed and heretical wretches! they swarm upon this coast as thick as sand-flies."

"And should be destroyed by the same means, by fire," growled his naval associate; "they should be burnt at their anchors wherever they are found; for if they have not already been guilty of any violation of the laws, they very soon will."

"Signor Pinto," said the more humane and considerate governor, "you are to recollect that our gracious sovereign is on terms of peace and amity with this new people, who have lately come into existence, and who seem to be driven by the devils to wander abroad, instead of passing theirlives peaceably at home. We cannot therefore treat them as enemies; and even when taken in violation of the laws, they must be heard in their own defence."

This grave rebuke rather mortified him of the marine department, and he was for a few minutes sulky, which the governor perceiving, and not wishing to offend him, again addressed him.

"But come, signor, cheer up. I know the sight of that schooner always makes you feel unpleasantly; you cannot forget how she misled you one dark night, and well nigh decoyed your ship ashore, by setting adrift a light in a tub."

This was but cold comfort to the redoubtable sea-officer, who was by no means fond of hearing the anecdote of the lantern in a tub repeated or alluded to; and he was about making an angry answer, when the sight of the schooner brought to his recollection that he had finally captured her, and had enjoyed the fiendish pleasure of abusing and maltreating her crew, and that, to crown his triumph, he had seen them set out for the mines. Poor man! he did not know, what indeed was a kind of state secret, that the viceroy, not wishing to embroil his sovereign in an unpleasant quarrel, or, as he was about returning to old Spain, wishing to leave behind him a character for clemency and humanity, had ordered them to be set at liberty, and they had actually embarked at Acapulco on board an English South Sea whaler. This had taken place a full yearprevious; and while the vindictive Spaniard was chuckling over their fancied sufferings "many a fathom deep" in the damp and unhealthy galleries of a silver mine, the objects of his hatred were jogging along comfortably towards London, with a full ship and light hearts.

In reply to the governor's "quip modest," he merely growled out something about zeal in discharging his duty, and anxiety to prevent smuggling, to which the governor replied,

"There is no danger of these foreigners smuggling, while they are so strictly watched by his majesty's ships and faithful soldiers. I wish, signor, you would go out with your ship, and bring this stranger in; I do not like to see him hovering about in this suspicious manner."

"It is impossible to go out, now that the sea-breeze is just setting in," said the naval officer, who had no more idea of working out with a head wind, than he had of flying, though the bay is open enough for the channel fleet to beat out in order of battle."

While this question was in agitation, an officer crossed in a skiff from the battery, and informed Don Gaspar that the sea-breeze had set in the offing, and that the stranger had hauled by the wind, and was standing off shore; further, that she was an American whaleman, that had probably pursued her huge prey close in shore. Don Gaspar was somewhat disappointed at this intelligence.

"I almost wish she had come in," said he, in a low tone, "for, heretics as they are, and damned to all eternity as they certainly will be, (for which blessed be the saints,) it cannot be denied that the puncho, or pontio, which they make, is most refreshing and delicious in this warm weather."

But as the Yankee manifested no symptoms of coming in to anchor, and thereby give him a chance for his glass of punch, he yielded to the suggestion of Don Gregorio, his aid-de-camp; and having lighted fresh segars, they mounted their horses, and rode back to San Blas.

A ladySo fair, and fastened to an empery,Would make the great'st king double.Cymbeline.

The family of Don Gaspar de Luna consisted of his wife, whom we have already noticed as a native of Mexico, and two daughters, Antonia and Carlota, who were rather pretty for Creole girls, and, like the generality of Creoles, especially when one half is Spanish, extremely ignorant and vulgar in their language and manners; the last trait being somewhat characteristic of the Spanish-American women, if we may believe travellers, to which I may add my own somewhat limited observation. They are, however, by way of amends, more civilized and sociable in their behaviour to strangers, and much more intelligent, than the men.

The lovely niece of the governor, the orphan daughter of his brother, made up the list of his family. As we have no great concern with the old lady and her two daughters, we have mentioned them first, in order to get them out of our way; but as the fair Isabella will make some figure in our pages, we can do no less than devote a chapter, or part of achapter, to giving some account and description of her, more particularly as she differs,toto coelo, from her cousins, morally, and, in many respects, physically.

Isabella de Luna was the daughter of Signor Anastasio de Luna, the only brother of Don Gaspar. He was an eminent merchant of Cadiz, who, having found it necessary to go to London on business, had afterwards found it equally necessary to remain there for some time, to attend to his mercantile affairs. Here he became acquainted with a Miss Campbell, a Scotch lady of about thirty years of age, very beautiful, but poor. Her father had been taken prisoner at the defeat of the Pretender's army at Culloden, in which army he was an officer, and immediately executed without a trial, by the blood-thirsty and infamous Duke of Cumberland. Her mother died of grief a few months afterwards, leaving her an infant, and the sole surviving member of a proscribed and ruined family. She was taken, from mere compassion, by a distant relation of her father, and carefully brought up in the Protestant faith, her parents having been Catholics.

When about twenty years old, she accompanied her relation to London, and had resided there some years, when she was introduced to and captivated Signor Anastasio, and after a long courtship, and considerable reluctance on the part of the lady, because the lover was at least nominally a Catholic, she became his wife. They lived long and happilytogether, for whether Anastasio's religious opinions had undergone any change or not, by associating so many years with Protestants, he never interfered with his wife's religious creed or devotions, and permitted her to educate, in the Protestant faith, their only child Isabella.

I would advise all husbands to do likewise, in some measure; that is, if the wife thinks proper to perform her devotions in a Pagan temple, a Mahometan mosque, a Jewish synagogue, or a Christian church, why, let her, and welcome, unless the husband is particularly anxious to get into hot water, and commit suicide upon his domestic happiness; for nothing so effectually disturbs the tranquillity of a family, as open opposition of religious creeds. Women become religious, in the every-day acceptation of the word, from any motive rather than a conviction of the truth or reasonableness of any particular creed. It would be difficult, perhaps impossible, to define the motive that carries women into the pale of any particular church. I have heard of an old lady, who was very anxious to be permitted to carry her knitting-work to meeting, "because it was such asteadimentto the mind." Perhaps joining the church has the same effect upon women in general. I have seen so much discomfort in families from conflicting religious opinions, that I cannot help hoping that the destinies will so contrive it, that my wife, if they ever mean to send me one at all, shall be a member of the Episcopal church. Thereis about that church, what attaches to no other sect, a sort of dignified reserve, that never breaks out in four-day meetings, revivals, or any other similar ebullition of fanaticism and absurdity.

When Isabella was in her fourteenth year, her father returned to his native country, taking his family with him, having given up his mercantile business, and retiring from it very wealthy. The priests, as might have been expected, were soon around him, like sharks around a slave-ship, all eager to discover, in his conversation and manners, the contamination of heresy, with which they took it for granted he was infected, from having dwelt so long among those obstinate and perverse heretics, the English; but Anastasio was too well acquainted with human nature, and with the ways of the world, to be thrown off his guard. He gave most munificently to the church; and, in spite of all their attempts to place Isabella in a convent, as a boarder, succeeded in retaining her under the immediate care of her excellent mother.

In making this arrangement, he was much assisted by a priest, whom he had formerly been acquainted with, and whom he now took into his family, as father confessor. In short, by the judicious management of pretty large sums of money, that he was able to spare, in less than a year after his return to Spain, Anastasio de Luna obtained the character of agood Catholic, who had kept fast the integrity of his faith, during a long residence among heretics. As for Madame de Luna, after having delivered her over in trust to the devil, the clergy gave themselves little or no concern about her; though her liberal charity, and the mildness and sweetness of her disposition, made her friends of all who knew her. Many a saint, of the present day, holds his character for sanctity by as slight a tenure, as Anastasio did his as an orthodox Catholic; and many a modest, unpretending female, has been, like Madame de Luna, regarded as an infidel, and a vessel of wrath, for not sounding a trumpet before her, in the exercise of unassuming virtues.

In about three years after his return to his native country, Anastasio died, bequeathing a large sum to the church, not from any violent partiality to the Catholic faith, but in order to secure peace to his wife and daughter. His widow intended to return to England; but her health was failing rapidly, and in a little more than a year after her husband's death, she followed him to the grave, with her last breath enjoining upon her daughter never to part with the faith in which she had been educated, and never to marry a Catholic, unless she was sure of the purity and goodness of his morals. This might seem illiberal in her; but there is no accounting for the prejudices of people, especially upon religious subjects.

After her mother's death, Isabella had no alternative left, but to takerefuge in the family of her uncle, Don Gaspar, who had already shown great fondness for her, and who received her with great cordiality and affection. In this family she was permitted to do much as she pleased; her gentle and amiable disposition soon won the warmest affections of her aunt and cousins, and her time passed agreeably, except that she was sometimes teased by the reverend clergy to enter a convent, and to "dedicate herself to God;" but as the young lady thought she could serve God to better purpose out of a convent than in one, she civilly declined their polite invitations to shut herself in a dungeon.

The same priest who befriended her father, extended his kindness to the daughter. He was a very influential clergyman, secretly of very liberal and enlightened views, on the subject of religion; but, not perceiving any pressing necessity for giving his body to be burnt, he had thought best to keep his religious notions to himself. He might very easily have "gained a martyr's glorious name," if he had only been one of those

"Stubborn saints, whom all men grantTo be the true church militant;"

but he was not; and, besides, martyrdom is not near so fashionable as it was during the time of the Roman emperors, when one saint insisted upon being crucified heels uppermost; and another, who was very comfortablybroiling on a gridiron, sung out to be turned, when he thought he was cooked enough on one side.Ourclergy are a grave, serious, set of men, who scorn such mad pranks; they have no idea of suffering martyrdom, or any thing else, if they can help it. I believe there have been no martyrs since the commencement of the nineteenth century, except Mr. Wolff, who was bastinadoed by the Pacha of Egypt, for interfering with what did not concern him, and some ten or a dozen missionaries, that would not do something the Cochin-Chinese bid them, and were, in consequence, made shorter by the head.

The good priest interposed his good offices, and influence, in Isabella's behalf, and gave her instructions in such branches of education as he thought were suited to her sex. But, in about a year after her mother's death, Don Gaspar received his appointment, as military commander of St. Blas, which, as I have already observed, was then a royal depot and arsenal; and, though but seldom visited by Spanish men-of-war, because there were but very few, besides guarda-costas, in the Pacific, was a place of considerable importance. Isabella cheerfully accompanied him to America; for, though neither giddy, nor thoughtless, all places were alike to her, provided she could be always surrounded with her uncle's family, with whom she enjoyed quiet happiness.

In the priests of Mexico, she saw nothing but ignorance, sensuality, bigotry, and indolence, nothing calculated to shake her faith as a Protestant, or cause her to forget her mother's first injunction; while the foppishness, frivolity, insolence, ignorance, and pride, of the men, by whom she was surrounded, most effectually protected her from the remotest thought of disobeying the second. The men, on the other hand, regarded her with the coolest indifference; accustomed to admire the black eyes, and hair, and colorless complexions of the Spanish and native, or Creole, women, varying from a sort of dirty cream color, to a deep and beautiful copper, Isabella's rather lightish brown hair, blue eyes, fair complexion, and cheeks rosy with health and cheerfulness, had no charms for them; and, while her cousins had lovers, or danglers, by the dozen, Isabella found herself, to her infinite satisfaction, completely deserted and neglected, by all the starched and pompous fools that visited her uncle, during a stay of some months in the city of Mexico.

She had, on the arrival of the family at St. Blas, contrived to employ her time in cultivating such female accomplishments as her mother had instructed her in, and was, at the time we introduce her to the reader's notice, in her twentieth year. In person, she was about the medium height of women, or, perhaps, a little below it; and would be called, in New England, rather a small woman. Her form was exceedinglywell-proportioned and beautiful, although, what may seem incredible, it had never been cramped, crushed, and distorted, by tight lacing, of which her mother had a very reasonable horror; and, in consequence, her movements were free, graceful, and unconfined.

I know very well that the idea of a lady's form being beautiful, unless moulded by corsets into the form of a ship's half-minute glass, will be scouted as absurd and impossible; but to the ridicule that such a proposition must necessarily excite, I can oppose my own observation, leaving antiquity, with its faultless statues and sculptures, to shift for itself. The Hindoo women, of whom I have seen hundreds at once bathing in the Hoogly, of all ages, from childhood to decrepitude, have extremely fine forms, when young, that is from twelve to twenty-two or three, at which period they have all the marks of old age. As they bathe with only a single thin cotton garment, which, when wet, sticks close to their bodies, and developes their forms most completely, any body that visits Calcutta can satisfy himself of the correctness of this fact, and yet they tolerate no sort of confinement whatever about the person.

Isabella's face was of an oval form, with an exquisitely delicate and fair complexion; when her features were at rest, the expression was quiet and serious, rather bordering upon the pensive, a cast of countenance that she inherited from her mother; but her smile was exceedingly attractive, with an air of frankness and innocenceattending it, that made it perfectly fascinating. Her eyes were of a deep blue, that, in conversation or when any emotion agitated the tranquillity of their owner, were extremely lively, animated, and sparkling. Her eyebrows were very delicately traced, slightly curved but not arched, as poets and others rave about—I never saw a pair that were, on forehead male or female, except among the Chinese, andthey, in consequence, looked like—no matter who—nor can I imagine how arched brows can be beautiful.

It was not the fashion, forty years since, for girls to cut off their hair and sell it to a barber for fifty cents, and then give ten dollars for a set of artificial curls, nor was it fashionable in Mexico to wear false hair; if it had been, nature had been so bountiful to Isabella in that beautiful ornament and pride (it ought to be) of a woman, that she could save the expense by the arrangement of her own luxuriant tresses.

Her temper was mild, and by no means easily ruffled; her disposition was gentle, humane, amiable, and cheerful, though seldom or never breaking out into extravagant gaiety. Like all young ladies of her age, who have much unemployed time on their hands, and I believe the same remark will apply to young men similarly situated, she had experienced a void, a want of something in the heart, that she felt acutely enough, but could neither describe nor account for; that peculiar feeling that certainlyis not love, but a symptom of the wish to love and be beloved; it is that state of the heart when the affections go forth, like Noah's dove, and finding no object on which to repose, return weary and dejected to their lonely prison.

It is an old adage, that "when the devil finds a man idle, he sets him to work;" when love finds a heart unoccupied, he soon finds it a tenant, for it always has been, is now, and always will be true, that

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