We
must be your debtors for ever."
I smiled at her extravagant words, but they were very sweet to hear,
none the less.
"Your ardent love of your country is a beautiful sentiment," I remarked
somewhat indiscreetly, "but is General Santa Coloma so necessary to
its welfare?"
She looked offended and did not reply. "You are a stranger in our
country, senor, and do not quite understand these things," said the
mother gently. "Dolores must not forget that. You know nothing of the
cruel wars we have seen and how our enemies have conquered only by
bringing in the foreigner to their aid. Ah, senor, the bloodshed, the
proscriptions, the infamies which they have brought on this land! But
there is one man they have never yet succeeded in crushing: always
from boyhood he has been foremost in the fight, defying their bullets,
and not to be corrupted by their Brazilian gold. Is it strange that
he is so much to us, who have lost all our relations, and have suffered
many persecutions, being deprived almost of the means of subsistence
that hirelings and traitors might be enriched with our property? To
us in this house he is even more than to others. He was my husband's
friend and companion in arms. He has done us a thousand favours, and if
he ever succeeds in overthrowing this infamous government he will restore
to us all the property we have lost.
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