vidently destined for privacy. "But a few
moments' patient hearing," continued he, "will show that, to me at
least, the object of this visit did not admit of delay."

"Be seated, senhor; and, if I may ask it without incivility, be brief,
for I have weighty matters before me."

"I will endeavor to be so," said Roland, civilly, and resumed: "This
evening, Don Pedro, has seen the last of twenty-eight thousand Spanish
dollars, which, five weeks since, I carried here along with me. They
were my share, as commander of the 'Esmeralda,' when she captured
a Mexican bark, in May last. They were won with hard blows and some
danger; they were squandered in disgrace at the gaming-table."

"Forgive me," said Don Pedro: "you can scarcely adhere to your pledge
of brevity if you permit yourself to be led away by moralizing; just say
how this event concerns me, and wherefore the present visit."

Roland became red with anger and shame, and when he resumed it was in
a voice tremulous with ill-suppressed passion. "I did not come here
for your sympathy, senhor. If the circumstance I have mentioned had no
relation to yourself, you had not seen me here. I say that I have now
lost all that I was possessed of in the world."

"Again I must interrupt you, Senhor Roland, by saying that these are
details for Geizheimer, not for me. He, as you well know, transacts
all matters of money, and if you desire a loan, or are in want of any
immediate assistance, I 'm sure you 'll find him in every way disposed
to meet your wishes."

"Thanks, senhor, but I am not inclined for such aid. I will neither
mortgage my blood nor my courage, nor promise three hundred per cent for
the means of a night at the gambling-table."

"Then pray, sir, how am I to understand your visit? Is it intended for
the sake of retailing to me your want of fortune at play, and charging
me with the results of your want of skill or luck?"

"Far from it, senhor. It is simply to make known that I am ruined; that
I have nothing left me in the world; and that, as one whose fortune has
deserted him, I have come to ask back that bond by which I accepted your
daughter's hand in betrothal."

A burst of laughter from Don Pedro here stopped the speaker, who, with
flushed cheek and glaring eyeballs, stared at this sudden outbreak. "Do
you know for what you ask me, senhor?" said Rica, smiling insolently.

"Yes, I ask for what you never could think to enforce,--to make me, a
beggar, the husba