fore I married the Doctor, I
went through many vicissitudes in my own country. They ended in leaving
me (at an age which is of no consequence to anybody) with some experience
of the world; with a cultivated musical talent on the pianoforte; and
with a comfortable little fortune unexpectedly bequeathed to me by a
relative of my dear dead mother (which fortune I shared with good Papa
and with my younger sisters). To these qualifications I added another,
the most precious of all, when I married the Doctor; namely--a strong
infusion of ultra-liberal principles. _Vive la Republique!_

Some people do one thing, and some do another, in the way of celebrating
the event of their marriage. Having become man and wife, Doctor
Pratolungo and I took ship to Central America--and devoted our
honey-moon, in those disturbed districts, to the sacred duty of
destroying tyrants.

Ah! the vital air of my noble husband was the air of revolutions. From
his youth upwards he had followed the glorious profession of Patriot.
Wherever the people of the Southern New World rose and declared their
independence--and, in my time, that fervent population did nothing
else--there was the Doctor self-devoted on the altar of his adopted
country. He had been fifteen times exiled, and condemned to death in his
absence, when I met with him in Paris--the picture of heroic poverty,
with a brown complexion and one lame leg. Who could avoid falling in love
with such a man? I was proud when he proposed to devote me on the altar
of his adopted country, as well as himself--me, and my money. For, alas!
everything is expensive in this world; including the destruction of
tyrants and the saving of Freedom. All my money went in helping the
sacred cause of the people. Dictators and filibusters flourished in spite
of us. Before we had been a year married, the Doctor had to fly (for the
sixteenth time) to escape being tried for his life. My husband condemned
to death in his absence; and I with my pockets empty. This is how the
Republic rewarded us. And yet, I love the Republic. Ah, you
monarchy-people, sitting fat and contented under tyrants, respect that!

This time, we took refuge in England. The affairs of Central America went
on without us.

I thought of giving lessons in music. But my glorious husband could not
spare me away from him. I suppose we should have starved, and made a sad
little paragraph in the English newspapers--if the end had not come in
another way. M