t had been their homes. I went to Saragossa after reading the
funeral service over them. I saw Tesse and told him of the scene I
had witnessed, and demanded vengeance. He laughed in my face. Senor, I
persisted, and he got angry and told me that, were it not for my cloth,
he would hang me from the steeple. I called down Heaven's curse upon
him, and left him and came home. Do you wonder, senor, that I found it
hard to spare those Frenchmen for whom you pleaded? Do you wonder that
I, a man of peace, lead out my villagers to slaughter our enemy?"

"I do not, indeed!" Jack exclaimed warmly. "Such acts as these would
stir the blood of the coldest into fire; and, priest or no priest, a man
would be less than a man who did not try to take vengeance for so foul a
deed. Have many massacres of this sort been perpetrated?"

"Many," the priest replied, "and in no case has any redress been
obtained by the relatives of the victims."

"And throughout all Arragon, does the same hatred of the French
prevail?"

"Everywhere," the priest said.

"Then King Charles would meet with an enthusiastic welcome here!"

"I do not say that," the priest answered. "He would be well received,
doubtless, simply because he is the enemy of the French; but for
himself, no. We Arragonese cannot for the life of us see why we should
be ruled over by a foreigner; and in some respects a German king is even
less to be desired than a French one. The connection between the two
Latin nations is naturally closer than between us and the Germans, and
a French king would more readily adapt himself to our ways than would a
stiff and thick headed German.

"Apart from the recent doings of the French army Arragon would have
preferred Philip to Charles. Moreover, Charles is looked upon as the
choice of the Catalans and Valencians, and why should the men of Arragon
take the king others have chosen? No, King Charles will doubtless be
received well because he appears as the enemy of the French; but you
will not find that the people of Arragon will make any great sacrifices
in his behalf. Let a French army enter our province again, every man
will rise in arms against it; but there will be little disposition to
raise troops to follow King Charles beyond the limits of the province.
Castile is strong for Philip; the jealousy there of the Catalans is even
greater than here, and the fact that Arragon will go with Catalonia and
Valencia will only render the Castilians more earne