st before the execution he gave legal status as
his wife to the woman, a rather remarkable Eurasian adventuress,
who had lived with him in Dapitan, and the religious ceremony was
the only one then recognized in the islands. [14] The greater part
of his last night on earth was spent in composing a chain of verse;
no very majestic flight of poesy, but a pathetic monody throbbing with
patient resignation and inextinguishable hope, one of the sweetest,
saddest swan-songs ever sung.

Thus he was left at the last, entirely alone. As soon as his doom
became certain the Patriots had all scurried to cover, one gentle
poetaster even rushing into doggerel verse to condemn him as a
reversion to barbarism; the wealthier suspects betook themselves
to other lands or made judicious use of their money-bags among the
Spanish officials; the better classes of the population floundered
hopelessly, leaderless, in the confused whirl of opinions and passions;
while the voiceless millions for whom he had spoken moved on in dumb,
uncomprehending silence. He had lived in that higher dreamland of
the future, ahead of his countrymen, ahead even of those who assumed
to be the mentors of his people, and he must learn, as does every
noble soul that labors "to make the bounds of freedom wider yet,"
the bitter lesson that nine-tenths, if not all, the woes that afflict
humanity spring from man's own stupid selfishness, that the wresting
of the scepter from the tyrant is often the least of the task, that
the bondman comes to love his bonds--like Chillon's prisoner, his very
chains and he grow friends,--but that the struggle for human freedom
must go on, at whatever cost, in ever-widening circles, "wave after
wave, each mightier than the last," for as long as one body toils in
fetters or one mind welters in blind ignorance, either of the slave's
base delusion or the despot's specious illusion, there can be no final
security for any free man, or his children, or his children's children.

IV

"God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!
Why look'st thou so?"--"With my cross-bow
I shot the Albatross!"

COLERIDGE.

It was one of those magic December mornings of the tropics--the very
nuptials of earth and sky, when great Nature seems to fling herself
incontinently into creation, wrapping the world in a brooding calm of
light and color, that Spain chose for committi