se fidelity
he could rely.

Francia dwelt in the palace of the old Spanish governors, tearing down
adjoining houses to isolate it. Constantly fearful of death and danger, he
did not trust fully to his vigilant body-guard, but nightly slept in a
different room, so that his sleeping apartment should not be known. In
this he resembled the famous Louis XI., whom he also imitated in his
austerity and simplicity of manners, and the fact that his principal
confidant was his barber,--a mulatto inclined to drink. His other associate
was Patinos, his secretary, who made the public suffer for any
ill-treatment from his master. The remainder of the despot's household
consisted of four slaves, two men and two women. In dress he strove to
imitate Napoleon, whom he greatly admired, and when drilling his troops
was armed with a large sword and pistols.

There remains to tell the story of the cruelties of this Paraguayan Nero.
With his suspicious nature and his absolute power, his subjects had no
more security for their lives than those of old Rome. Plots against his
person--which he identified with the state--served him as a pretext for
seizing and shooting or imprisoning any one of whom he was suspicious. One
of his first victims was Yegros, his former associate in the consulate.
Accused of favoring an invasion of Paraguay, he and forty others were
condemned to death in 1819.

More than three hundred others were imprisoned on the same charge, and
were held captive for eighteen months, during which they were subjected by
the tyrant to daily tortures. The ferocious dictator took special pleasure
in the torment of these unfortunates, devising tortures of his own and
making a diversion out of his revenge. From his actions it has been
supposed that there were the seeds of madness in his mind, and it is
certain that it was in his frequent fits of hypochondria that he issued
his decrees of proscription and carried out his excesses of cruelty.

When in this condition, sad was it for the heedless wretch who omitted to
address him as "Your Excellence the Supreme, Most Excellent Lord and
Perpetual Dictator!" Equally sad was it for the man who, wishing to speak
with him, dared to approach too closely and did not keep his hands well in
view, to show that he had no concealed weapons. Treason, daggers, and
assassins seemed the perpetual tenants of Francia's thoughts. One
country-woman was seized for coming too near his office window to present
a