silenced. My _madrecita_
declared at once, and in the presence of my four shipmates, that, six
years before, I left her on my first voyage in a Dutch vessel; that my
_querido padre_, had gone to bliss two years after my departure; and,
accordingly, that now, I, Antonio Gomez y Carrasco, was the only
surviving male of the family, and, of course, would never more quit
either her, my darling sisters, or the old _pobrecita_, our
grandmother. This florid explanation was immediately closed like the
pleasant air of an opera by a new chorus of kisses, nor can there be
any doubt that I responded to the embraces of my sweet _hermanas_ with
the most gratifying fraternity.

Our charming _quartette_ lasted in all its harmony for half an hour,
during which volley after volley of family secrets was discharged into
my eager ears. So rapid was the talk, and so quickly was its thread
taken up and spun out by each of the three, that I had no opportunity
to interpose. At length, however, in a momentary lull and in a jocular
manner,--but in rather bad Spanish,--I ventured to ask my loving and
talkative mamma, "what amount of property my worthy father had deemed
proper to leave on earth _for his son_ when he took his departure to
rest _con Dios_?" I thought it possible that this agreeable drama was
a Spanish joke, got up _al' improvista_, and that I might end it by
exploding the dangerous mine of money: besides this, it was growing
late, and my return to the galliot was imperative.

But alas! my question brought tears in an instant into my mother's
eyes, and I saw that the scene was _not_ a jest. Accordingly, I
hastened, in all seriousness, to explain and insist on their error. I
protested with all the force of my Franco-Italian nature and Spanish
rhetoric, against the assumed relationship. But all was unavailing;
they argued and persisted; they brought in the neighbors; lots of old
women and old men, with rusty cloaks or shawls, with cigars or
_cigarillos_ in mouth, formed a jury of inquest; so that, in the end,
there was an unanimous verdict in favor of my Galician nativity!

Finding matters had indeed taken so serious a turn, and knowing the
impossibility of eradicating an impression from the female mind when
it becomes imbedded with go much apparent conviction, I resolved to
yield; and, assuming the manner of a penitent prodigal, I kissed the
girls, embraced my mother, passed my head over both shoulders of my
grand-dame, and promised