vely eye, perfect teeth and air of
decision were calculated to please an Indian girl of his vicinity. To
complete his rehabilitation in the eyes of the party, his introductory
address was delivered with the grace of a Spanish cavalier.

"The gentlemen," said he, gracefully getting rid of his superabundant
hat, "will voluntarily excuse me for having waited so long with my
respects and offers of service. I should have gone to meet them at
Marcapata, but my uncle the gobernador forbade me to do so for fear of
displeasing the priest. Gentlemen, I am Juan the nephew of Aragon. It is
by the advice of my uncle that I have come to place myself in your way,
and ask if you will admit me to your company as mozo-assistant and
interpreter."

The colonel, whose antipathy to the salteador did not yield on a closer
acquaintance, roughly asked the youth what he meant by his assurance.
Mr. Marcoy, however, was disposed to temporize.

"If you are Juan the nephew of Aragon," said he, "you must have already
learned from your uncle that we have engaged an interpreter, Pepe Garcia
of Chile-Chile."

"Precisely what he told me, senor," replied the young man; "but, for my
part, I thought that if one interpreter would be useful to these
gentlemen on their journey, two interpreters would be a good deal
better, on account of the fact that we walk better with two legs than
with one: that is the reason I have intercepted you, gentlemen."

This opinion made everybody laugh, and as Juan considered it his
privilege to laugh five times louder than any one, a quasi engagement
resulted from this sudden harmony of temper. Colonel Perez shrugged his
shoulders: Marcoy, as literary man, took down the name of the new-comer.
The nephew of Aragon was so delighted that he gave vent to a little cry
of pleasure, at the same time cutting a pirouette. This harmless caper
allowed the party to detect; tied to his haversack, the local banjo, or
_charango_, an instrument which the Paganinis of the country make for
themselves out of half a calabash and the unfeeling bowels of the cat.

[Illustration: "GENTLEMEN, I AM JUAN THE NEPHEW OF ARAGON."]

The priest, who had recommended Pepe Garcia, had made mention of that
person's fine voice, with which the church of Marcapata was edified
every Sunday. The gobernador, while putting in a word for his nephew,
and particularizing the beauty of his execution on the guitar, had
insinuated doubts of the baritone favored by the p