demeanour, impress you with the conviction that they are those who carry
the water and hew the wood of the country. It is so. They are the
"Indios mansos" (the civilised Indians): slaves, in fact, though freemen
by the letter of the law. They are the "peons", the labourers, the
serfs of the land--the descendants of the conquered sons of Anahuac.

Such are the people you find in the _tierra caliente_ of Mexico--in the
environs of Vera Cruz. They do not differ much from the inhabitants of
the high plains, either in costume, customs, or otherwise. In fact,
there is a homogeneousness about the inhabitants of all Spanish
America--making allowance for difference of climate and other
peculiarities--rarely found in any other people.

------------------------------------------------------------------------

Before daybreak of the morning after my interview with the "swearing
major", a head appeared between the flaps of my tent. It was that of
Sergeant Bob Lincoln.

"The men air under arms, Cap'n."

"Very well," cried I, leaping from my bed, and hastily buckling on my
accoutrements.

I looked forth. The moon was still brightly shining, and I could see a
number of uniformed men standing upon the company parade, in double
rank. Directly in front of my tent a small boy was saddling a very
small horse. The boy was "Little Jack", as the soldiers called him; and
the horse was little Jack's mustang, "Twidget."

Jack wore a tight-fitting green jacket, trimmed with yellow lace, and
buttoned up to the throat; pantaloons of light green, straight cut, and
striped along the seams; a forage-cap set jauntily upon a profusion of
bright curls; a sabre with a blade of eighteen inches, and a pair of
clinking Mexican spurs. Besides these, he carried the smallest of all
rifles. Thus armed and accoutred, he presented the appearance of a
miniature Ranger.

Twidget had _his_ peculiarities. He was a tight, wiry little animal,
that could live upon mezquite beans or maguey leaves for an indefinite
time; and his abstemiousness was often put to the test. Afterwards,
upon an occasion during the battles in the valley of Mexico, Jack and
Twidget had somehow got separated, at which time the mustang had been
shut up for four days in the cellar of a ruined convent with no other
food than stones and mortar! How Twidget came by his name is not clear.
Perhaps it was some waif of the rider's own fancy.

As I appeared at the entrance of my tent,