, from
the boy. Jose Antonio was left alone with the highwayman's corpse. It
was no light thing in Venezuela to commit a homicide without testimony
of innocence, and young Jose hastened homewards with his treasure, in a
state of trepidation far greater than any the living highwaymen could
have inspired. Even in his parents' dwelling, he dreaded, every moment,
the arrival of an order for his arrest, and to appease his groundless
anxiety his father shortly suggested that he should take refuge upon the
Llanos,--the Sherwood of Venezuelan Robin Hoods. The youth was delighted
with the idea, and engaged himself as herdsman in the service of Don
Manuel Pulido, a wealthy proprietor, whom he served so well that he was
very quickly advanced to a position of confidence and command. In a few
months the slayer of the _churrion_ had learned to smile at his recent
apprehensions; but the wild life of the _hato_ had already thrown around
him its subtle fascination, and the sprightly youth of Araure had become
a naturalized son of the Plains. Soon few were able like young Jose to
break an untried steed; few wielded more dexterously the lasso, or could
drive with more unerring force the jagged lance into the side of a
galloping bull. Clad in _poncho_ and _calzones_, he scoured the vast
plain of La Calzada, acquiring, at the same time with manual dexterity
and physical hardihood, the affections, still more important, of the
wild Llaneros with whom only he associated. The lad of eighteen,
scarcely two years a denizen of the Plains, possessed all the influence
and authority of the hoariest Llanero; and now the predictions ran
that this daring Jose Antonio would one day be the most successful
cattle-farmer in Venezuela!

III.

EL TEMBLOR.

We must leave young Jose among his comrades of the _hato_ for a while,
and glance at the contemporaneous doings of anointed heads, whose
destinies were strangely interwoven with his own.

Far away across the Atlantic, in the shadow of the Pyrenees, events had
been developing themselves to the consummation that should overturn a
splendid throne, shake Europe to its foundations, and electrify Spanish
America with a sympathetic current of revolution, flashing from the
pines of Oregon to the deserts of Patagonia.

The mysterious treachery of Bayonne was consummated. Joseph, brother
of Napoleon, reigned on the throne of which King Charles had been
perfidiously despoiled. Ferdinand, heir to the crown of