expelled
the Jesuits, and fostered the material progress of the country; they
renounce the memory of those foreign ministers who came to civilise
Spain. Jesuits, friars and clerics order and direct as in the best
times of Charles II. To have had as minister a Count of Aranda, the
friend of Voltaire, is a shame of the past and to be passed over in
silence. Yes, Don Luis, you say well, the monarchy is dead. Between it
and the country there is the same relation as between a corpse and a
living man. The secular laziness, the resistance to all change, and
the fear of the unknown that all stationary people feel, are the
causes of the continuance of this institution, that has not like other
countries the military outlet or the aggrandisement of its territory
as a justification of its existence."

With this the conversation ended that evening in the Chapel-master's
little room.

Gabriel found himself drawn afresh by the affection of his admirers
in the Claverias. They coaxed him and followed him, lamenting his
absence. They could not live without him, so declared the shoemaker.
They had become accustomed to listen to him, they felt the desire of
being enlightened, and they begged the master not to desert them.

"We meet in the tower now," said the bell-ringer; "Silver Stick
looks on our meetings with an evil eye, and he has gone so far as
to threaten the shoemaker to turn him out of the Claverias if the
meetings continue to be held in his house. He will not interfere with
me; he knows my character. Besides, if he rules in the upper cloister,
I rule in my tower. I am quite capable, if he comes to disturb us with
his spying, of throwing him down the stairs, the miserly devil!"

And he added with an affectionate expression, a great contrast to his
usual rough and taciturn character:

"Come, Gabriel, we expect you in my house. When you are tired of
keeping your niece and that crazy Don Luis company, come up for a
little while. We cannot get on without your words. Don Martin has been
quite enthusiastic since he heard you the other evening; he wants to
see you; he says he would go from one end of Toledo to the other to
hear you. He wishes me to let him know if you decide on rejoining your
friends, because Don Antolin in speaking to him sets you down as a
madman and a heretic who does not know what to be after. But he is an
ignoramus who, after studying for his profession, can do no better
than sell tickets and squeeze the poor