"And how is that?"

The schoolmaster smiled sadly.

"It is a long story."

"Don't think I ask from curiosity," said Ibarra. "I have thought much
about it, and it seems to me better to try to carry out my father's
ideas than to weep or to avenge his death. I wish to inspire myself
with his spirit. That is why I ask this question."

"The country will bless your memory, senor, if you carry out the
splendid projects of your father. You wish to know the obstacles I
meet? In a word, the plan of instruction is hopeless. The children
read, write, learn by heart passages, sometimes whole books, in
Castilian, without understanding a single word. Of what use is such
a school to the children of our peasants!"

"You see the evil, what remedy do you propose?"

"I have none," said the young man; "one cannot struggle alone against
so many needs and against certain influences. I tried to remedy
the evil of which I just spoke; I tried to carry out the order
of the Government, and began to teach the children Spanish. The
beginning was excellent, but one day Brother Damaso sent for me. I
went up immediately, and I said good-day to him in Castilian. Without
replying, he burst into laughter. At length he said, with a sidelong
glance: 'What buenos dias! buenos dias! It's very pretty. You know
Spanish?' and he began to laugh again."

Ibarra could not repress a smile.

"You laugh," said the teacher, "and I, too, now; but I assure you
I had no desire to then. I started to reply, I don't know what,
but Brother Damaso interrupted:

"'Don't wear clothes that are not your own,' he said in Tagal; 'be
content to speak your own language. Do you know about Ciruela? Well,
Ciruela was a master who could neither read nor write, yet he kept
school.' And he left the room, slamming the door behind him. What
was I to do? What could I, against him, the highest authority of the
pueblo, moral, political, and civil; backed by his order, feared by the
Government, rich, powerful, always obeyed and believed. To withstand
him was to lose my place, and break off my career without hope of
another. Every one would have sided with the priest. I should have
been called proud, insolent, no Christian, perhaps even anti-Spanish
and filibustero. Heaven forgive me if I denied my conscience and my
reason, but I was born here, must live here, I have a mother, and I
abandoned myself to my fate, as a cadaver to the wave that rolls it."

"And you lost all hope? You hav