old Spanish-Mexican aristocracy, and
why it could not easily become truly republican, even in the New World,
which is beginning to grow old on its own account.

Dinner was now ready, and Ned voted it a prime good one, for it
consisted mainly of chicken, with capital corn-cakes and coffee. It was
a tremendous improvement upon the dinners he had been eating at sea,
cooked in the peculiar style of the caboose of the _Goshhawk_.

One large idea was becoming firmly fixed in the acute mind of the young
adventurer, and it tended to make him both watchful and silent. Not only
was he in a country which was at war with his own, but he was in a land
where men were apt to be more or less suspicious of each other. It was
also quite the correct thing in good manners for him to say but little,
and he was the better able to hear what the others were saying.
Therefore, he could hardly help taking note that none of the party at
the dinner-table said anything about the powder on the _Goshhawk_, or
concerning a possible trip to be made to Oaxaca by any one there. They
all appeared ready, on the other hand, to praise the patriotism,
statesmanship, and military genius of that truly great man, President
Paredes. They made no mention whatever of General Santa Anna, but they
spoke confidently of the certainty with which Generals Ampudia and
Arista were about to crush the invading gringos at the north, under
Taylor. They also were sure that these first victories were to be
followed by greater ones, which would be gained by the President
himself, as soon as he should be able to take command of the Mexican
armies in person. If any friend of his, a servant, for instance, of the
Tassara family, had been listening, he would have had nothing to report
which would have made any other man suppose that the rulers of Mexico
had bitter, revengeful foes under that hospitable roof.

The dinner ended, and Ned was once more in his room, glad enough to get
into his hammock and go to sleep. If the norther did any howling around
that house, he did not hear it, but he may have missed the swing motion
which a hammock obtains on board a ship at sea. His eyes closed just as
he was thinking:

"This is great, but I wonder what on earth is going to happen to me
to-morrow."

CHAPTER VI.

FORWARD, MARCH

The sun of the next morning arose upon a great deal of doubt and
uncertainty in many places. Some of the soldiers of General Taylor's
army were altogethe