CHAPTER XXV

SMILES AND TEARS


The sala of the _Pansiteria Macanista de Buen Gusto_ [54] that
night presented an extraordinary aspect. Fourteen young men of the
principal islands of the archipelago, from the pure Indian (if there
be pure ones) to the Peninsular Spaniard, were met to hold the banquet
advised by Padre Irene in view of the happy solution of the affair
about instruction in Castilian. They had engaged all the tables for
themselves, ordered the lights to be increased, and had posted on the
wall beside the landscapes and Chinese kakemonos this strange versicle:

"GLORY TO CUSTODIO FOR HIS CLEVERNESS AND PANSIT ON EABTH TO THE
YOUTHS OF GOOD WILL."

In a country where everything grotesque is covered with a mantle
of seriousness, where many rise by the force of wind and hot air,
in a country where the deeply serious and sincere may do damage on
issuing from the heart and may cause trouble, probably this was the
best way to celebrate the ingenious inspiration of the illustrious
Don Custodio. The mocked replied to the mockery with a laugh, to the
governmental joke with a plate of _pansit_, and yet--!