intelligence, refinement, and character as something inherent in the
nature of things was one of the symptoms of degradation that had the
power to exasperate her almost to the verge of despair. Still looking at
the ingot of silver, she shook her head at Don Pepe's remark--

"If it had not been for the lawless tyranny of your Government, Don
Pepe, many an outlaw now with Hernandez would be living peaceably and
happy by the honest work of his hands."

"Senora," cried Don Pepe, with enthusiasm, "it is true! It is as if God
had given you the power to look into the very breasts of people. You
have seen them working round you, Dona Emilia--meek as lambs, patient
like their own burros, brave like lions. I have led them to the very
muzzles of guns--I, who stand here before you, senora--in the time of
Paez, who was full of generosity, and in courage only approached by the
uncle of Don Carlos here, as far as I know. No wonder there are bandits
in the Campo when there are none but thieves, swindlers, and sanguinary
macaques to rule us in Sta. Marta. However, all the same, a bandit is a
bandit, and we shall have a dozen good straight Winchesters to ride with
the silver down to Sulaco."

Mrs. Gould's ride with the first silver escort to Sulaco was the closing
episode of what she called "my camp life" before she had settled in her
town-house permanently, as was proper and even necessary for the wife of
the administrator of such an important institution as the San Tome mine.
For the San Tome mine was to become an institution, a rallying point
for everything in the province that needed order and stability to live.
Security seemed to flow upon this land from the mountain-gorge. The
authorities of Sulaco had learned that the San Tome mine could make it
worth their while to leave things and people alone. This was the nearest