a Duke of Alva straggling behind in the roster of the Civil Guard--
talks little, but in a harsh, curt way. One of the priests, a youthful
Dominican friar, handsome, graceful, polished as the gold-mounted
eyeglasses he wears, maintains a premature gravity. He is the curate
of Binondo and has been in former years a professor in the college
of San Juan de Letran,[16] where he enjoyed the reputation of being a
consummate dialectician, so much so that in the days when the sons of
Guzman[17] still dared to match themselves in subtleties with laymen,
the able disputant B. de Luna had never been able either to catch
or to confuse him, the distinctions made by Fray Sibyla leaving his
opponent in the situation of a fisherman who tries to catch eels with
a lasso. The Dominican says little, appearing to weigh his words.

Quite in contrast, the other priest, a Franciscan, talks much and
gesticulates more. In spite of the fact that his hair is beginning to
turn gray, he seems to be preserving well his robust constitution,
while his regular features, his rather disquieting glance, his wide
jaws and herculean frame give him the appearance of a Roman noble in
disguise and make us involuntarily recall one of those three monks of
whom Heine tells in his "Gods in Exile," who at the September equinox
in the Tyrol used to cross a lake at midnight and each time place
in the hand of the poor boatman a silver piece, cold as ice, which
left him full of terror.[18] But Fray Damaso is not so mysterious as
they were. He is full of merriment, and if the tone of his voice is
rough like that of a man who has never had occasion to correct himself
and who believes that whatever he says is holy and above improvement,
still his frank, merry laugh wipes out this disagreeable impression and
even obliges us to pardon his showing to the room bare feet and hairy
legs that would make the fortune of a Mendieta in the Quiapo fairs.[19]