CHAPTER XII.
San Augustin's Day—August, the 28th.
Oh! but I have been angered this day!
What? when my betrothed lies in prison, ill, perhaps, or fretting his brave heart away, am I to be dragged forth to make part of a pageant for the entertainment of his jailers? I would sooner have the lowest cell in the dungeon—aye! and starve and stifle for lack of food and air, than be forced to deck myself out in borrowed bravery, and sit mowing and smiling in a gay pavilion, and clap hands in transport over the fine cavalier airs of the man I hold most in abhorrence!
Do they take me for so vapid a little fool that I may be compelled to any course they choose? Nay, then, they have learned a lesson. Oh, but it is good to be in a fair rage for once!
I had grown so weary and sick at heart that the blood crawled sluggishly in my veins; my eyes were dull and heavy; I had sat listlessly, with idle hands, day after day, waiting—waiting for I knew not what! Therefore it was that I had no will or courage to oppose the Governor's wife when she came to me this morning and bade me wear the gown she brought, and pin a flower in my hair, and sit with her in the Governor's pavilion to see the fine parade go by.
"This is a great day in San Augustin," she said, "being the one-hundred-and-fifth anniversary of its founding by the Spanish."
As the captives of olden times made part of the triumph of their conquerors, 'twas very fit that I, forsooth, should lend what little I possessed of youth and fairness to the making of a Spanish holiday!