Resolving not to be outdone in generosity, and at least not to be guilty of dishonesty before my own conscience, I insisted upon the Governor's acceptance of my watch,—a very costly repeater, studded with precious stones.
“The arms of my family—the Cregans are Irish—will bring me to your recollection,” said I, pointing to a very magnificent heraldic display on the timepiece, wherein figured the ancient crown of Ireland over a shield, in one compartment of which was an “eye winking,” the motto being the Gaelic word “Nabocklish,” signifying “Maybe not,” ironically.
I will not dwell upon the other particulars of an interview which lasted till nigh morning. It will be sufficient to mention that I was presented with letters of introduction and recommendation to the Mexican Ministers at Paris and Madrid, instructing them to show me every attention, and desiring them to extend to me their entire confidence, particularly to furnish me with introductions to any official personages with whom I desired to be acquainted. This was all that I wanted; for I was immensely rich, and only needed permission to pass the door of the “great world,” to mingle in that society for which my heart yearned and longed unceasingly.
Some of my readers will smile at the simplicity which believed these passports necessary, and was ignorant that wealth alone is wanting to attain any position, to frequent any society, to be the intimate of any set in Europe, and that the rich man is other than he was in classic days,—“Honoratus, pulcher, rex denique regum.”
I have lived to be wiser, and to see vulgarity, coarseness, meanness, knavery, nay, even convicted guilt, the favored guests of royal saloons. The moral indictments against crime have to the full as many flaws as the legal ones; and we see, in every society, men, and women too, as notoriously criminal as though they wore the red-and-yellow livery of the galleys. Physicians tell us that every drug whose sanitary properties are acknowledged in medicine, contains some ingredients of a noxious or poisonous nature. May not something similar exist in the moral world? and even in the very healthiest mixture, may not some “bitter principle” be found to lurk?
CHAPTER XXVIII. THE VOYAGE OF THE 'ACADIE'
I was not sorry to leave the Havannah on the following day. I did not desire another interview with my “friend” the Governor, but rather felt impatient to escape a repetition of his arithmetic and the story of the “original debt.”
Desirous of supporting my character as a great personage, and at the same time to secure for myself the pleasure of being unmolested during the voyage, I obtained the sole right to the entire cabin accommodation of the “Acadie” for myself and suite; my equipages, baggage, and some eight or ten Mexican horses occupying the deck.