And he continued his route towards the convent. In the silence of night he was heard singing, in his clear and sonorous voice—
“Alas, poor wife and cherished horse!
Who the same hour died:
I sorely weep, but for which loss?
My poor horse shall decide.”
“Go to bed, Manuel, and nimbly,” his mother said to him, when they arrived at home.
“My wife takes care of that,” he replied; “is it not true, brunette?”
“What I wish is, that you were already asleep,” replied Dolores.
“Liar! how can you thus speak in opposition to your heart?”
“Do you not know how to hold your peace?” said his brother-in-law to him, laughing.
“Listen, José,” continued Manuel, “have you found in the thickets of the fields, or in the grottoes, any thing which could close the mouth of a woman? If you have found it, there will not be wanting people who will pay you for the information in solid gold. As to me, I have never met with it in this world, and I have learned nothing of it in the life of God.”
Thereupon he began to sing—
“The sun’s sublimest heat,
’Tis easier to put out,
Than e’er with fear to worry,
A woman in her fury.
Try the caress, be gay;
She with a stick will play:
A traitress she will be,
For good or bad, we’ll see.”