Journeys Through Bookland, Volume 7 | Page 9

old governor determined to
attend to the affair in person. He ordered out his carriage of state and,
surrounded by his guards, rumbled down the avenue of the Alhambra
into the city. Driving to the house of the Escribano, he summoned him
to the portal.
The eye of the old governor gleamed like a coal at beholding the

smirking man of the law advancing with an air of exultation.
[Illustration: THE NOTARY ENTERS THE CARRIAGE]
"What is this I hear," cried he, "that you are about to put to death one of
my soldiers?"
"All according to law--all in strict form of justice," said the
self-sufficient Escribano, chuckling and rubbing his hands. "I can show
your excellency the written testimony in the case."
"Fetch it hither," said the governor.
The Escribano bustled into his office, delighted with having another
opportunity of displaying his ingenuity at the expense of the
hard-headed veteran. He returned with a satchel full of papers, and
began to read a long deposition with professional volubility. By this
time a crowd had collected, listening with outstretched necks and
gaping mouths.
"Prithee man, get into the carriage out of this pestilent throng, that I
may the better hear thee," said the governor. The Escribano entered the
carriage, when in a twinkling the door was closed, the coachman
smacked his whip, mules, carriage, guards, and all dashed off at a
thundering rate, leaving the crowd in gaping wonderment, nor did the
governor pause until he had lodged his prey in one of the strongest
dungeons of the Alhambra.
He then sent down a flag of truce in military style, proposing a cartel or
exchange of prisoners, the corporal for the notary. The pride of the
captain-general was piqued, he returned a contemptuous refusal, and
forthwith caused a gallows, tall and strong, to be erected in the center
of the Plaza Nueva, for the execution of the corporal.
"Oho! is that the game?" said Governor Manco; he gave orders, and
immediately a gibbet was reared on the verge of the great beetling
bastion that overlooked the Plaza. "Now," said he, in a message to the
captain-general, "hang my soldier when you please; but at the same

time that he is swung off in the square, look up to see your Escribano
dangling against the sky."
The captain-general was inflexible; troops were paraded in the square;
the drums beat; the bell tolled; an immense multitude of amateurs had
collected to behold the execution; on the other hand, the governor
paraded his garrison on the bastion, and tolled the funeral dirge of the
notary from the Torre de la Campana, or tower of the bell.
The notary's wife pressed through the crowd with a whole progeny of
little embryo Escribanoes at her heels, and throwing herself at the feet
of the captain-general implored him not to sacrifice the life of her
husband and the welfare of herself and her numerous little ones to a
point of pride.
The captain-general was overpowered by her tears and lamentations,
and the clamors of her callow brood. The corporal was sent up to the
Alhambra under a guard, in his gallows garb, like a hooded friar; but
with head erect and a face of iron. The Escribano was demanded in
exchange, according to the cartel. The once bustling and self-sufficient
man of the law was drawn forth from his dungeon, more dead than
alive. All his flippancy and conceit had evaporated; his hair, it is said,
had nearly turned gray with fright, and he had a downcast, dogged look,
as if he still felt the halter round his neck.
The old governor stuck his one arm akimbo, and for a moment
surveyed him with an iron smile. "Henceforth, my friend," said he,
"moderate your zeal in hurrying others to the gallows; be not too
certain of your own safety, even though you should have the law on
your side; and, above all, take care how you play off your schoolcraft
another time upon an old soldier."
FOOTNOTES:
[20-1] The Alhambra was the fortified palace, or citadel, of the
Moorish kings when they reigned over Granada, in Spain. It was built
in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and is one of the most
beautiful examples of Moorish architecture.

[20-2] A toledo is a sword having a blade made at Toledo, in Spain, a
place famous for blades of remarkably fine temper and great elasticity.
[21-3] Imperium in imperio is a Latin phrase meaning a government
within a government.
[22-4] Contrabandista is a Spanish name for a smuggler.

[Illustration]
THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT MARINER[29-*]
By SAMUEL T. COLERIDGE
PART I
It is an ancient Mariner, And he stoppeth one of three. "By thy long
gray beard and glittering eye, Now wherefore stopp'st thou me?
"The Bridegroom's doors are opened