cried in English, "Halt! Who goes there?"

Aiken had not told me the answer to that challenge, so I kept silent.
I could hear Jose behind me interrupting his prayers with little sobs
of fright.

Aiken scrambled back into an upright position, held up his hands, and
cried: "Confound you, we are travellers, going to the capital on
business. Who the devil are you?"

"Qui vive?" the man demanded over the barrel of his gun.

"What does that mean?" Aiken cried, petulantly. "Talk English, can't
you, and put down that gun."

The man ceased moving the rifle between us, and settled it on Aiken.

"Cry 'Long live the government,'" he commanded, sharply.

Aiken gave a sudden start of surprise, and I saw his eyelids drop and
rise again. Later when I grew to know him intimately, I could always
tell when he was lying, or making the winning move in some bit of
knavery, by that nervous trick of the eyelids. He knew that I knew
about it, and he once confided to me that, had he been able to
overcome it, he would have saved himself some thousands of dollars
which it had cost him at cards.

But except for this drooping of the eyelids he gave no sign.

"No, I won't cry 'Long live the government,'" he answered. "That is,"