fell an ox.

Manuel listened to Dona Violante's stories with genuine delight. The
old lady was at her best in her commentaries.

"I tell you, my boy," she would say, "you can take my word for it. A
woman with a good pair of breasts and who happens to be a pretty warm
article"--and here the old lady pulled at her cigarette and with an
expressive gesture indicated what she meant by her no less expressive
word--"will always have a trail of men after her."

Dona Violante used to sing songs from Spanish _zarzuelas_ and
from French operettas, which produced in Manuel a terrible sadness. He
could not say why, but they gave him the impression of a world of
pleasures that was hopelessly beyond his reach. When he heard Dona
Violante sing the song from _El Juramento_

_Disdain is a sword with a double edge,
One slays with love, the other with forgetfulness...._

he had a vision of salons, ladies, amorous intrigues; but even more
than by this he was overwhelmed with sadness by the waltzes from _La
Dina_ and _La Grande Duchesse_.

Dona Violante's reflexions opened Manuel's eyes; the scenes that
occurred daily in the house, however, worked quite as much as these
toward such a result.

Another good instructor was found in the person of Dona Casiana's
niece, a trifle older than Manuel,--a thin, weakly chit of such a