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264 same time that his salary should be paid from the date of his imprisonment at Tablado; he was evidently determined to secure for himself a comfortable and permanent establishment—the condition of the country seeming to promise peace and quiet for the present.

He took up his quarters in one of the southern forts, provided himself with a body-guard, and sent for a coarse, ignorant woman, by the name of Dolores, with whom he had become enamored in Rioja. Mendoza had for some time witnessed the jealous rivalry of his; Lima mistress and this Dolores, and the latter being finally victorious, her rival went back to Chili, leaving two illegitimate children. An unfortunate influence for the people was this utter disregard of morality—vice in its most repugnant forms,—an apostate priest, unchaste women, illegitimate children, whose illegal birth was also sacreligious. Aldao omitted no cares for his personal safety, and his body-guard never left him for a moment, not even when he sat at the card-table; and the fort from hall to cellar was one constant scene of dissipation. Excitement became more and more necessary to him, and when he visited the city he ordered preparations for card playing as if it were a regular part of public affairs. It is impossible to give an idea of the degradation into which this man had fallen, his debasing pleasures and entire forgetfulness of business. It is true that neither the Aldaos nor Quiroga ever really governed; they left to others the labors of the administration, while they reserved for themselves all the power.

Don Felix now governed Mendoza, through nominal governors who dared not displease him in anything;