Page:The Present State of Peru.djvu/294

352 this information, I forbore to say a single word to the judge, and entered into the necessary explanation with Maria. She burst into a flood of tears, observing that the prisoner was first cousin to the sister-in-law of one of her female companions, and that I ought to set about in good earnest to deliver him from his confinement. , who saw the negress weep, grew angry, remarking that it behoved me to take an interest in the affair; and that it was sufficient I had been requested to do so by the female who had reared my child.

To my misfortune, entered at the moment. Without wishing me a good day, and without any preface, she called me a brute and an ungrateful monster, telling me that I was not justified in giving displeasure to a wet-nurse; that I ought to consider her as a second mother; that persons of the highest dignity pledged themselves, and moved heaven and earth, to oblige not only their servants, but those whom they had taken under their protection; and that if I was not capable of undertaking this good office for, and of procuring the deliverance of the negro recommended by her, she would go in person, and would take care to be accompanied by my wife, and by herself. This unfortunate child, stunned by the clamours of her grandmother, and by the lamentations of her nurse, wept bitterly; and all the little ones did the like.

I was so much confounded by this scene, that I had not a word to offer in reply: my head became giddy, and I was agitated beyond measure. To avoid sensations of a still more powerful