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 cles which needed scraping to clear him for more comfortable sailing among men. He held his patron's stirrup with servile diminution of his own importance, an office quite ignored by the lofty Don Abrahan, who spoke to him in slow, precise English, as if for the ears of one to whom the tongue was strange.

"This is Gabriel Henderson, deserter from the Yankee ship at San Pedro. There is a reward of fifty dollars, gold, offered for his return. I have given him sanctuary; he is under my protection. Feed him, give him a place to sleep."

"It shall be done, Don Abrahan," the mayordomo replied.

With that assurance, for which he seemed to be waiting, Don Abrahan dismounted, turned his back on them without more words, and walked off to his own refreshment.

Don Felipe clapped his hands as if applauding his patron's exit from the scene, a proceeding seen and heard by Henderson with astonishment. This feeling quickly passed to a better one of amusement when a Mexican youth appeared from among the piles of hides in the warehouse, all eagerness to relieve Don Felipe of the horse.

Don Felipe was master of more English than his patron's manner toward him would lead one to believe. It was rather abrupt, somewhat fragmentary, with misplaced tenses and a strong seasoning of profanity, yet it served very well. It was plainly that sort of English a foreigner would ac-