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 let his sword fall with a loud clatter on the tiles, and the muttered curses of the great man as he snatched the various pieces of his apparel. Padre Mateo made ready his candle to light the governor down the stairs.

For an elderly stout man, Governor de Arrillaga was quick about getting into his clothes. Although it seemed long to Padre Mateo's fuming inipatience, it could not have been more than a minute or two until the governor appeared in his boots, his trousers pulled on with rather a stuffy appearance over his nightgown. He was carrying his sword in his hand.

"Now, my good padre, I'm with you," he said. "Lead away—let me get a sight of these precious citizens at their admirable work!"

Padre Ignacio arrived in breathless precipitation at the dam, having run all the way. He burst among the wreckers, who were so intent on their preliminary work of destruction that they had not seen him until he was within two rods of them, holding the cross before him with extended arms like a peace offering or a shield.

"Hold your work here, lawless men!" Padre Ignacio commanded. He pushed among them to the spot where two men, under the direction of no less important person than Comisionado Felix himself, were drilling a hole with a crowbar deep into the adobe-and-bowlder dam.

There were not more than nine or ten men in the crowd; their horses were tied near the mill. The