began, as she kissed the hem of my mantle. "Laura, who means better than any one else in the world, is forgotten by every one. You must not think I have run after you to be thanked, for I do not know myself what for. But you are so proud that you hardly say 'Good-day' to Laura, and yet I have stood a good deal for you; I at least deserved that your Honor should say 'Good-by' to me. I should have been offended if I were not so long used to the ingratitude of the world. Holy Mary, Mother of God, be with me! poor sinner that I am, I could wish in my heart that they would bring me the last sacrament, and give me a house of six boards. Our dear good Don Alfonso goes away, and we shall have Ash Wednesday the whole year round. As St. Jago is good to me, you may believe me, if I were not so fond of Manuela I would not stay twenty-four hours with the old cripple, who makes a face like Judas every day in the year; and that good child, what she suffers from him no one knows. Oh! it would be well enough for you, if only I need not suffer from it. If it is all settled among ourselves, no one will tell a whisper of it abroad; you see what it is not to have old experienced persons who have been much about in the world for advisers. In my last situation I brought a pair together, whom the old ones were much more against than is our old grumbler upstairs; but they were not so proud that for mere billing and cooing they have over-
