was cracked, and that he was almost at the last gasp.  The outcry spread all up the hill, and to the Plaza del Carmen, where it reached the ears of an alguazil, who flew to the spot with two police-runners.  They did not arrive a moment too soon, for they found Lope surrounded by more than a score of water-carriers, who were basting his ribs at such a rate that there was almost as much reason to fear for his life as that of the wounded man.  The alguazil took him out of their hands, delivered him and his ass into those of his followers, had the wounded man laid like a sack upon his own ass, and marched them all off to prison attended by such a crowd that they could hardly make way through the streets.  The noise drew Tomas Pedro and his master to the door, and, to their great surprise, they saw Asturiano led by in the gripe of two police-runners, with his face all bloody.  The landlord immediately looked about for his ass, and saw it in the hands of another catchpoll, who had joined the alguazil’s party.  He inquired the cause of these captures, was told what had happened, and was sorely distressed on account of his ass, fearing that he should lose it, or have to pay more for it than it was worth.

Tomas followed his comrade, but could not speak a single word to him, such was the throng round the prisoner, and the strictness of the catchpolls.  Lope was thrust into a narrow cell in the prison, with a doubly grated window, and the wounded man was taken to the infirmary, where the surgeon pronounced his case extremely dangerous.

The alguazil took home the two asses with him, besides five pieces of eight which had been found on Lope.  Tomas returned greatly disconcerted to the inn, where he found the landlord in no better spirits than himself, and gave him an account of the condition in which he had left his comrade, the danger of the wounded man, and the fate of the ass.  “To add to the misfortune,” said he, “I have just met a gentleman of Burgos, who tells me that my master will not now come this way.  In order to make more speed and shorten his journey by two leagues, he has crossed the ferry at Aceca; he will sleep to-night at Orgaz, and has sent me twelve crowns, with orders to meet him at Seville.  But that cannot be, for it is not in reason that I should leave my friend and comrade in prison and in such peril.  My master must excuse me for the present, and I know he will, for he is so good-natured that he will put up with a little inconvenience rather than that I should forsake my comrade.  Will you do me the favour, senor, to take this money, and see what you can do in this business.  While you are spending this, I will write to my master for more, telling him all that has happened, and I am sure he will send us enough to get us out of any scrape.”