Mauer looked up at him with an expression of keenest anguish, and gasped for breath; while Jonathan continued to smile at him.

No wonder Carmen thought, “What a strange sort of friendship!”

“It must be with my dear father as it is with me,” she said to herself by way of explanation.  “He recognizes the snake-like nature in Brother Jonathan, but dares not show it; and having been friends in early youth, he still loves him in spite of everything.”

Weeks and months passed away.  Mauer’s house was in process of being completed, and he was constantly urging the workmen to have it ready for him as soon as possible, as he longed to be settled.

The plan had evidently been drawn on the same simple and spacious style of the hacienda in Jamaica, where Carmen’s mother had lived.  A wide, shady veranda was to extend all around, and a broad flight of steps to lead from it to the spacious grounds.  Deep-seated windows were to open out on the garden, and elms instead of magnolias must shade them.  But the veranda had to be given up, for, when the plan came under the observation of the elders, a committee called on Mauer and represented to him that such a thing would be a gross violation of the severe laws respecting the simple style of building used in the settlement, and would give cause for great offence.  The inhabitants of the town must be content to live without ostentation and show, abiding by the general customs, and conducting themselves as humble members of the faith.

“Just to think:  I, an old man, was going to set such a bad example and encourage foolish ideas!” said Mauer to his daughter, deeply mortified.  “When one has been abroad, in different lands, as I have, much that belongs to the outside world clings to him when he gets home, and is never so noticeable as when he mingles once more with his brethren.  The renouncing of our own will, and compliance with the wishes of others, has all to be learned over again.”

“But,” cried Carmen, impatiently, “they find impropriety in so many things here that one must needs give up thinking, in order to please them.  The free spirit within us is so cramped and restricted that we cease to be individuals.  It is surely not necessary to make automatons of ourselves if we wish to be good.  No; we should choose the right of our own free will, because it is right; then we will not fail to do what is pleasing in the sight of God.”

“Free spirit within us!  What do you mean by that?  We are so often the slaves of our own desires that our ideas of right and wrong get confused, and we lose our own souls thereby,” returned her father, much agitated.  “We should, therefore, never reject the path which our religion requires us to choose, but rather submit patiently, without arguing or any wish to rebel.”