“For in the wars,” he said, “are all things to be won, and nothing is unobtainable to the sword.  For parchment and custom govern all the possessions of man, as they taught me in the College of San Josephus.  Yet the sword is at first the founder and discoverer of all possessions; and this my father told me before he gave me this sword, which hath already acquired in the old time fair castles with many a tower.”

“And those that dwelt in the castles, master, before the sword came?” said Morano.

“They died and went dismally to Hell,” said Rodriguez, “as the old songs say.”

They walked on then in silence.  Morano, with his low forehead and greater girth of body than of brain to the superficial observer, was not incapable of thought.  However slow his thoughts may have come, Morano was pondering surely.  Suddenly the puckers on his little forehead cleared and he brightly looked at Rodriguez as they went on side by side.

“Master,” Morano said, “when you choose a castle in the wars, let it above all things be one of those that is easy to be defended; for castles are easily got, as the old songs tell, and in the heat of combat positions are quickly stormed, and no more ado; but, when wars are over, then is the time for ease and languorous days and the imperilling of the soul, though not beyond the point where our good fathers may save it.”

“Nay, Morano,” Rodriguez said, “no man, as they taught me well in the College of San Josephus, should ever imperil his soul.”

“But, master,” Morano said, “a man imperils his body in the wars yet hopes by dexterity and his sword to draw it safely thence:  so a man of courage and high heart may surely imperil his soul and still hope to bring it at the last to salvation.”

“Not so,” said Rodriguez, and gave his mind to pondering upon the exact teaching he had received on this very point, but could not clearly remember.

So they walked in silence, Rodriguez thinking still of this spiritual problem, Morano turning, though with infinite slowness, to another thought upon a lower plane.

And after a while Rodriguez’ eyes turned again to the flowers, and he felt his meditation, as youth will, and looking abroad he saw the wonder of Spring calling forth the beauty of Spain, and he lifted up his head and his heart rejoiced with the anemones, as hearts at his age do:  but Morano clung to his thought.

It was long before Rodriguez’ fanciful thoughts came back from among the flowers, for among those delicate earliest blooms of Spring his youthful visions felt they were with familiars; so they tarried, neglecting the dusty road and poor gross Morano.  But when his fancies left the flowers at last and looked again at Morano, Rodriguez perceived that his servant was all troubled with thought:  so he left Morano in silence for his thought to come to maturity, for he had formed a liking already for the judgments of Morano’s simple mind.