"I consider that a good story," said the Consul, when he had
finished the narration out of which I have compounded the foregoing,--
"and, what is not always the case with a good story, it is a true one."
I cordially concurred with my honored friend in this opinion, and if
the reader should unfortunately differ from me on this point, I beg
him to believe that it is entirely my fault. As the Consul told it
to me, it was an excellent good story.
"Poor Mynheer Van Holland," he added, laughing, "never got over that
adventure. Not that the loss was material to him; he was too rich
for that; but the provocation of his fifty thousand dollars going to
a parcel of Mexican _ladrones_, after buying an opera-singer for a
Frenchman on its way, was enough to rouse even Dutch human-nature to
the swearing-point. He could not abide either Frenchmen or
opera-singers, all the rest of his life. And, by Jove, I don't
wonder at it!"
Nor I, neither, for the matter of that.
* * * * *