From that hour I felt that Puebla was no place for me. Any _metier_ but
that of the singed moth. I determined thenceforth to shun the candle
that had cruelly scorched, and might only scorch me more.
Attractive as was the light that had lured me, I resolved never more to
let my eyes look upon it. It had proved too resplendent. It would not
be with my own will, if I should ever again see _Dolores_ Villa-Senor.
How easy thus to talk--thus to resolve--during the first throes of a
wounded vanity--when the spirit is strengthened by its discomfiture.
But ah! how difficult to maintain the determination! Hercules had no
such task.
I endeavoured to fortify myself with reflection: by conjuring up every
thought that might restore my indifference, or enable me to forget her.
It was all to no purpose. Such memories could only be chastened by
time.
They were not universally painful. It was something to think that I had
interested, even in the slightest degree, one so grand, so famed, so
incomparable; and there were moments when the remembrance soothed me.
It was but a poor recompense for the sacrifice I had made, and the
suffering I endured.
In vain I invoked my pride--my vanity, if you prefer so to call it. It
no longer availed me. Crushed in the encounter, it made one last
spasmodic attempt, and then sank under a sense of humiliation.
Untrue what I had been told by other tongues. They must have been sheer
flatterers, those friends who had called me _handsome_. Compared with
Francisco Moreno, I was as Satyr to Hyperion. So must Dolores have
thought? At times, reflecting thus, I could not help feeling vengeful,
and dwelling on schemes of retaliation,--of which both were the object.
By good fortune none appeared feasible, or even possible. I was
helpless as Chatelar, when the sated queen no longer looked lovingly
upon him.
There was no hope except in absence--that grand balsam of the broken
heart. I knew it by a past experience. Fortune favoured me with the
chance of trying it the second time; and soon. Three days after that
sweet encounter in the Cathedral--and the bitter one in the Alameda--our
bugles summoned us to get ready; and, on the fourth, we commenced moving
towards the capital of Mexico.
The counsel I had received from my sage comrade, along with the
excitement of opening a new chapter in our campaign, gave temporary
relief to my wounded spirit. An untrodden track was before us--new
fields of fame--to end in that long anticipated, much talked-of,
pleasure: a revel in the "Halls of the Moctezumas!"
To me the prospect had but little attraction: and even this was gone,
before we had passed the _Piedmont_ of the Cordillera that overlooks the
classic town of Cholula.
On entering the "Black Forest," whose trees were to screen it from my
sight, I turned to take a parting look at the City of the Angels.
The chances were nearly equal I might never see it again. We were about
to enter a valley close as that of Cabool; and from which retreat would
be even more difficult. Our troops, all told, mustered scarce ten
thousand; while the _trained_ regiments of our enemy were of themselves
three times the number. Besides, we were about to penetrate a capital
city--the very heart's core of an ancient nation. Would it not rouse
our adversaries to a gigantic effort--a throe sufficient to overwhelm
us?
So supposed many of my comrades.
For myself I had no reflections about the future--either of its
conquests or defeats.
My thoughts were with my eyes--wandering over the vast _vega_--resting
on the spires of a city, where I had experienced one of the sweetest
sensations of my life.
Alas! it had proved a deception, and I had no pleasure in recalling it.
On the contrary, I looked back upon the place with a cold pain at my
heart, and a consciousness, that I had there sacrificed some of its
warmest affections without an iota of return!
I remained for some minutes on the edge of the _Bosque Negra_--the
_ancillae_ of the long-leaved pines sweeping the crown of my forage cap.
Under my eyes, as on a chart, was spread the fertile plain of Puebla,
with the city projected in clear outline. Besides the Cathedral, many a
spire could I distinguish, and that "public walk" where I had suffered
such humiliation. My eyes traced the lines of the streets--running
parallel, as in all Spanish-American cities--and sought that of the
Calle del Obispo.
I fancied that I could distinguish it; and along with the fancy a score
of souvenirs came sweeping over my soul.
They were not pleasant--not one of them. Though all bright below--
turrets rising gaily against the turquoise sky--domes that sparkled
silver-like in the sun--Orizava snow-white in the distance--around me
upon the mountain side all seemed dark as death!
It was not the _lava_ that laced the slope, nor the sombre foliage of
the pine-trees, under whose shade I was standing.
The shadow came from within--from the cloud covering my soul.
It was not dread of the Black Forest behind me--the terror of
stage-coach travellers--nor apprehension of the fate that might be
awaiting me in the capital of the Moctezumas, yet to be conquered.
It could not be worse than that, which had befallen me in the City of
the Angels!