Which is, of course, fatal to social advancement, and set him at one stroke outside the pale of political life.

Spain at this time, and, indeed, during the last thirty years, had been the happy hunting ground of the beau sabreur, of those (of all men, most miserable) who owe their success in life to a woman's favour.
This silent Spaniard might, perhaps, have made for himself a name in the world's arena in other days; for he had a spark of that genius which creates a leader.

But fate had ruled that he should have no wider sphere than an obscure Pyrenean gorge, no greater a following than the men of the Valley of the Wolf.

These he held in an iron grip.

Within his deep and narrow head lay the secret which neither Madrid nor Bayonne could ever understand; why the Valley of the Wolf was neither Royalist nor Carlist.