But I possessed a valuable asset in the ring given me by the French lady on the field of Vittoria.

It was heavy, of antique make, curiously wrought, and set with a large sapphire of incomparable beauty.

A jeweler, to whom I showed it, said he had never seen a finer.

I could have sold it for a hundred guineas.

But as the gem was property in a portable shape and more convertible than a bill of exchange, I preferred to keep it, taking, however, the precaution to have the sapphire covered with a composition, in order that its value might not be too readily apparent to covetous eyes.
At this time the Spanish colonies of Colombia (including the countries now known as Venezuela, New Granada, and Ecuador, as also the present republic of southern Central America) were in full revolt against the mother country.