Imagine you I have lain here, under tender Spanish care, all these weeks, where, as I do most solemnly affirm, not so much as a glass of decent wine has found way down my throat, nor have I possessed a bit of pomade for the proper arrangement of my locks--which will account for their present dishevelment--Saint Cecilia! but that moon-faced Moor who commands the guard merely laughed at me when I did request a comb;--think you, I say, I have been through all this without calculating chances for escape?
But, _pardieu_! what use?
A man of sense will not dream such fool dreams.

This I know, there are three sentries yonder in the passageway, a good dozen more under arms in the guard-room beyond, with still others vigilantly pacing the deck above.

What use, I say, for did not poor Villere try it, and, before he had covered twenty feet, had three bullets in his brain?
Nay, Master Benteen, to endeavor running such a gantlet would only give me my fill of Spanish lead before the hour set, which, they tell me, comes with the sunrise." He arose languidly to his feet, paused a moment in front of the cracked mirror to recurl his long moustaches, and then, turning about, extended a white hand toward me, smiling pleasantly as he did so.
"Faith, I fear I shall not look my best when it is all over, but if so it will be the fault of the Dons--they seem most careless as to requirements of the toilet.

Yet I would not have you deem me ungrateful, and I thank you heartily, Monsieur.

But if it be my turn to die, and I doubt it not,--for who ever heard of mercy in the black heart of a Spaniard ?--then it is best I front it as becomes a gentleman of France, not with a bullet in my back, as though I fled from fate with the faint heart of a coward.