"But the roads be bad--just mule tracks, while by the river the road is tolerable good." "Yet," said the lieutenant, "I think I shall go back tha' way." The fumes of the wine were mounting steadily to addle his indifferent brains.

Every moment he was seeing things in proportions more and more false.

His resentment against priests who, sworn to self-abnegation, hoarded good wine, whilst soldiers sent to keep harm from priests' fat carcasses were left to suffer cold and even hunger, was increasing with every moment.

He would sample that wine at Tavora; and he would bear some of it away that his brother officers at Pinhel might sample it.

He would buy it.