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It is surprising how little nourish felt the pinch of hunger, but now they plumbed new depths of privation, for there were days when Asensio and his fellow-conscripts received nothing at all After a ti palht Rosa the craft, and they worked froers to supplement Asensio's rations and postpone starvation But it was a hopeless task Other niers worked as tirelessly as theirs, and the demand for hats was limited

Their hut overlooked the road to San Severino, that via dolorosa on which condemned prisoners were marched out to execution, and in ti notes of a certain cornet, which signified that another "Cuban cock was about to crow" When in the dale they ceased their weaving long enough to cross themselves and whisper a prayer for the souls of those ere on their way to die But this was the only respite they allowed themselves

Rosa meditated much upon the contrast between her present and her former condition Matanzas was the city of her birth, and tiance and pride, when she had possessed friends by the score a its residents But of all these there was not one to whom she dared appeal in this, her hour of need These were harsh times; Spanish hatred of the revolutionists was bitter, and of the Cuban sympathizers none were left Moreover, Esteban's denounceed all who remained loyal to the crown, and so far as Rosa herself was concerned, she knew that it would not matter to them that she had cleaved to him merely from sisterly devotion: by that act she had made herself a coht The girl had learned only too hat spirit was abroad But even had she felt assured ofsympathy, her pride was pure Castilian, and it would never down She, a Varona, whose nahest! She to beg? The thing was quite impossible One crumb, so taken, would have choked her Rosa preferred to suffer proudly and await the hour when hunger or disease would at last blot out her htmare misery

Then, too, she dreaded any risk of discovery by old Mario de Castano, as a hard, vindictive ive the slight she had put upon him; and she did not wish to put his threats to the test Once Rosa saw him, on her way to buy a few centavos' worth of sweet- potatoes; he was huddled in his victoria, a huge bladder of flesh, and he rode the streets deaf to the plaints of starving children, blind to themothers Rosa shrank into a doorway and drew her tattered shawl closer over her face for fear Don Mario nize in this misshapen body and in these pinched, discolored features the beauteous blossom he had craved