Under the Southern Cross: A Tale of the New World
Deborah Alcock
9781465515544
418 pages
Library of Alexandria
Overview
On a burning autumn afternoon,—in the Sixteenth Century, which had then passed its meridian by rather more than ten years,—Don Fray Tomas de San Martin, the stately prior of the great Franciscan monastery of Ciudad de los Reyes, now called Lima, was sitting alone in his private apartment. Meaner and idler men were dozing the sultry hours away; but it was not in the nature of Fray Tomas to seek repose while the duties of his calling, the interests of his Order, or the concerns of any of his numerous friends required his attention. In spite of physical languor and exhaustion, an expression of satisfaction lit up his countenance as he finished his second careful perusal of a letter he held in his hand. Then he laid the document on the table before him, pausing, however, to glance, with a slight smile, at the pompous armorial bearings inscribed on the seals with which the floss silk that bound it had been secured. The prior was not a man given to soliloquy; but if we might translate his unspoken thoughts, they would run somewhat after this fashion: “Sixteen quarterings for honest Marcio Serra de Leguisano, the tailor’s son! Where, in heaven’s name, have they all come from? Truly saith the Preacher in the Book of Ecclesiastes, ‘I have seen servants riding upon horses.’ He might have added,—and there be none such headlong riders. Pues, every man to his taste. These little weaknesses of Marcio Serra’s may well be borne with, after all. For amongst the conquistadors there is many a worse man, and not one better. Would that all, like him, broke off their sins by righteousness, and their iniquities by showing mercy to the poor. Certainly, it behoves us to aid him to the utmost of our power.”—And, stretching out his hand, he rang a little silver bell that lay near him on the table. But the attendant, whose duty it was to answer it, was lying on a mat in the ante-chamber, fast asleep,—and not until the prior had more than once raised his voice and called loudly, “Antonio!” did he make his appearance. “Send me hither Fray Fernando immediately, and then go finish thy siesta,” said the prior, cutting short his apologies with contemptuous good-nature. Fray Fernando, who was not asleep, came in a few moments; and having made the accustomed reverence, stood silently before the chair of his superior. Fray Tomas was an able man and a good ruler. Both within the walls of his monastery and beyond them he was thoroughly respected. Yet few could have looked on the two who now stood face to face without the thought that they ought to have changed places,—that Fray Fernando ought to have commanded and Fray Tomas to have obeyed. Everything about the younger monk, from the broad white forehead to the nervous taper fingers, bespoke the refinement and sensitiveness of high breeding. Yet he did not look like a man of the schools and the cloister. Power and determination gleamed from his dark, deep-set eye, and showed themselves in every movement of his vigorous though attenuated frame. You would have said that he ought to have worn the plumed casque instead of the tonsure, and have shouted, “St. Jago for Spain!” instead of telling Ave Marias on the rosary that hung from his belt.
