During this discussion, loud shouts were suddenly heard from the populace as they beheld the approaching captives, who marched two by two, in their slaves' dresses, each bearing his chain upon his shoulders. They were preceded by a considerable number of monks of the order of Mercy, who had been to meet them, and who rode on mules caparisoned in black serge, as if they headed a funeral: one of these good fathers carried the standard of Redemption. The younger captives came first; the more aged followed; and the procession was closed by an aged monk of the same order as the first, who, mounted on a diminutive steed, had all the air of a prophet: this was the chief of the missionary expedition. To him every eye was attracted, as much by his excessive gravity, as by a long white beard which flowed down his bosom, and gave to the features of this Moses of the Spaniards a venerable aspect, lighted as they were by a heartfelt joy at having been the instrument of restoring so many of his Christian brethren to their country.
"The captives whom you see," commenced the Cripple, "are not all equally rejoiced at their restoration to liberty. If there be some whose hearts beat with pleasure at the thought that they are about to see once more their dearest friends, there are others not a little fearful that, during the time they have been estranged from their families, events may have occurred which will bring tortures to their minds more cruel than the most refined of slavery itself.
"For instance, the two who first approach are in the latter category. The one, a native of the little town of Velilla in Aragon, after having passed ten years in bondage with the Turk, without once hearing of his much-loved wife, comes home to find her bound again in wedlock, and the mother of five little ones who can claim no kin with him. The other, son of a wool-merchant of Segovia, was carried off by a corsair nearly twenty years ago: he returns with a lively apprehension that matters have gravely changed during that time with his family, and he will find himself a prophet in his loss. His father and mother are dead; and his brothers, who shared their wealth, have dissipated it foolishly enough."