Within a hundred years of this time the emancipated Indians, who smile with pity at the paltry struggles carried on by the phantom republics that surround them, will take their place in the world again and carry their heads high. And this will be just, for they are heroic men with richly endowed characters, and capable of undertaking and successfully carrying out great things. We will quote in support of this statement one fact which will speak better than words:--The best history of South America which has been published in Spanish up to this day was written by an Inca. Is not this conclusive?
Let us return to Leon and his two comrades Wilhelm and Giacomo. They were three determined men. Our readers know Leon, so we will say no more of him; but we will sketch in a few outlines the appearance of Wilhelm and his comrade Giacomo. These worthy gentlemen, who were bound together by a hearty friendship, formed the most singular contrast imaginable.
Giacomo, a native of Naples, whence he escaped one morning under the excuse that the house he lived in was too near Vesuvius, but in reality on account of the visits paid him repeatedly by the sbirri, whom he was not particularly anxious to see, was the real type of a lazzarone, careless, slothful, thievish, and yet capable of extraordinary bravery, and bursts of energy and devotion. Well built, with an intelligent and crafty face, and endowed with far from common muscular strength, he seemed to be born for the smuggler's trade.
Wilhelm, on the contrary, was one of those cold and systematic Germans who do nothing save by weights and measures. Only speaking when he was compelled, he seemed ever to be dreaming though he thought of nothing, and concealed, under an apparent simplicity and proverbial phlegm, an excellent disposition, and a certain amount of intelligence. He was tall, smoke-dried, thin, and angular, and his flat face, disfigured by the smallpox, was rendered still uglier by gimlet eyes deep set in their orbits.
His hair, of a flaxen hue, fell in flat curls on his enormous ears, and gave him one of those countenances which provoke hilarity. His magnificent teeth, however, and a mouth which had a remarkably clever expression, formed a happy diversion with the grotesqueness of his features. He had been a member of the Cuadrilla for two years, and had entered it, as he said, in consequence of a violent love disappointment.