The Liberals won a great victory; they obtained eight places out of ten vacancies.
XVIII. DECLARATION OF WAR
The new city government of Castro was the most extraordinary that could be imagined. Dr. Ortigosa presented motions which caused the greatest astonishment and stupefaction, not only in the town, but in the whole province. He conceived magnificent plans and extravagant ideas. He asked to have the teaching system changed, religious festivals suppressed and other ones instituted, property abolished, public baths installed, and that Castro Duro should break with Rome.
The doctor was a creature born to succeed those revolutionary eagle-men, like Robespierre and Saint Just, and condemned to live in a miserable chicken-yard.
One day when Cæsar was working in his office, he was astounded to see Father Martin enter.
Father Martin greeted Cæsar like an old acquaintance; he had come to ask him a favour. Suspicious, Cæsar prepared to listen. After speaking of the business that had brought him, the friar began to criticize the town-government of Castro and to say that it was a veritable mad-house.
“Your friends,” said the priest, smiling, “are unrestrained. They want to change everything in three days. Dr. Ortigosa is a crazy man....”
“To my mind, he is the only man in Castro that deserves my estimation.”
“Yes?”