10 



THE GULF. 



master of Tamaulipas, jealous and suspicious of every 

 man on board. One personage, however, was too striking 

 not to be singled out. 



A tall athletic figure, with strongly marked features ; a 

 countenance roughened with the signs of long addiction 

 to a life of passion and adventure ; shabby travel-worn 

 habiliments, and a slouched hat. under which he could, 

 when occasion suited, throw his changeful features into 

 shadows, indicated the bravo, soi disant Monsieur le 

 Marquis de Maison Rouge, of the ancient and noble 

 house of Maison Rouge de Perpignan. According to 

 his own account, he had been born and bred in Louisiana, 

 and had been cheated of some hundred thousand million 

 acres of fat and fertile land in that state, his lawful patri- 

 mony. He had been compelled by a stern and uncivil 

 guardian to study civil engineering and, according to 

 his own testimony, with considerable success. Subse- 

 quently he had been taken prisoner by the English, when 

 acting as sentinel in the marshes, at the time of the attack 

 upon New Orleans. Whether his brain or his morals 

 had become unsettled by a knock on the head from the 

 butt end of a musket, which he had received on this oc- 

 casion, and had not yet digested, I cannot say ; but it 

 was evident that he had never acted like a man of edu- 

 cation, breeding, or noble birth since. He had adopted 

 the creed of Sardanapalus ; and at New Orleans, in the 

 Attakapas, at the Havanna, in the islands, and on the 

 main, had led, for years, a shameless life of sin and crime. 

 As he acquired gold, he spent it in brawls and violence. 

 His person bore the marks of the cutting and stabbing 

 frays in which he had often been an actor, and not un* 

 frequently a victim. Now, penniless, he was going to 

 Mexico, to make his fortune in some wild speculation, in 

 reference to which he could point out neither the means 

 by which it was to be set on foot, nor the ultimate ends 

 which were to be gained. When not excited, he was 

 good tempered, and his voice was one of the most musical 

 I ever heard. When conversing, which he did at times 

 most agreeably and well, you could hardly believe that 

 those bland tones were the production of such a stormy 



