at
same night succeeded in disposing of upwards of thirty Testaments.  The
next morning the house was entered by the two factious _curas_; but upon
my rising to confront them, they retreated, and I heard no more of them,
except that they publicly cursed me in the church more than once, an
event which, as no ill resulted from it, gave me little concern.

I will not detail the events of the next week; suffice it to say that,
arranging my forces in the most advantageous way, I succeeded, by God’s
assistance, in disposing of from five to six hundred Testaments amongst
the villages from one to seven leagues’ distance from Abades.  At the
expiration of that period I received information that my proceedings were
known in Segovia, in which province Abades is situated, and that an order
was about to be sent to the _alcalde_ to seize all books in my
possession.  Whereupon, notwithstanding that it was late in the evening,
I decamped with all my people, and upwards of three hundred Testaments,
having a few hours previously received a fresh supply from Madrid.  That
night we passed in the fields, and next morning proceeded to Labajos, a
village on the high-road from Madrid to Valladolid.  In this place we
offered no books for sale, but contented ourselves with supplying the
neighbouring villages with the Word of God; we likewise sold it in the
highways.

                            [Picture: Segovia]

We had not been at Labajos a week, during which time we were remarkably
successful, when the Carlist chieftain, Balmaseda, {211a} at the head of
his cavalry, made his desperate inroad into the southern part of Old
Castile, dashing down like an avalanche from the pine-woods of Soria.  I
was present at all the horrors which ensued,—the sack of Arrevalo, and
the forcible entry into Martin Muñoz.  Amidst these terrible scenes we
continued our labours.  Suddenly I lost Lopez for three days, and
suffered dreadful anxiety on his account, imagining that he had been shot
by the Carlists; at last I heard that he was in prison at Vi