DURING the night the expectant populace had taken possession of all the belfries in the town in order to welcome Pedrito Montero, who was making his entry after having slept the night in Rincon. And first came straggling in through the land gate the armed mob of all colours, complexions¹, types, and states of raggedness², calling themselves the Sulaco National Guard, and commanded by Senor Gamacho. Through the middle of the street streamed, like a torrent⁴ of rubbish, a mass of straw hats, ponchos⁵, gun-barrels, with an enormous green and yellow flag flapping in their midst, in a cloud of dust, to the furious beating of drums. The spectators recoiled⁶ against the walls of the houses shouting their Vivas! Behind the rabble⁷ could be seen the lances of the cavalry⁸, the “army” of Pedro Montero. He advanced between Senores Fuentes and Gamacho at the head of his llaneros, who had accomplished⁹ the feat¹⁰ of crossing the Paramos of the Higuerota in a snow-storm. They rode four abreast¹¹, mounted on confiscated¹² Campo horses, clad in the heterogeneous¹³ stock of roadside stores they had looted hurriedly in their rapid ride through the northern part of the province; for Pedro Montero had been in a great hurry to occupy Sulaco. The handkerchiefs knotted loosely around their bare throats were glaringly new, and all the right sleeves of their cotton shirts had been cut off close to the shoulder for greater freedom in throwing the lazo.

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