An Eagle Flight by Jose Rizal

Captain Tiago was very happy. During these troublous times, no one had paid any attention to him. He had not been arrested, he had not been subjected to cross-examination, to electrical machines, to repeated foot-baths in subterranean habitations, nor to any other of these pleasantries, well known to certain people who call themselves civilized. His friends, that is to say, those who had been -- for he had repudiated his Filipino friends as soon as they had become suspects in the eyes of the Government -- had returned home after several days of vacation in the edifices of the State. The captain-general had ordered them out of his possessions, to the great displeasure of the one-armed man, who would have liked to celebrate the approaching Christmas in so numerous a company of the rich.

Captain Tinong returned to his home, ill, pale, another man. The excursion had not been for his good. He said nothing, not even to greet his family, who laughed and wept over him, mad with joy. The poor man no longer left the house, for fear of saluting a filibuster. Cousin Primitivo himself, with all the wisdom of the ancients, could not draw him out of his mutism.