Pedro Antonio de Alarcón - O Capitão Veneno

"Your Excellency, Madam Countess, has the unfortunate fate of harboring in your home one of the most complicated and troublesome men that God ever placed in this world. I won’t go so far as to say he seems a complete demon; but it certainly takes a saint’s patience—or the kind of affection I have for him, born of natural law and ill luck—to endure his impertinences, ferocity, and madness. It should suffice to tell you that the frivolous and fearless people he associates with at the Casino and in cafés have nicknamed him Captain Venom, having observed that he is always in a basilisk-like mood and ready, at the slightest provocation, to crack the skull of any living creature!

I must immediately reassure Your Excellency, for your own peace of mind and the safety of your family, that he is chaste, and a man of honor and decency—incapable not only of offending the modesty of any lady, but also excessively unsociable and skittish in the presence of the fairer sex."

—Pedro Antonio de Alarcón