"Ignacio Emmanuel de Altuna was one of those rare individuals, whom Spain alone produces, too seldom for her own glory. He was not a man of the violent national passions common to his countrymen; the idea of revenge was as far from his mind as the desire of it from his heart. He was too proud to be vindictive, and I have often heard him say, with great sang-froid, that no living man could offend him. He was gallant without being tender; he played with women as if they had been pretty children; he amused himself with his friends’ mistresses, but I never knew him to have one himself, or even to desire it. The flames of the virtue which consumed his heart never suffered the passions of desire to become excited."