4½ stars. This seminal Zorro story, originally published under the name "The Curse of Capistrano", is an extremely enjoyable adventure tale. For those few souls who have never heard of Zorro, he is 18th century southern California's version of a Spanish Robin Hood or the Scarlet Pimpernel - a masked gentleman righting wrongs and protecting the oppressed from unjust persecution. I was pleasantly surprised that in this original book the soldiers, especially the sergeant, were more competent than they are typically portrayed in dramatizations. This makes them more believable and at the same time, more venial. ( )