Translated from the Spanish. PERICO THE SAD; OR, THE FAMILY OF ALVAREDA.

Following the curve formed by the ancient walls of Seville, encircling it as with a girdle of stone, leaving on the right the river and Las Delicias, we reach the gate of San Fernando. From this gate, in a direct line across the plain, as far as the ridge of Buena Vista, extends a road which passes the rill upon a bridge of stone, and ascends the steep side of the hill. To the right of the road are seen the ruins of a chapel. At a bird's-eye view this road looks like an arm which Seville extends toward the ruins as if to call attention to them; for though small, and without a vestige of artistic merit, they form a religious and historic souvenir. They are an inheritance from the great king, Fernando III., whose memory is so popular that he is admired as a hero, venerated as a saint, and beloved as a king: thus realizing, in one grand historic figure the ideal of the Spanish people.

Having gained the summit, the road descends upon the opposite side into a a little valley, through which runs a narrow stream, which has washed its channel so clean that you will see in it only shining pebbles and golden sand.

Fording this stream, the road touches on its right at a cheerful and hospitable little inn, and salutes on its left a Moorish castle seated so haughtily upon the height that it seems as though the ground had risen solely to form a pedestal for it. This castle was given by Don Pedro de Castilla to Doña Maria de Padilla, whose name it retains. The estate and castle of Doña Maria passed in time, as a pious donation, to the Cathedral of Seville, the chapter of which has, in our days, sold it to a private gentleman. The associations passed for nothing, since a little while afterward, the withered, old, and furrowed Doña Maria appeared clothed in the whitest of lime, and adorned with brilliants of crystal.

Let us follow the road which advances, opening its way through the palmettos and evergreens of some pasture-lands, until it enters the village of Dos-Hermanas, [Footnote 85] situated in the midst of a sandy plain, two leagues from Seville.

One sees here neither river, nor lake, nor umbrageous trees, nor rural houses with green blinds, nor arbors covered with twining plants, nor peacocks and Guinea fowls picking the green turf, nor grand avenues of trees in straight lines, like slaves holding parasols, to provide a constant shade for those who walk beneath. All these are wanting here. Sad it is to confess it! All is common, rude, and inelegant, but instead, one meets good and contented faces, which prove how little those things are needed to make happiness. One sees, beside, flowers in the yards of the houses, and at their doors gay and healthy children, even more numerous than the flowers, and finds that sweet peace of the country, made up of silence and solitude, an atmosphere of Eden and the sky of paradise.

The village consists of houses of a single story, arranged in long, straight, though not parallel streets, which open upon the large, sandy market-place, spread out like a yellow carpet before a fine church, which lifts its lofty tower, surmounted by a cross, like a soldier elevating his standard.

Behind the church we shall find the oasis of this desert. Supported by the rear wall of the edifice is a gate, opening into a wide and vast court, which leads to the chapel of Saint Anna, the patroness of the place. Built against the side of the chapel is the small and humble dwelling of the custodian, who is both singer and sacristan of the church. In this enclosure we shall see century-old cypresses, thick foliaged and sombre; the lilac, of stem so slight and rapid growth, lavishing leaves, flowers, and perfumes upon the wind, as if conscious that its life is short; the orange, that grand seigneur, that favorite son of the soil of Andalusia, to whom it yields a life so sweet and long. We shall see the vine, which, like a child, needs the help of man to thrive and rise, and which spreads its broad leaves as if to caress the trellis that supports it. For it is certain that even plants have their individual characters from which we receive different impressions. We can hardly see a cypress without sadness, a lilac without tenderness, an orange-tree without admiration. Does not the lavender suggest the thought of a neat and peaceful interior; and the rosemary, perfume of holy night, does it not awaken the wholesome and sacred thoughts of that season?

To the right and left of the place extend those interminable olive plantations, which form the principal branch of the agriculture of Andalusia. The trees being planted well apart from each other give a cheerful air to these groves, but the ground underneath, kept so level and free from other vegetation by the plough, renders them wearisomely monotonous. At certain distances we encounter the groups of buildings which belong to the estates. These are constructed without taste or symmetry, and we may go all round them without finding the front. There is nothing imposing about these great masses, or structures, except the towers of their windmills, which rise above the olives as if to count them. The most of these estates belong to the aristocracy of Seville, but they are generally deserted because the ladies do not like to live in the country, and are therefore as desolate and as empty as barns, so that in these out-of-the-way places, the silence is only broken by the crowing of the cock, while he vigilantly guards his seraglio, or by the braying of some superannuated ass, that, turned out by the overseer to take his ease, tires of his solitude.

At the close of a beautiful day in January, in the year 1810, might have been heard the fresh voice of a youth of some twenty years, who, with his musket upon his shoulder, was walking with a firm but light step along one of the footpaths which are traced through the olive groves. His figure was straight, tall, and slight. His person, his air, his walk, had the ease, the grace, and the elegance which art endeavors to create, and which nature herself lavishes upon the Andalusians with generous hand. His head, covered with black curls, a model of the beautiful Spanish type, he carried erect and proudly. His large eyes were black and vivid; his look frank and full of intelligence. His well-formed upper lip, shortened with an expression of cheerful humor, showed his white and brilliant teeth. His whole person breathed a superabundance of life, health, and strength. A silver button fastened the snowy shirt at his brown throat. He wore a short jacket of gray cloth, short trowsers, tied at the knee with cords and tassels of silk, and a yellow silk girdle passed several times around his waist. Leather shoes and gaiters of the same, finely stitched, encased his well-formed feet and legs. A wide-brimmed Portuguese hat, adorned with a velvet band and silk tassels, and jauntily inclined toward the left side, completed the elegant Andalusian dress.

This youth, noted for his active disposition, and for his impulsive and daring character, was employed by the superintendent of one of the estates to act as guard during the olive gathering. He sang as he went along:

"The way is short, my step is light,
    I loiter not, nor do I weary;
The path seems downward--easy trod,
    When up the hill I climb to Mary.

"But long the road, and oh! how steep!
    My lingering footsteps slow and weary;
The mountains seem before me piled
    When down the hill I come from Mary."

Arriving at the paling which enclosed the plantation the guard sprang over it without stopping to look for the gate, and found himself in a road face to face with another youth a little older than himself, who was also going toward the village. He was dressed in the same manner, but he was neither so tall nor so erect as the former.

His eyes were gray, and not so vivid, and his glance was more tranquil, his mouth was graver and his smile sweeter. Instead of a gun he carried a spade upon his shoulder. An ass preceded him without being driven, and he was followed by an enormous dog, with short thick hair of a whitish yellow color, of the fine race of shepherd-dogs of Estremadura.

"Since you saw my sister, Elvira," interrupted Perico with his sweet smile. "Very good, my friend, you are killing two birds with one stone."

"You keep still, Perico, and I will. He whose house has a glass roof shouldn't throw stones at his neighbor's," answered the guard.

"You are happy, Ventura," proceeded Perico with a sigh, "for you can marry when you like, without opposition from any one."

"What are you saying?" asked Ventura, "and why? What fault can she find with Rita, who is young, good-looking, and comes of a good stock, since she is own cousin to you?"

"An old woman's scruples! Does she wish to change the custom of the church, which permits it?"

"My mother's scruples," replied Perico, "are not religious ones. She says that the union of such near relations is against nature, that the same blood in both repels itself, and distaste is the result; that sooner or later evils, misfortunes and weariness follow and overtake them, and she gives a hundred examples to prove it."

"Don't mind her," said Ventura; "let her prophesy and sing evil like an owl. Mothers have always something against their sons' marrying."

"No," answered Perico gravely, "no; without my mother's consent I will never marry."

"The truth is, I am like the captain who embarked the passengers and remained on shore himself, or like the preacher who used to say, 'Do as I tell you and not as I do;' for, in fact, does not the will of my father hold me, tied down like a lion with a woollen rope? Do you think, Perico, that if it were not for my father, I would not now be in Utrera, where the regiment of volunteers is enlisting to go and fight the infamous traitors who steal across our frontier in the guise of friends, to make themselves masters of the country and put a foreign yoke upon our necks?"

"I am of the same mind," said Perico, "but how can I leave my mother and sister who have only me to look to? But remember, if my mother sets herself against my marrying, I'm not going to live so, and I shall go with the other young men."

"And you will do right," said Ventura with energy. "As for me, the day they least expect it, though they call me, I shall not answer, and you may be sure, Perico, that on that day there will be a few less Frenchmen on the soil of Spain."

The house of the family of Perico was spacious and neatly whitewashed, both without and within. On each side of the door, built against the wall, was a bench of mason work. In the entry hung a lantern before an image of our Lord which was fixed upon the inner door, according to the Catholic custom, which requires that a religious thought shall precede everything, and puts all things under some holy patronage. In the midst of the spacious court-yard an enormous orange-tree rose luxuriantly upon its smooth and robust trunk. Its base was shielded by a wooden frame. For numberless generations this beautiful tree had been a source of enjoyment to this family. The deceased Juan Alvareda, the father of Perico, claimed upon tradition, that its existence dated as far back as the expulsion of the Moors, when, according to his assertion, an Alvareda, a soldier of the royal saint, Fernando, had planted it, and when the parish priest, who was his wife's brother, would jest him upon the antiquity, and uninterrupted succession of his lineage, or make light of it, he always answered, without being disturbed or vacillating for an instant in his conviction, that all the lineages of the world were ancient, and that, though the direct line or succession of the rich might often be extinguished, such a thing never happened with the poor.

The women of the family made of the leaves of the orange-tree tonics for the stomach and soothing preparations for the nerves. The young girls adorned themselves with its flowers and made confections of them. The children regaled their palate and refreshed their blood with its fruit. The birds had their quarters-general among its leaves, and sung to it a thousand cheerful songs, while its possessors, who had grown up under its shelter, watered it unweariedly in summer-time and in winter cut away its withered twigs, as one pulls the gray hairs from the head of the father he would never see grow old.

On opposite sides of the entry were two suites of rooms, or, according to the expression of the province, partidos, both alike; consisting, each, of a parlor having two small windows with gratings looking toward the street, and two bedrooms forming an angle with the parlor, and receiving light from the yard. At the end of the yard was a door which opened into a large enclosure in which were the kitchen, wash-house, and stables, and which paraded in its centre a large fig-tree of so little pretension and self-esteem that it yielded itself without complaint to the nightly roost of the hens, never having bent its boughs under the inconvenient weight, even to play them a trick by way of carnival.

The master of the house had been dead three years. When he felt his end approaching, he called his son to him and said: "In your care I leave your mother and sister; be guided by the one and watch over the other. Live always in the holy fear of God, and think often of death, so that you may see his approach without either surprise or fear. Remember my end, that you may not dread your own. All the Alvaredas have been honest men; in your veins flows the same Spanish blood and in your heart exist the same Catholic principles that made them such. Be like them, and you will live happily and die in peace!"

Anna, his widow, was a woman distinguished among her class, and she would have been so in a more elevated one. Carefully brought up by her brother the priest, her understanding was cultivated, her character grave, her manners dignified, and her virtue instinctive. These merits, united with {501} her easy circumstances, gave her a real superiority over those who surrounded her, which she accepted without misusing. Her son Perico, submissive, modest, and industrious, had been her consolation, his love for his cousin Rita being the only disquietude he had ever caused her.

Her daughter Elvira, who was three years younger than Perico, was a malva in gentleness, a violet in modesty and a lily in purity. Ill-health in childhood had given to her features, which closely resembled those of her brother, a delicacy, and an expression of calm resignation, which lent to her a singular attraction. From her infancy she had clung to Ventura, the proud and handsome son of Uncle Pedro, who had been the friend and gossip of the late Alvareda.

The wife of Pedro died in giving birth to a daughter, who from her infancy had been confided to the care of her mother's sister, a religious of Alcala. Separated thus from his daughter, Pedro had concentrated all his affection upon his son, and with pride and satisfaction had seen him become the handsomest, the bravest, and the most gallant, of all the youths of the place.

Directly in front of the house of the Alvaredas stood the small cottage of Maria, the mother of Rita. Maria was the widow of Anna's brother, who had been superintendent of the neighboring hacienda of Quintos.

This woman was so good, so without gall, so candid and simple, that she had never possessed enough force and energy to subdue the decided, haughty, and imperious character which her daughter had manifested from her childhood, and these evil dispositions had therefore developed themselves without restraint. She was violent-tempered, fickle, and cold-hearted. Her face, extraordinarily beautiful, seductively expressive, piquant, lively, smiling, and mischievous, formed a perfect contrast to that of her cousin Elvira.

The one might have been compared to a fresh rose armed with its thorns; the other to one of those roses of passion, which lift above their pale leaves a crown of thorns in token of endurance, while they hide in the depths of their calix the sweetest honey.

In the delineation and classification of the members which composed this family and those connected with them, we must not omit Melampo, the dog we have already seen, lazily following Perico on his return home. We must give him his place, for not all dogs are equal, even in the eye of the law. Melampo was a grave and honorable dog, without pretension, even to being a Hercules or an Alcides among his race, notwithstanding his enormous strength. He seldom barked, and never without good cause. He was sober and in nothing gluttonous. He never caressed his masters, but never, upon any pretext, separated himself from them. He had never, in all his life, bitten any person, and he despised above all things the attacks of those curs that with stupid hostility barked at his heels. But Melampo had killed six foxes and three wolves; and one day had thrown himself upon a bull which was pursuing his master, and obliged him to stop by seizing him by the ear, as one might treat a bad child. With such certificates of service, Melampo slept in the sun upon his laurels.

When the two youths arrived, they found Elvira and Rita leaning each against a side of the doorway, wrapped in their mantles of yellow cloth, bordered with black velvet ribbon, such as were worn then by the women of the country in place of the large shawls which they use nowadays. They covered the lower part of the face, allowing only the forehead and eyes to be seen. Having wished them good evening, Perico said to his sister:

"Elvira, I warn you that this bird wants to fly; fasten the cage well . . . He is beside himself to go and fight these gabachos [Footnote 86] who are trying to pass through here like Pedro through his house."

"For they say," added Ventura, "that they are approaching Seville; and must we stand looking on with our arms crossed, without so much as saying this mouth is my own?"

"Ah goodness!" exclaimed Elvira, "I hope in God that this may not happen! Do not even speak of it! O my protectress Saint Anna! I offer thee what I prize so much, my hair, which I will tie up in a tress with an azure ribbon and hang upon thy altar, if thou wilt save us from this."

"And I," said Rita, "will offer the Saint two pots of pinks to adorn her chapel, if it falls out so that you take yourselves off in haste and do not come back soon."

"Never mind, let her say it; the Saint is sure to prefer the beautiful tress of your hair to her pinks," observed Ventura.

At this moment the good widow, Maria, approached. She was older than her sister-in-law, and although hardly sixty years old, was so small and thin that she appeared much older.

"Children," she cried, "the night is falling, what are you doing out here, freezing yourselves?"

"How freezing ourselves?" answered Ventura, unbuttoning his collar, "I'm too warm, the cold is in your bones, Aunt Maria."

"Do not play with your health, my son, nor trust in your youth, for Death does not look at the record of baptism. This north wind cuts like a knife, and you are more likely to get a consumption by waiting here than an inheritance from the Indies."

So saying she passed into the house, all following her, except Ventura, who went to discharge his commissions.

They found Anna seated before the brasier, the point of reunion round which families gather m winter. The great copper frying-pan shone like gold upon its low wooden bench. The floor of the spacious room was covered with mattings of straw and hemp, around it were arranged rude wooden chairs, high-backed and low-seated, a low pine table upon which burned a large metal lamp, and a leathern arm-chair, like those seen in the barbers' shops of the region, completed the simple furniture of the room. In the alcove were seen a very high bed, over which was spread a white counterpane with well starched ruffles; a very large cedar chest, with supports underneath to preserve it from the dampness of the floor; a small table of the same wood, upon which, in its case of mahogany and glass, was a beautiful image of "Our Lady of Sorrows," some pious offerings, and the "Mystic Garland; or, Lives of the Saints," by Father Baltasar Bosch Centellas.

As soon as they were all reunited, including Pedro, the neighbor and friend of Anna, the latter began to recite the rosary. When the prayers were finished Anna took up her distaff to spin, Elvira applied herself to her knitting, and Pedro, who occupied the great chair, employed himself in the preparation of a cigarette; Perico in roasting chestnuts and acorns, which, when they were done, he gave to Rita, who ate them.

"Did you ever!" said Perico, "how the rain holds off! The earth has turned to stone and the sky to brass. Last year at this time it had rained so much that the ground could not be seen for the grass that covered it."

"It is true," said Uncle Pedro, "and now the flocks are perishing with hunger, notwithstanding that last year their table was so well spread."

"It appears to me," added Elvira, in her sweet voice, "that it is going to rain soon. The river wore its black frown to-day, and the old people say that these frowns are sleeping tempests, which, when the winds awaken them, drench the world.'"

"Of course it is going to rain," said Rita; "I saw to-night the star of the waters which the storm brings for a lantern."

"It is a-going to rain," confirmed Maria, aroused from her dose by the abrupt and clear voice of her daughter; "my rheumatic pains announce it to me. Indeed, wind and rain are the fruits of the season, and they are needed. But I am sorry for the poor herdsmen who pass such nights in the inn of the stars."

"Don't trouble yourself about them, Maria," said the jovial Uncle Pedro, who had always a saying, a proverb, a story, or a something, to bring in support of whatever he asserted. "In this world habit is everything, and that which seems disagreeable to one, another finds quite to his liking; custom makes all level as the sea, and gilds all like the sun. There was once a shepherd that got married to a girl as lovely as a rose, and as chance would have it, on the very night of the wedding there arose such a tempest as if all the imps from beneath had been abroad with thunder and lightning, hurricane and flood. It was too much for the shepherd; he abandoned his bride and rushed to the window exclaiming as he dashed it open, 'O blessed night I why am I not out to enjoy thee!'"

"The bride might well be jealous of such a rival," said Rita, bursting into a loud laugh.

When the mother and her children were left alone Elvira spread a clean cloth upon the table and placed upon it a dish of salad. Anna and her daughter began to sup, but Perico remained seated with his head inclined over the brasier, absently stirring with the shovel the few coals which still glowed among the ashes.

"Are you not going to eat your supper, Perico?" said his sister, extending toward him the fine white bread which she herself had kneaded.

The supper was finished in silence, and when Elvira had gone out, carrying the plates, Perico abruptly said to his mother:

"Mother, I am going to Utrera tomorrow to enlist with the loyal Spanish who are preparing to defend the country."

Anna was thunderstruck. Accustomed to the docile obedience of her son, who had never failed to keep his word, she said to him:

"To the war? That is to say that you are going to abandon us. But it cannot be! You must not do it! You ought not to leave your mother and sister, and I will not give my consent."

"Mother," said the young man, exasperated, "it is seen that you always have something to oppose to my desires; you have subjected my will, and now you wish to fetter my arm; but mother," he proceeded, growing excited, and impelled by the two greatest motives which can rule a man--patriotism in all its purity, and love in all its ardor, "mother, I am twenty-two years old, and I have besides strength enough and will enough, to break away if you force me to it."

Anna, as much astonished as terrified, clapped her cold and trembling hands in agony, exclaiming:

"What! is there no alternative between a marriage which will make you wretched and the war which will cost you your life?"

"None, mother," said Perico, drawn out of his natural character, and hardened by the dread that he should yield in the contest now fairly entered upon. "Either I remain to marry, or I go to fulfil the duty of every young Spaniard."

"Marry, then," said the mother in a grave voice. "Between two misfortunes I choose the least bitter; but remember, Perico, what your mother tells you to-day; Rita is vain and light {504} an indifferent Christian, and an ungrateful daughter. A bad daughter makes a bad wife--your blood and hers will repel each other. You will remember what your mother now says, but it will be too late."

Saying these words, the noble woman rose and went into her room to hide from her son the tears that choked her voice.

Perico, who regarded his mother with as much tenderness as veneration, made a movement as if to retain her. He would have spoken, but his timidity and the excitement of his mind confused his faculties. He found no words, and after a moment of indecision rose suddenly, passed his hand across his damp forehead, and went out.

During this time Rita, who waited in vain at the grating of her window for Perico, was impatient and uneasy.

"I won't put up with this!" she said at last, spitefully, closing the wooden shutter. "You may come now, but upon my life, you shall wait longer than I have." At this instant a stone rolled against the foot of the wall, This was the signal agreed upon between her and Perico to announce his arrival.

"Now you may roll all the stones of Dos-Hermanas and I shall not open the shutter," said Rita to herself. "Perhaps you think you have me at your will and pleasure, like your old donkey, but this will never do, my son."

Another stone came rolling, and bounded back from the wall with more violence than Perico was accustomed to use.

"Ho!" said Rita, "he appears to be in a hurry; it is well to let him know that waiting has not the flavor of caramels; I'm only sorry it doesn't rain pitchforks." But, after a moment of reflection, she added, "If we quarrel, the one to bathe in rose water will be my hypocrite of an aunt; afterward Uncle Pedro's daughter, Saint Marcela, that the old fox keeps shut up in the convent, like a sardine in pickle, will be brought out to dance, so that she may trap his godson Perico on the first opportunity. But they shall not see themselves in that glass, for to frustrate their plans--"

"I am here." Addressing herself to Perico, she continued with asperity, "Look here, are you determined to throw down the wall? Why did you wake me? When I am kept waiting I fall asleep, and when I am asleep I do not thank anyone for disturbing me; so go back by the way you came, or by another, it's all the same to me." And she made a motion as if to shut the blind.

"You!" said Rita, opening again the half-shut blind. "You don't say it! Why, this is another miracle like that of Balaam's ass! and what answer did this 'mater' not 'amabilis' give you?"

"Says yes!" mocked Rita. "Saint Quilindon help me! How often a key can turn! But it belongs to the wise to change their minds. Go along with you! To-morrow I will come over and condole with her. Perico, what if, following the good example of your mother, as mine exhorts me to, I also should change my mind and now say no?"

"Rita, Rita!" cried Perico, beside himself with joy, "you are going to be my wife."

"That remains to be seen," she responded; "the idea is not like a silver dollar, which, the oftener you turn it, the prettier it looks."

With these and other absurdities Rita blotted entirely from the mind of Perico, the solemn impression his mother's words had left there.

On the following morning Anna was sitting alone, sad and depressed, when Uncle Pedro entered. "Neighbor," he said, "here I am, because I have come."

"You must know, then, that my wind-mill of a Ventura has taken it into his head to go and get his hide pierced by those French savages, confound them!"

"Gently, gently, neighbor; kill an enemy in fair fight, but do not curse him. Perico also was thinking of the same thing. It is bitter, old friend, it is cruel for us, but it is natural."

"I do not say the contrary, my friend. Bad luck to the traitors! but, in short, he is my only son, and I would not lose him; no, not for all Spain. I have found but one means to keep him at home and am come to tell you what that is."

As he spoke, Pedro was seating himself comfortably in the great leathern arm-chair, gathering up the ends of his cloak, approaching his feet to the fire, and settling himself at his ease generally.

"Neighbor," he said, at last, with that profusion of synonymous phrases in which great talkers indulge, "I abhor preambles, which only serve to waste the breath. Things ought to be arranged with few words, and those to the point. One side or the other, and this is mine, that which can be said in five minutes, why waste an hour talking about it? that which can be done to-day, why leave it until tomorrow? Of all roads the shortest is the best, but to come to the point, for I neither like circumlocution nor--"

"Really," said Anna, interrupting him, "you give occasion to suppose the contrary. Do come to the point, for you have kept me in suspense ever since you entered."

"Patience, patience! I can't fire myself off like a musket; by talking folks come to an understanding. What is there to hurry us? Good gracious! neighbor, if you are not all fire and tow, and as sudden as a flash. I was saying, Mrs. Gunpowder, that I had found only one method of keeping this skyrocket of mine from going off; and that is to take a step which sooner or later I should have taken; in a word, and to end the matter, I have come to ask of you your Elvira for my Ventura, hoping the son I offer you may be as much to your liking as the daughter I ask you for is to mine."

Anna did not attempt to hide the satisfaction she felt at the prospect of a union so suitable and equal in every respect, a union that had been foreseen by the parents, and was as much desired by them as by their children. Therefore, like the sensible people they were, they began at once to discuss the conditions of the contract.

"Neighbor," said Anna, "you know what we have as well as I do. The only question is how to divide it. This house has always gone to the oldest son; the vineyard belongs to Perico by right, because he has improved it, and has newly planted the greater part of it; my cows I give to him, because he has me to support while I live. The ass he needs."

"Would you tell me, companion of my sins," interrupted Pedro, "what remains to Elvira? for according to these dispositions, it appears to me she is coming from your hands as our mother Eve, may she rest in peace, came from those of the Creator."

"That is the patrimony of a princess," exclaimed Uncle Pedro. "Go along! an olive-yard the size of a pocket handkerchief, which hardly yields oil enough for the lamp of the blessed sacrament."

"Twenty years ago it yielded more than a hundred arrobos," [Footnote 87] observed Anna.

[Footnote 87: Arroba of liquids, 32 pints; of solids, 29 pounds of 16 ounces to the pound.]

"Neighbor," said Pedro, "that which was and is not, is the same as if it had never been; twenty years ago the girls were dying for me."

"How very exact you are, neighbor," pursued Pedro. "Let us come to the point. Trees are as scarce in that yard as hairs on the head of Saint Peter, and those which remain are so dry that they look like church candlesticks."

"It is plain, my friend, that you have not seen them in a long time. Since Perico has known that the oliveyard was to be his sister's, the trees have been taken care of like rose-bushes in pots; each tree would shade a parade ground. Elvira will have, besides, the fields that skirt and that are watered by the brook which runs through them."

"And that are so parched and thirsty, you will take notice, because the brook is one half the year dry and the other half without water," added Pedro. "Let us understand each other. I like bread, bread, and wine, wine; neither bran in the one nor water in the other. Those fields, neighbor, are poor and unproductive; of no use, except for the asses to wallow in. But, since no one overhears us, did you not sell last year two fat hogs, each weighing fifteen arrobas, at a shilling a pound--calculate it, a hundred bushels of barley at fifteen shillings a bushel, a hundred skins of wine, and fifty of vinegar? Now this cat which you must have, shut up in a chest, without room to breathe, what better occasion could there be to give it the air? When his majesty, Charles V., came to Jerez (so the story goes) they offered him a rich wine. But such a wine! rather better than that of your grace's vineyard, and his majesty appears to have been a judge, for he praised the wine greatly. 'Sir,' said the Alcalde, so puffed up that his skin could scarce contain him, for you must know that the people of Jerez are more vain of their wine than I am of my son, 'permit me to inform your majesty that we have a wine even better than that.' 'Yes?' said the king; 'keep it then for a better occasion;' and this, neighbor, is the letter I write to you; it is for you to make the application."

"Which is," said Anna, "that all this money, and somewhat more, I have saved and put together for the daughter of my heart."

"That's what I call talking," exclaimed Pedro. "Upon my word, neighbor, you are worth a Peru. As for my Ventura, all I have is his, since Marcela wishes to take the veil, and you may be sure that he is not shirtless. He will have my house."

"That do not make up to you in milk, cheeses, and kids, what they cost you in fines, they are so vicious."

"And my orchard," continued Pedro, without replying to the raillery with which Anna revenged herself for his jests.

In such discussion they arranged the preliminaries of the contract, remaining afterward, as they were before, the best friends in the world.

When Pedro had gone, Anna put on her woollen mantle, and repressing her grief, and hiding the extreme repugnance she felt, went to the house of her sister-in-law.

Maria, who professed for Anna, who was very kind to her, as much love as gratitude, and as much respect as veneration, received her with loquacious pleasure.

"It does one's eyes good to see you in this house," she exclaimed, as Anna entered. "What good thought has brought you, sister?"

The proposition so filled the poor woman with joy, that she could not find words to express herself.

"O my sister!" she exclaimed in broken sentences, "what good fortune! Perico! son of my heart! It is to Saint Antonio that I owe this good {507} fortune! And you, Anna, are you satisfied? Look here, sister: Rita, although forward, is really a good-hearted girl. She is wilful, but that is my fault. If I had brought her up as well as you have Elvira, she would be different. She is giddy, but you will see (with years and married life) how steady she will become. All these things are the effects of my spoiling and of her youth. Rita! Rita!" she cried, "come, make haste: here is your aunt--what do I say? your mother, she wishes to become, by marrying you to Perico."

Rita entered with the self-possession of a banker, and the composure of a diplomatist.

"Go along," said the mother in an undertone, "if you are not as calm as if you were used to it, and cooler than a fresh lettuce."

"And what would you have me do--dance a fandango, because I am going to be married?" answered Rita, raising her voice.

Anna rose and went out. Maria, extremely mortified by her daughter's rudeness, went with her sister-in-law as far as the street, lavishing upon her a thousand expressions of endearment and gratitude.

Preparations were being made for the weddings. That of Elvira and Ventura was to take place before that of Rita and Perico, as the former had not to wait for a dispensation from Rome.

Pedro wished his daughter Marcela to assist at her brother's marriage, before commencing her novitiate, and determined to go to Alcalá to bring her. Maria had a debt to collect there, and needing all her funds for the expected event, took advantage of her old friend's going to make the trip in company.

The ancient pair, mounted upon their respective asses, set out on their journey, crossing themselves, and Maria, the Christian soul, making a prayer to the holy archangel, Saint Raphael, patron of all travellers, from Tobias down to herself.

Maria, comfortably seated upon the the cushions of her saddle, dressed in a wide chintz skirt, which was plaited at the waist, a jacket of black woollen cloth, of which the closely fitting sleeves were fastened at the wrist by a row of silver buttons, and round her neck, a white muslin kerchief, pinned down at the back to keep it from touching her hair, looked like a burlesque, anticipated, upon the mode which was to rule among the fashionables thirty years later. A little shawl covered her head, the ends being tied under her chin.

Pedro wore, with some slight difference, the dress we have already described in speaking of his son. The cloth was coarser, the bolt black, as became a widower, his clothes all fitted more loosely, and his hat had a broader brim, and was without ornament.

"It is a day of flowers!" said Maria, "the fields are smiling, and the sun seems as if he were telling them to be gay."

"Yes," said Pedro, "the yellow-haired appears to have washed his face, and sharpened his rays, for they prick like pins."

He took out a little rabbit-skin bag, in which was tobacco, and began to make a cigarette.

"Maria," said he, when he had finished it, "my opinion is, that, you will come back from Alcalá with your hands as empty as they go. But, Christian woman, who the deuce tempted you to lend money to that vagabond? You knew that he had not so much as a place whereon to fall dead, and nothing in expectation but alternate rations of hunger and necessity."

"But," said Maria, "to whom shall we lend if not to the poor? the rich have no need to borrow."

"And don't you know, big innocent, that 'he who lends to a friend, loses both the money and the friend!' But you, Maria, are always so credulous, and I tell you now that this man will pay you in three instalments: 'badly, late, and never.'"

"That is the reason why I always hit the mark; think ill, and you will think the truth," said the crafty Pedro.

Presently he commenced droning a ballad, of which the interminable text is as follows:

In my house I heard at night,
Sounds that roused me in affright;
Quick unsheathed my rapier bright,
Stole upstairs with footsteps light.

Searched the dwelling all around,
From the rooftree to the ground,
Listening for the faintest sound--
Nothing heard I, nothing found.

And my story, being new,
I'll repeat it o'er to you.
In my house, etc., etc.

Maria said nothing, nor did she think much more. Rocked by the quiet pace of her animal, she yielded herself to the indolence which the balmy spring day induced, and went along sleeping.

Half the road being passed, they came to a small inn. When they arrived some soldiers were lounging upon the brick seats which were fixed on each side of the door under the projecting roof. As soon as they perceived the approach of our venerable couple, they began to attack them with facetious sayings, burlesque provocations, and railleries, such as are usual among the country folk, and especially among the soldiers.

"Aunty," cried another "is the church where you were christened still standing?"

"Aunt," said another, "does your grace retain any recollection of the day you were married?"

"Uncle," asked the fourth, "are you going with this maiden to Alcalá to have the bans published?"

"No," answered Pedro, lazily dismounting, "I shall wait for that until I am of age, and the girl has her growth."

Pedro found some acquaintances in the tavern who immediately asked him to drink with them. He did not wait to be urged, and having drank said to them:

"It is my turn now, and since I have accepted your treat, you, my friends, and these gentlemen, whom I know only to serve, will do me the favor to drink a small glass of anisete to my health."

"Uncle Pedro," said a young muleteer of Dos-Hermanas, "tell us a story; and I in the mean while will take care to keep your glass filled so that your throat don't get dry."

"Ah me!" exclaimed Aunt Maria, who after having drank her little glass of anisette [Footnote 88] had seated herself upon some bags of wheat, "have mercy on us, for if Pedro lets loose his boneless member, we shall not get back to our place to-night, at least, not without the miracle of Joshua."

"There is no danger, Maria," answered Pedro, "but you will sit on those sacks till the corn sprouts."

"Is it true, Uncle Pedro, what my mother says," asked the muleteer, "that in old times, when you were young, you were a lover of Maria's?"

"What a story!" exclaimed Aunt Maria, "it is a lie as big as a house. Go along with you, Pedro, for a boaster. I never had a lover in my life except my husband, 'may he rest in peace.'"

"O Mrs. Maria, Mrs. Maria!" said Pedro, "how very poor is your grace's memory! for you know the song--