^^ OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
THE CATHEDRAL, TOLEDO 
 
^ ROMANTIC LEGENDS 
 OF SPAIN 
 
 By 
 GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 TRANSLATED BY 
 
 CORNELIA FRANCES BATES 
 
 AND 
 
 KATHARINE LEE BATES 
 
 ^ OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 Of 
 NEW YORK 
 
 THOMAS Y. CROWELL & CO. 
 
 PUBLISHERS 
 
^^mnpi 
 
 Copyright, 1909 
 By THOMAS Y. CROWELL & COMPANY 
 
 yi^' 
 
 c^^'^"' 
 

 DEDICATED 
 TO 
 
 A SHINING MEMORY 
 
 208527 
 
PREFACE 
 
 A WORD regarding the circumstances under which this 
 translation was made will be pardoned by all children of 
 dear mothers. 
 
 Mrs. Cornelia Frances Bates (1826-1908), a graduate of 
 Mount Holyoke in the days of Mary Lyon and the widow 
 of a Congregational minister, took up the study of Spanish 
 at the age of seventy-one. Until her death ten years later, 
 the proverbial ten years of "labor and sorrow," her Spanish 
 readings and translations were a keen intellectual delight. 
 Her Spanish Bible, from which she had committed many 
 passages to memory, was found at her death no less worn 
 than her English one. Even a few hours before dying, she 
 repeated in Spanish, without the failure of a syllable, the 
 Shepherd's Psalm and the Lord's Prayer. 
 
 So youthful was her spirit that, of the various modern 
 Spanish works with which she became acquainted, nothing 
 fascinated her so much as Becquer's strange, romantic tales. 
 The wilder they were, the brighter would be the eager face, 
 under its soft white cap, bent over the familiar little green 
 volumes and the great red dictionary. Seeing the pleasure 
 she took in these legends and learning that no complete Eng- 
 lish translation existed, I suggested that we unite in a 
 " Becquer Book." Her full share of the work was promptly 
 
 V 
 
vi PREFACE 
 
 done; mine was delayed; and the volume — which we had 
 meant to inscribe to my sister — becomes her own memorial. 
 Gratitude for helpful suggestions is due to the late Mr. 
 Frederick Gulick of Auburndale, Mass., formerly of San 
 Sebastian, and to Senorita Carolina Marcial, formerly of 
 Seville and now of Wellesley College. Especial and most 
 cordial acknowledgment is made of the critical reading given 
 the entire manuscript by Miss Alice H. Bushde of the 
 Colegio Iniernacionaly Madrid. 
 
 K. L. B. 
 
d j-ii-'- 
 
 < -u- 
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 FAGB 
 
 Preface v 
 
 Gustavo Adolfo Becquer , v xi 
 
 Foreword i 
 
 'x-ilk^ASTER PiREZ THE ORGANIST 5 */ 
 
 Jf A Tale of Seville 
 
 .J ^tThe Emerald Eyes 23 '-^ 
 
 y^'' A Legend of the Moncayo 
 
 I The Golden Bracelet 32 't^ 
 
 A Tale of Toledo ^ 
 
 The Ray of Moonshine 40**^ 
 
 A Tale of Sort a 
 
 • ^^<The Devil's CroSs 52* 
 
 / A Legend of the Eastern Pyrenees 
 
 Three Dates.-. 72 
 
 Reminiscences of Toledo 
 
 / ^ly^THE Christ OF THE Skull 93* 
 
 ' ' A Lege7td of Toledo 
 
 NJ The White Doe 105 
 
 / A Legend of Aragon 
 
 The Passion Rose* 1 26 • 
 
 A Legend of Toledo 
 
 X. Believe in Odd 137 
 
 / A Legend of the Montagut Valley in Tarragona 
 
 The Proa^se 151 
 
 I A Legend of Soria 
 
 , -~iyTHE Kiss 163 ' 
 
 / A Tale of Toledo 
 
 The Spirits' Mountain"... 179* 
 
 A Legend of Soria 
 
 vii 
 
"MlfU 
 
 viii CONTENTS 
 
 i 
 
 A PAGB 
 
 The Cave of the Moor's Daughter 189 
 
 A Legend of Fitero 
 The Gnome i96» 
 
 A Tale of the Moncayo ^ >. X^ I 
 
 The Miserere ^ ...,;.... .'. 2i4« Y 
 
 A Legend 0/ Fitero 
 Strange ! 226 
 
 A Story of Madrid /^ ^ /4*-i^X '^L-e ^ . 
 
 '^4>»^ iTHERED Leaves 239^ 
 
 y A Phantasy 
 
 The Set of Emeralds ^ y^.... 244 
 
 A story of Madrii fl^ l/>.«2^ ^ iro A)^^ 
 The Tavern of the Cats »;. v 252 
 
 An Idyl of Andalusia 
 All Souls' Night 266 
 
 In Madrid 
 
ILLUSTRATIONS 
 
 The Cathedral, Toledo Frontispiece 
 
 PAGB 
 
 The Cathedral, Seville , 8 
 
 A City Square, Toledo 32 
 
 The Bridge of Toledo 40 
 
 Cloister of San Juan de los Reyes 74 
 
 The Visagra Gate 94 
 
 A Moorish Window .,,. 126 
 
 The Monastery of Montserrat 146 
 
 An Ancient Castle 1 56 
 
 Palace OF Carlos V, Toledo 164 
 
 A Mountain Pass 182 
 
 A Mountain Grotto 190 
 
 Girls at the Fountain 198 
 
 A Monastery Court 216 
 
 A Senorita 246 
 
 A Ruined Cloister 266 
 
^^ OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
 GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 The writer of these tales was a young poet, oppressed by 
 illness, care and poverty. His brief life held many troubles. 
 Born in Seville, February 17, 1836, of a distinguished family 
 that came to Andalusia from Flanders at about the end of 
 the sixteenth century, he was but five years old, the fourth 
 of eight little sons, when he lost his father. The bereave- 
 ment was greater than anyone knew, for Don Jose Domin- 
 guez Becquer, a genre painter of repute, could have given 
 this imaginative child, a genius in germ, parental sympathy 
 and guidance in an unusual degree. Less than five years 
 later, the mother died, and the disposition of the orphans 
 became a puzzling problem for relatives and friends. Gus- 
 tavo, who had already attended the day school of San Antonio 
 Abad, was admitted, through the efforts of an uncle, to the 
 Colegio de Sa?i TelmOy a naval academy, maintained by the 
 government, on the banks of the Guadalquivir. This famous 
 school of Seville was originally founded by the companions 
 of Columbus in gratitude to St. Elmo, patron of mariners. 
 Here Gustavo found a friend of congenial tastes, Narciso 
 Campillo, with whom he composed and presented before 
 their admiring mates what Senor Campillo, who also made a 
 name for himself in Spanish letters, has described as " a 
 fearful and extravagant drama." But Gustavo had enjoyed 
 barely a year of this new life when Isabella II suppressed 
 the academy, bestowing building and grounds on her newly 
 wedded sister, the Duchesse de Montpensier. Visitors to 
 modern Seville know well the Palacio de Santelmo^ with the 
 
 xi 
 
 'V 
 
 tf 
 
Xii GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 fountains playing in its marble courts, with its gardens of 
 orange trees, palms and aloes, of trellised roses and luxuriant 
 tropic shrubs ; but who gives a thought there to the exiled* 
 boy thrown again, at the age of ten, upon the chances of 
 the world ? 
 
 His godmother, Doiia Manuela Monchay, opened her 
 doors to the waif, and in her comfortable home he dwelt for 
 the next eight years. His schooling was over, but he read 
 his way through Dona Manuela's library and, at fourteen, 
 entered the studio of a Seville painter ; here for two years 
 he trained his talent for drawing. Then he changed to the 
 rival studio, that of his father's brother, who was sufficiently 
 impressed by the lad's literary promise to have him taught 
 a little Latin. Meanwhile his godmother, childless and well- 
 to-do, was urging him to adopt a mercantile career. Had 
 he consented, it is supposed that she would have made him 
 her heir, and his manhood, instead of the exhausting struggle 
 it was for bread and shelter, might have been, from the 
 worldly point of view, prosperous enough. But the visionary 
 youth, who, says his friend Correa,* " had learned to 
 draw while he was yet learning to write, whose unbounded 
 passion for reading had given him wider horizons than those 
 of book-keeping, and who could never do a sum in mental 
 arithmetic," would not betray his ideal. While his prudent 
 godmother was making her own plans for his future, he was 
 
 * To the posthumous edition of Becquer's Works, Senor Correa pre- 
 fixed an account of the poet's life. This, brief and often indefinite as it 
 is, remains the authentic biography. It has been partially reproduced 
 in English by Mrs. Humphry Ward, who published in Macmillah's 
 Magazine, February, 1883, pp. 305-320, a valuable article entitled :/4 
 Spanish Romanticist : Gustavo Becqiier. Professor Olmsted of Cornell, 
 in his recent class-room edition of selected Legends, Tales and Poems by 
 Becquer (Ginn and Company, Boston, 1907) contributes additional facts 
 gathered from Spanish periodical articles — of which he gives a bibliog- 
 raphy — and in conversation with Spaniards who had known the poet. 
 
GUSTA VO ADOLFO BECQUER xiii 
 
 composing with Campillo the opening cantos of an epic on 
 The Conquest of Seville^ or wandering alone on the banks of 
 the Guadalquivir, his " majestic Betis, the river of nymphs, 
 naiads and poets, which, crowned with belfries and laurels, 
 flows to the sea from a crystal amphora." In the shade of 
 the white poplars he would lie and dream " of an indepen- 
 dent, blissful life, like that of the bird, which is born to sing, 
 while God provides it with food, . . . that tranquil life of the 
 poet, which glows with a soft lustre from generation to gen- 
 eration." And when that life should be over, he saw his 
 grateful city, the Sultana of Andalusia, laying her poet down 
 " to dream the golden dream of immortality on the banks of 
 the Be'tis, whose praise I should have sung in splendid odes, 
 in that very spot where I used to go so often to hear the 
 sweet murmur of its waves." His pensive fancy loved to 
 picture that white cross under the poplars whose green and 
 silver leaves, as they rustled in the wind, would seem to be 
 praying for his soul, while the birds in their branches would 
 carol at dawn a joyous resurrection hymn. And when the 
 river reeds and the wild morning-glories, his favorite " blue 
 morning-glories with a disk of carmine at the heart," hovered 
 over by " golden insects with wings of light," should have 
 grown up about the marble, hiding his time-blurred name 
 with a leafy curtain, what matter ? " Who would not know 
 that I was sleeping there ? " And so, to escape commercial 
 drudgery and realize these fair visions, the young Anda- 
 lusian, at eighteen, the mid-point of his life, with no more 
 than sufficed for the costs of the journey to Madrid, started 
 forth on his quest of glory. 
 
 It may truly be said of Becquer that, like Hakluyt's 
 staunch old worthies, he was " content to take his adventure 
 gladly." Nobody ever knew how narrow were the straits of 
 those first years in Madrid. He had to turn his hand to 
 anything, from odds and ends of journalism to a day's job 
 
xiv GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 of fresco-painting. Homesick, hungry, ill, he kept through 
 it all a brave buoyancy of spirits and a manly reticence as 
 to his sufferings. " He was never known," testifies Correa/ 
 " to complain of his hard life or his physical distresses, nor 
 to curse his fate. Silent as long as he was unhappy, he 
 would find voice only to express a moment's pleasure." He 
 made fun of his troubles, which he, more easily than grosser 
 souls, could indeed forget in the ecstatic contemplation of 
 beauty or in giving form to the crowding fantasies that 
 clamored in his brain. A friend, more concerned over his 
 privations than was Becquer himself, found him a position 
 as copyist in an office of one of the state departments at a 
 salary of one hundred and fifty dollars a year. The poet, 
 more out of gratitude for the intended kindness than from 
 any sense of personal relief, for he would rather starve body 
 than mind, undertook the irksome employment. But the 
 national finances, under the drain of the Carlist wars and 
 the , popular uprisings and official corruption of Isabella's 
 disastrous reign, had become so embarrassed that economy 
 in the public service was imperative, and Becquer was 
 pointed out — perhaps, after all, by his good angel — for a 
 victim. In the Direccibn de Bienes Nacionales, as in other 
 departments, superfluous men were to be weeded out. The 
 Director, as chance would have it, came into the office one 
 day when all the clerks were gathered about Becquer's 
 stool, eagerly looking over his shoulders, lost in admiration 
 of the sketches that his facile pen was turning off. The 
 Director, joining the group and peering with the rest, 
 demanded : " What is this ? " Not recognizing the voice, 
 the culprit, absorbed in the joy of art, innocently answered : 
 " This is Ophelia, plucking the leaves from her garland. 
 That old uncle is a grave-digger. Over there " — At this 
 point the awful silence smote his senses and he looked up 
 only to meet the verdict : " Here is one that can be spared." 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER xv 
 
 But although Becquer thus failed to serve his country 
 with proper zeal in the only direct opportunity she afforded 
 him, the touch of the capital, with its sense of impending 
 crisis, its call for patriotic leadership, had given a new 
 turn to his dreams. Or perhaps it would be truer to say 
 that the Gothic cathedrals, old castles and ruined abbeys so 
 abundant in Castile, though not in the Crowned City itself, 
 had fastened the hold of the feudal world, with its military 
 ideals, upon his imagination. In these days he longed — or 
 fancied that he longed — to be " a thunderbolt of war," to 
 exert a mighty influence on the destinies of Spain, so that 
 every revolution of the future might be, as it were, a person- 
 ification of himself, but most of all he indulged his musings 
 in the glorious picture of a warrior's death and burial. He 
 would have chosen, his " thirst for triumphs and acclaim 
 assuaged, to fall in battle, hearing as the last sound of earth 
 the shrill clamor of the trumpets of my valiant hosts, — to be 
 borne upon a shield, wrapped in the folds of my tattered 
 banner, emblem of a hundred victories, finding the peace of 
 the grave in the depths of one of those holy cloisters where 
 dwells eternal silence and to which the centuries lend majesty 
 and a mysterious, indefinable hue." And then the artist in 
 him revelled in all the detailed beauty of that visioned tomb 
 " bathed in dusky shadow," on which his statue, " of richest, 
 transparent alabaster," wdth sword on breast and couchant 
 lion at the feet, was to sleep an august sleep under the 
 hushed watch of long-robed, praying angels. 
 
 Meanwhile, bad lodging and uncertain fare were telling 
 on his delicate constitution. In one respect, Becquer was 
 always fortunate — in friends. Early in his Madrid life he 
 had won the faithful affection of Correa, another young 
 literary aspirant leading a hand-to-mouth existence, but of 
 vigorous physique and practical capabilities. When in the 
 third year of his struggle Becquer fell seriously ill — " hor- 
 
xvi G US TA VO ADOLFO BE CQ UER 
 
 ribly " ill, says Correa — this devoted comrade not only 
 nursed him through, but, finding among the poet's papers a 
 long legend purporting to be an East Indian tradition, 
 managed to get it published in La Crofiica, — the beginning 
 of success. This legend. The Chieftain of the Crimson 
 Hands, has to do with the expiation of a fratricide by a 
 pilgrimage up the Ganges to its far sources in the Himalayas, 
 that in the most secret of those sacred springs the clinging 
 bloodstains might be washed away. But after forty moons 
 of weary travel across the broad plains of India up into the 
 very shadow of the dread Himalayan wall, a law of the 
 pilgrimage was broken, and Vishnu could no longer shield 
 the slayer from the wrath of Siva, who, himself the De- 
 stroyer, resents all other destruction as an infringement on 
 his great prerogative. 
 
 Another Indian subject. The Creation, on which Becquer 
 had tried his hand with a peculiarly light, ironic touch, 
 yielded a more characteristic result. The fable tells how 
 Brahma, utterly bored by the contemplation of his own per- 
 fections, took to chemistry. The astonished cherubs flut- 
 tered on their thousand-colored wings about the smoking, 
 roaring tower where the Deity had his laboratory and where 
 his eight arms and sixteen hands were all kept busy with 
 managing his test-tubes and retorts, for he was shaping 
 worlds to people space. But one day, tired of his experi- 
 ments, he went out to take the air and, for all his omniscience, 
 absent-mindedly failed to lock the door. In swarmed the 
 cherubs, ripe for mischief, and lost no time in turning every- 
 thing topsy-turvy. They flung the parchments into the fire, 
 pulled the stoppers out of the flasks, overturned the great 
 glass vessels, breaking not a few of them and spilling their 
 contents, and wound up their meddling by blowing a ridicu- 
 lous, soap-bubble planet of their own. This imperfect globe, 
 all awry, with flattened poles and with contradictor)^ elements, 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER xvii 
 
 heat and cold, joy and grief, good and evil, life and death, 
 at war within itself, went rolling so grotesquely on its axis, 
 that the peals of cherubic laughter brought Brahma hurrying 
 back. In his vexation he was about to crush that prepos- 
 terous, misformed world, our world, but the appeaUng cries 
 of the celestial children moved him to let them toss their 
 absurd toy out into the ether among his own beautiful, self- 
 consistent, harmonious spheres. Ever since, the cherubs 
 have been trundling it about the sky, to the amazement of 
 the other planets and the despair of us poor mortals ; but it 
 will not last. "There is nothing more tender nor more 
 terrible than the hands of little children ; in these the play- 
 thing cannot long endure." 
 
 It was not literature like this that the Spanish periodicals 
 were seeking in the stormy fifties. It was a time of the 
 keenest political strife, when even poets and novelists were 
 bought by one party or another and made to fight in the 
 midst of the newspaper arena. But no extremity could bring 
 Becquer to be a politician's tool. " Incapable of hatred," 
 says Correa, " he never placed his enviable powers as a 
 writer at the service of animosity . . . nor was his noble 
 character fitted for adulation or assiduous servility." Yet 
 in his own way he played the patriot by earnest effort, con- 
 tinued unceasingly throughout his life, to assist in recording 
 by pen and pencil the architectural beauties and devout 
 traditions of Spain before these should have utterly perished 
 under the march of progress. Putting politics out of his 
 mind as a matter of little moment, Becquer undertook, with 
 a few kindred spirits, what might have proved, with adequate 
 support, a monumental work on the Spanish churches. As 
 it was, there appeared only one volume, to which he con- 
 tributed the Introduction, the chapters on the famous Toledo 
 monastery, San Juan de los Reyes, and a number of draw- 
 ings. In his story Three Dates, more descriptive than nar- 
 
xviii GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 rative, we catch a few fleeting glimpses of him, always with 
 his sketch-book, pursuing his artistic and archaeological 
 researches in Toledo. A similar errand, in all probability,, 
 took him to Soria, an ancient city peculiarly rich in mediae- 
 val buildings, situated .on the Douro, to the north-east of 
 Madrid. In Soria he found several of his legends and, less 
 fortunately, a wife, Carta Esteban y Navarro. The mar- 
 riage, which took place about 1861, soon resulted in separa- 
 tion. Becquer retained possession of the children, two 
 baby boys, for whom he tenderly cared, as best he could in 
 his Bohemian life, until the last. 
 
 It would seem to have been the unwonted sense of an as- 
 sured income that gave him courage to undertake the sup- 
 port of a wife, for in this year 1861 his constant friend Correa 
 obtained for him a position on the staff of a new Madrid 
 daily. El Contempordneo, a journal into whose labors he 
 threw himself with a zest far beyond his strength and which 
 he came to love with a touching enthusiasm. " El Contem- 
 pordneo is not for me a newspaper like any other ; its columns 
 are yourselves, my friends, my comrades in hope or disap- 
 pointment, in failure or triumph, in joy or bitterness." It 
 was in El Contempordneo that many of his legends appeared. 
 But even as he thus became more and more closely identified 
 with the life of Madrid, homesickness grew upon him for his 
 own Andalusia " with her golden days and luminous, trans- 
 parent nights," — for his own Seville, " with her Giralda of 
 lace-work mirrored in the trembling Guadalquivir, , . . 
 with her barred windows and her serenades, her iron door- 
 screens and her night watchmen that chant the hour, her 
 shrines and her stories, her brawls and her music, her tran- 
 quil nights and fiery afternoons, her rosy dawns and azure 
 twilights, — Seville, with all the traditions that twenty cen- 
 turies have heaped upon her brow, with all the pageantry 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 XIX 
 
 and festal beauty of her southern nature, with all the poetry 
 that imagination lends to a beloved memory." 
 
 He re-visited Seville, if The Tavern of the Cats can be 
 taken as testimony, at about this time, and may so have re- 
 newed intercourse with his family, for in 1862 his next older 
 brother, Valeriano, who, following in their father's path, had 
 entered on a promising career as a painter of Andalusian 
 types, came to him in Madrid. Valeriano, too, was of frail 
 physique; he, too, had been unhappy in his marriage; yet 
 the brothers affectionately joined such forces as they had and 
 set up, with the little children, a makeshift for a home. But 
 in a year or two some wasting illness, apparently the early 
 stages of consumption, forced the poet to leave " the Court '* 
 and seek renewal of health in the mountain valley of Veruela, 
 During this sojourn he gathered several legends of the Mon- 
 cayo, that precipitous granite wall — known to Martial as the 
 haunt of ^olus — which bars Old Castile from Aragon and 
 divides the basin of the Douro, the river of Soria, from that 
 of the Ebro, the river of Saragossa. To Becquer its snowy 
 crests looked " like the waves of a motionless, gigantic sea." 
 But the main literary result of that retirement is found in 
 the series of eight exquisite letters. From My Cell, the high- 
 water mark of Becquer's prose, sent back to El Co7itetnpo- 
 rdneo. In these he gives a vivid, humorous account of his 
 journey, by rail to Tudela, by diligence to Tarazona, and by 
 mule up the Moncayo to Veruela, in whose walled and 
 towered old Cistercian abbey he found an austere refuge. 
 He had his Shakespeare with him and his Byron, but the 
 event of the day, in the earlier weeks of his banishment, was 
 the arrival of the mounted postman with El Contempordneo. 
 He could not wait for it in the Gothic cloisters, but would 
 wander halfway down the poplar avenue to the Black 
 Cross of Veruela and, seated at its foot on one of the marble 
 steps, would wait sometimes the afternoon long listening for 
 
XX GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 the far-off beat of the horse's hoofs. The journal came to 
 him like a personal greeting from the life he had left behind. 
 He loved even the odor of the damp paper and the printer's 
 ink, an odor that brought back to him " the incessant pound- 
 ing and creaking of the presses " and all the eager activity 
 of those hurrying nights in which the words " came palpitat- 
 ing from the pen." But with sunset the feverish memories 
 of Madrid fell from him and his thoughts took on the 
 serenity of faith, " the faith in something grander, in a coming, 
 unknown destiny beyond this life, the faith in eternity." 
 Again he found himself dreaming of death, but not now of a 
 poet's cherished grave beside the Guadalquivir, not now of 
 a great patriot's tomb in some sublime cathedral, but of a 
 mound in a village burial-plot, forgotten under nettles, thistles 
 and grass. Long tormented by insomnia, it seemed sweet 
 to him to slumber in such untroubled peace, *' wrapt in a 
 light cloak of earth," without having over him "even the 
 weight of a sepulchral stone." As the mountain air brought 
 strength, he began to ramble over the Moncayo, sketching 
 and gathering up traditions, while through El Cofitempordneo 
 he passionately urged the claims of the past, and proposed 
 the state organization of archaeological expeditions in groups 
 made up of an artist, an architect and a man of letters, to 
 explore the provinces for their hidden, perishing traces of 
 that bygone Spain of Roman, Visigoth, Moor, mailed knight 
 and saintly vision. Bent, as ever, on doing his part in this 
 unprized service, he wrote out, in the quiet and leisure that 
 had been so seldom his, masterly descriptions of the market- 
 place of Tarazona, and of the peasant- women of the Ama- 
 zonian hamlet of An6n. In the sixth letter he narrates, with 
 a pen almost unendurably graphic, the recent doing to death 
 of a reputed hereditary witch, a wretched old woman whom 
 the superstitious Aragonese peasants had, in very truth, 
 hunted to a peak of the Moncayo off which, bleeding from 
 
GUSTA VO ADOLFO BECQUER xxi 
 
 stones and knives, she had been thrust down the precipice. 
 In the seventh and eighth letters he goes on to relate, in his 
 most attractive manner, two local legends of witchcraft, — 
 one of the necromancer who built in a night the castle of 
 Trasmoz, and one of the pious priest who exorcised the 
 witches that had come, in course of time, to make its ruined 
 tower their tryst, only to have his work undone by the girlish 
 vanity of his niece. She tampered with the holy water and 
 restored to the witches the freedom of the castle in return 
 for their kind offices in scrambling down her chimney, gray 
 cats, black cats, all manner of cats, the night before a festi- 
 val, and stitching up for her such fascinating finery that she 
 forthwith won a husband. 
 
 His brother followed Becquer to Veruela and together they 
 made trial of the neighboring Baths of Fitero in Navarre, 
 but they were in Madrid again by 1865, often sorely put 
 to it in the effort to carry the costs of their little household. 
 If one of the children fell ill and a doctor must be called in, 
 a friend might be entreated for an emergency loan of three 
 or four dollars ; but as a rule these invalid brothers bore 
 their burden unassisted. Valeriano drew woodcuts for such 
 market as he could find, talking, says Correa, of " the great 
 pictures he would paint as soon as he could get the canvases," 
 and Gustavo translated the trashy French novels that were 
 in demand, writing, in the intervals of such hack work, an 
 occasional fantasy of delicate beauty, as Withered Leaves ^ 
 and ever looking forward to the time when he should have 
 golden hours of calm in which he might give his higher and 
 more mystical conceptions fitting utterance. Twice it seemed 
 as if the way were opening. Isabella's last prime minister, 
 Luis Gonzalez Bravo, became interested in the poet and 
 made him censor of novels. Becquer immediately availed 
 himself of the comparative leisure thus afforded to gather 
 together a volume of his poems, which Gonzalez Bravo was 
 
xxii GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 proposing to print at his own expense. Then burst the long- 
 gathering storm of 1868, the genial, unprincipled queen was 
 dethroned, and her prime minister of literary tastes fled to 
 the frontier with such precipitation that the precious manu- 
 script entrusted to his keeping was lost. Becquer, with that 
 scrupulous honor well known to his friends, promptly re- 
 signed his censorship ; Valeriano's pension for the study of 
 national types was withdrawn ; and the year 1869 ^^^ them 
 again in straits. Yet they took daily comfort in their close 
 brotherly love and their artistic sympathies, even though, in 
 those troublous times, their joint enthusiasm for the beauties 
 of Toledo once landed them in jail. They were then tem- 
 porarily residing, with their little family, in their favorite 
 city, "the city sombre and melancholy /^r excellence,^'' and 
 had sallied out, one evening, to contemplate its ghostly 
 charms by moonlight. Their disordered dress, long beards, 
 excited gestures and eager talk roused the suspicion of a 
 brace of Civil Guards, who, drawing near and overhearing 
 such dangerous terms as " apses, squinches, ogives," seized 
 the conspirators without more ado and lodged them, for their 
 further artistic illumination, in one of the historic dungeons 
 of Toledo. The next morning the editorial room of El Con- 
 tempordneo resounded with merriment as a letter from Bec- 
 quer went the rounds, — a letter " all full," says Correa, ** of 
 sketches representing in detail the probable passion and 
 death of both innocents." The entire staff united in a writ- 
 ten protest and explanation to the jailer, and it was long 
 remembered in that office with what shining eyes and peals 
 of laughter the delivered prisoners, on their return, set out 
 their adventure in exuberant wit of words and pencil. 
 
 The second opportunity came with the founding of that 
 now famous periodical. La Ilustracibn de Madrid ; but it 
 came too late. Becquer was appointed director and looked 
 to for regular contributions, while Valeriano furnished many 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER xxiii 
 
 of the illustrations. The management had large schemes in 
 hand, including a Library of Great Authors^ for which Bec- 
 quer began a translation of Dante. But now, when a certain 
 degree of freedom, rehef and recognition had been at last 
 attained, the strained and fretted cord of life gave way. 
 •The first number of La llustracibn appeared January 12, 
 1870. On September 23, Valeriano died in his brother's 
 arms. On December 22, the poet, surrounded by devoted 
 friends to whom, with his failing breath, he commended his 
 children, sank exhausted into that mysterious repose on 
 which, from boyhood, his musings had so often dwelt. But 
 his mocking destiny was not yet content. His body was 
 buried in one of those crowded city cemeteries always so 
 repugnant to him, San Nicolds in Madrid. His younger 
 son did not live to manhood ; the elder, his namesake, went 
 wrong. 
 
 His loyal friends, after raising what money they could for 
 the children, gathered together and published in three small 
 volumes the most characteristic of Becquer's writings, — a 
 series of lyrical poems,* the letters Froin My Cell^-\ some 
 legends and tales of unequal meritj and a few miscel- 
 laneous articles t on architecture, literature and the like. 
 
 * Of the seventy-six poems that make up the Rimas, thirty-two are 
 given in literal English rendering by Lucy White Jennison ( " Owen 
 Innsley") as the third section of her Love Songs and Other Poems 
 (The Grafton Press, New York, 1883), and a few are similarly rendered 
 by Mrs. Humphry Ward in the article already mentioned. A complete 
 translation in English verse, by Jules Renard of Seattle, has just come 
 (1908) from The Gorham Press, Richard G. Badger, Boston. 
 
 t Not, to my knowledge, translated into English. 
 
 X Except for a few magazine waifs and strays, usually in abridged 
 form, and for seven out of the twelve stories in W. W. Gibbings' Ter- 
 rible Tales, where the translation, -according to Professor Olmsted, is 
 "often inaccurate," these legends- have not before been translated into 
 English. The twenty-one here given include everything even remotely in 
 the nature of a tale contain-ed in the three volumes, with the exception 
 
xxiv GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 The Rimas almost immediately established Becquer's fame. 
 He is counted to-day among the chief lyrists of the nine- 
 teenth century. These poignant snatches of song pass, in 
 theme, from life to love and from love to death. So far as 
 they give, or purport to give, a history of the poet's heart, 
 they tell of passion at first requited, then of estrangement 
 and despair. It is supposed that a certain Julia Espfn y 
 Guillen, later the wife of Don Benigno Quiroga Ballesteros, 
 a living Spaniard of distinction, figures to some extent in 
 the Rimas. The house of her father, director of the orches- 
 tra in the Teatro Red!, was a resort of young musicians, 
 artists and men of letters, and here Becquer, during his 
 earlier years in Madrid, was a frequent guest There seems 
 little doubt that his youthful devotion was given, though in 
 silence, to this disdainful brunette, but the poems likewise 
 tell of a love " of gold and snow." There is a green-eyed 
 maiden, too, whom he essays to comfort for this peculiarity, 
 — though, indeed, eyes of jewel green, strangely fascinating, 
 are not rare in Spain. He may have had her in mind in 
 writing his legend of The Emerald Eyes. And one of the 
 most beautiful lyrics follows out the slight thread of story in 
 Three DateSy representing the poet as gazing night after 
 night up from that ancient Toledo square, with its glorified 
 rubbish-heap, to the ogive windows of the convent where 
 the nun who had so thrilled his imagination was immured. 
 Over the spirit of Becquer, to whom the immaterial was ever 
 more real than the material, no one actual woman held last- 
 
 of the two East Indian legends already mentioned, and the two witch- 
 craft tales in From My Cell. Good as these witch stories are, it seemed 
 apitytotake them out of their context. What might be considered 
 further omission is noted later. Of the translations in this volume, 
 several have appeared in Short Stories, two in The Churchman, and one 
 in the Boston Evening Transcript. 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER xxv 
 
 ing sway. He tells the truth of the matter in his eleventh 
 lyric : 
 
 I am black and comely; my lips are glowing; 
 
 I am passion; my heart is hot ; 
 
 The rapture of life in my veins is flowing. 
 
 For me thou callest t — I call thee not. 
 
 Pale is my forehead and gold my tresses ; 
 Endless comforts are locked in me, 
 Treasure of hearthside tendernesses. 
 ' Tis I whom thou seekest ? — Nay, not thee. 
 
 I am a dream, afar, forbidden. 
 
 Vague as the mist on the mountain-brow, 
 
 A bodiless glory, haunting, hidden ; 
 
 I cannot love thee. — Oh, come ! come thou ! 
 
 Becquer himself was wont to ascribe the premature death 
 of poets, that breaking of the harp while yet the golden 
 chords have yielded but their least of melodies, to a restless 
 fulness of life, the imprisoned vapor that bursts the vessel. 
 This appears with pathetic emphasis in the Introduction that 
 he wrote, not long before his death, for a projected volume 
 of tales and fantasies. He felt that he must rid his fevered 
 brain of their importunity, but he had begun to give expres- 
 sion to only one. The Woman of Stone, when death broke 
 the magic pen. The story remains a fragment,* not passing 
 beyond its opening pages of rich artistic description, nor can 
 its course be clearly conjectured even though in The Kiss, 
 and in the closing passages of his Literary Letters to a 
 Woman,\i\s imagination hovers about the theme. He left, 
 like Hawthorne, many tantalizing titles that suggest the 
 greatness of our loss. That drama on " The Brothers of 
 Sorrow," that poem on the discovery of America, those 
 Andalusian novels on " The Last Minstrel," " To Live or Not 
 to Live," those Toledo legends on " The Foundress of Con- 
 
 * And therefore has not been Included in this volume. 
 
xxvi GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 vents," " El Crista de la Vega" " The Angel Musicians," 
 those fantasies on "Light and Snow," " The Diana of the 
 Indies," " The Life of the Dead," — these are but a few of 
 the conceptions that teemed in his mind but found no out- 
 let to the world. It seemed to his friends, who knew the 
 man and had listened to his marvellous talk, that the scanty- 
 handful of tales they could collect from newspapers here and 
 there made so inadequate a showing as almost to misrepre- 
 sent his powers. Yet however thwarted and wronged by 
 circumstance this harvest of his imagination may be, it 
 deserves attention if only for its finer and less obvious 
 qualities. Becquer charges himself with a melancholy tem- 
 perament, and seldom, in fact, do we find in these pages the 
 blither humor playing in The Set of Emeralds ; but the 
 occasional morbidness of his tone is due rather, it would 
 seem, to illness and its consequent despondency than to any 
 native quality of his thought. He deals too much in the 
 horrible for modern taste, but he cannot claim, like Baude- 
 laire, to have "invented a new shudder." Tales grounded 
 in folk-lore are bound to contain elements of superstitious 
 terror, and the affinity of these legends in that respect is 
 rather with German balladry and the earlier romanticism in 
 general than with the genius of Poe. Becquer's truer kin- 
 ship is with Hawthorne, whose outer faculty of close and 
 minute observation is his as well as the inner preoccupation 
 with mysteiy and symbol. All the senses of this young 
 Spaniard seem to have been of the finest, his exquisite hear- 
 ing entering into these tales as effectively as his keen sight ; 
 but he is most himself in presence of the dim, the fugitive, 
 the impalpable. His mind was essentially mystical. His 
 religion was not without its human side. In brooding on 
 the inequalities of the mortal lot, he finds comfort in the re- 
 flection : " God, though invisible, yet holds a hand outreached 
 to lift a little the burden that presses on the poor." But 
 
GUSTAVO ADOLFO BECQUER xxvii 
 
 faith in him was of the very fibre of imagination. He even 
 lent a certain sympathetic credence to the mediaeval legends 
 of the Church, at least when the spell of Toledo was upon 
 him. " Outside the place that guards their memory," he 
 says, " far from the precincts which still preserve their 
 traces, and where we seem yet to breathe the atmosphere of 
 the ages that gave them being, traditions lose their poetic 
 mystery, their inexplicable hold upon the soul. At a dis- 
 tance we question, we analyze, we doubt; but there faith, 
 like a secret revelation, illuminates the spirit, and we be- 
 lieve." In a letter from Veruela to a lady of his acquaint- 
 ance, a letter relating a brief but lovely legend* of an ap- 
 pearance of the Virgin, he asserts : " Only the hand of faith 
 can touch the delicate flowers of tradition." "God," he 
 elsewhere says, " is the glowing, eternal centre of all 
 beauty." 
 
 The writer of these tales described himself thus: " I have 
 a special predilection for all that which cannot be vulgarized 
 by the touch and the judgment of the indifferent multitude. 
 If I were to paint landscapes, I would paint them without 
 figures. I like the fleeting ideas that slip away without 
 leaving a trace on the understandings of practical folk, like 
 a drop of water over a marble shelf. In the cities I visit, I 
 seek the narrow, lonely streets ; in the edifices I examine, 
 the dusky nooks and corners of the inner courts, where 
 grass springs up, and moisture enriches with its patches of 
 greenish color the parched tint of the wall ; in the women 
 who impress me, the liint of mystery that I think I see shin- 
 ing with wavering light in the depths of their eyes, like the 
 glimmer of a lamp that burns unknown and unsuspected in 
 the sanctuary of their hearts ; even in the blossoms of a 
 shrub, I believe there is for me something more potent and 
 
 * Not included in this volume because it should not be taken from 
 its context. 
 
xxviii GUST A VO ADOLFO BECQUER 
 
 exciting in the one that hides beneath the leaves and there, 
 concealed, fills the air with fragrance, unprofaned by human 
 gaze. In all this I find a certain unsullied purity of feelings' 
 and of things.'* 
 
 Becquer goes on to admit that this " pronounced inclina- 
 tion sometimes degenerates into extravagances." 
 
I 
 
 FOREWORD 
 
 In dim corners of my mind there sleep, hidden away and 
 naked, the freakish children of my imagination, waiting in 
 silence for art to clothe them with language that it may 
 present them in decency upon the stage of the world. 
 
 My Muse, as fruitful as the marriage-bed of poverty, and 
 like those parents who bring to birth more children than they 
 have means to rear, is ever conceiving and bearing in the 
 mystic sanctuary of the intelligence, peopling it with innu- 
 merable creations, to which not my utmost effort nor all the 
 years that are left to me of life, will be sufficient to give 
 form. 
 
 And here within me I sometimes feel them, all unclad and 
 shapeless as they are, huddled and twisted together in con- 
 fusion indescribable, stirring and living with a dim, strange 
 life, similar to that of those myriad germs which seethe and 
 quiver in eternal generation within the secret places of the 
 earth, without winning strength enough to reach the surface 
 and transform themselves, at the kiss of the sun, into flowers 
 and fruits. 
 
 They go with me, destined to die with me, leaving no more 
 trace than is left by a midnight dream which the morning 
 cannot recall. On certain occasions and in face of this 
 terrible idea, there rises in them the instinct of life, and 
 trooping in formidable though silent multitudes they seek 
 tumultuously a way of escape from amid the shadows of 
 their dwelling-place forth to the light. But alas ! between 
 the world of idea and the world of form yawns an abyss 
 which only the word can bridge, and the word, timid and 
 
 I 
 
2 FOREWORD 
 
 slothful, refuses to aid their efforts. Mute, dim and power- 
 less, after the unavailing struggle they fall back into their 
 old passivity. So fall, inert, into the hollows by the wayside, 
 when the wind ceases, the yellow leaves which the autumn 
 storm blew up. 
 
 These seditions on the part of the rebel sons of my ima- 
 gination explain some of my attacks of fever ; they are the 
 cause, unrecognized by science, of my excitements and de- 
 pressions. And thus, although in ill estate, have I lived 
 till now, walking among the indifferent throngs of men with 
 this silent tempest in my head. Thus have I lived till now, 
 but all things reach an end, and to these must be put their 
 period. 
 
 Sleeplessness and fantasy go on begetting and producing 
 with monstrous fecundity. Their creations, crowded already 
 like the feeble plants of a conservatory, strive one with an- 
 other for the expanding of their unreal existences, fighting 
 for the drops of memory as for the scanty moisture of a 
 sterile land. It is needful to open a channel for the deep 
 waters, which, daily fed from a living spring, will at last break 
 down the dike. 
 
 Go forth, then ! Go forth and live with the only life I can 
 give you. My intellect shall supply you with nutriment 
 enough to make you palpable; I will clothe you, though in 
 rags, so that you need not blush for nakedness. I would 
 like to fashion for each one of you a marvellous stuff woven 
 of exquisite phrases, in which you could fold yourselves with 
 pride, as in mantles of purple. I would like to engrave the 
 form that must contain you as the golden vase which holds 
 a precious ointment is engraved. But this may not be. 
 
 And yet, I need to rest. I need, just as the body through 
 whose swollen veins the life-blood surges with phlethoric 
 force, is bled, to clear my brain, inadequate to the lodging of 
 so many grotesqueries. 
 
FOREWORD 3 
 
 Then gather here, like the misty trail that marks the 
 passing of an unknown comet, like atoms dispersed in an 
 embryonic world which Death fans through the air, until the 
 Creator shall have spoken the fiat hex that divides light 
 from darkness. 
 
 I would not that in my sleepless nights you still should 
 pass before my eyes in weird procession, begging me with 
 gestures and contortions to draw you out from the limbo in 
 which you lead these phantom, thin existences into the life 
 of reality. I would not that at the breaking of this harp 
 already old and cracked the unknown notes which it con- 
 tained should perish with the instrument. I would interest 
 myself a little in the world which lies without me, free at 
 last to withdraw my eyes from this other world that I carry 
 within my head. Common sense, which is the barrier of 
 dreamland, is beginning to give way, and the people of the 
 different camps mingle and grow confused. It costs me an 
 effort to know which things I have dreamed and which have 
 actually happened. My affections are divided between real 
 persons and phantasms of the imagination. My memory 
 shifts from one category to the other the names of women 
 who have died and the dates of days that have passed, with 
 days and women that have existed only in my mind. I must 
 put an end to this by flinging you all forth from my brain 
 once and forever. 
 
 If to die is to sleep, I would sleep in peace in the night of 
 death, without your coming to be my nightmare, cursing me 
 for having doomed you to nothingness before you had been 
 born. Go, then, to the world at whose touch you came into 
 being, and linger there, as the echo which life's joys and 
 griefs, hopes and struggles, found in one soul that passed 
 across the earth. 
 
 Perchance very soon must I pack my portmanteau for the 
 great journey. At any moment the spirit may free herself 
 
4 FOREWORD 
 
 from the material that she may rise to purer air. I would 
 not, when this moment comes, take with me, as the trivial 
 baggage of a mountebank, the treasure of tinsel and tatters 
 that my Fancy has been heaping up in the rubbish chambers 
 of the brain. 
 
ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 
 
 In Seville, in the very portico of Santa Ines, and while, 
 on Christmas Eve, I was waiting for the Midnight Mass 
 to begin, I heard this tradition from a lay-sister of the 
 convent. 
 
 As was natural, after hearing it, I waited impatiently 
 for the ceremony to commence, eager to be present at a 
 miracle. 
 
 Nothing could be less miraculous, however, than the organ 
 of Santa Ines, and nothing more vulgar than the insipid 
 motets with which that night the organist regaled us. 
 
 On going out from the mass, I could not resist asking the 
 lay-sister mischievously : 
 
 " How does it happen that the organ of Master Perez is 
 so unmusical at present ? " ^ 
 
 " Why ! " replied the old woman. " Because it isn't his." 
 
 " Not his ? What has become of it ? " 
 
 " It fell to pieces from sheer old age, a number of years 
 ago." 
 
 " And the soul of the organist ? " 
 
 " It has not appeared again since the new organ was set 
 up in place of his own." 
 
 If anyone of my readers, after perusing this history, should 
 be moved to ask the same question, now he knows why the 
 notable miracle has not continued into our own time. 
 
ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " Do you see that man with the scarlet cloak and the 
 white plume in his hat, — the one who seems to wear on his 
 waistcoat all the gold of the galleons of the Indies, — that 
 man, I mean, just stepping down from his litter to give his 
 hand to the lady there, who, now that she is out of hers, 
 is coming our way, preceded by four pages with torches ? 
 Well, that is the Marquis of Moscoso, suitor to the widowed 
 Countess of Villapineda. They say that before setting his 
 eyes upon this lady, he had asked in marriage the daughter 
 of a man of large fortune, but the girl's father, of whom the 
 rumor goes that he is a bit of a miser, — but hush 1 Speaking 
 of the devil — do you see that man coming on foot under the 
 arch of San Felipe, all muffled up in a dark cloak and at- 
 tended by a single servant carrying a lantern ? Now he is 
 in front of the outer shrine. 
 
 *' Do you notice, as his cloak falls back while he salutes 
 the image, the embroidered cross that sparkles on his 
 breast ? 
 
 " If it were not for this noble decoration, one would take 
 him for a shop-keeper from Culebras street. Well, that is 
 the father in question. See how the people make way for 
 him and lift their hats. 
 
 " Everybody in Seville knows him on account of his im- 
 mense fortune. That one man has more golden ducats in 
 his chests than our lord King Philip maintains soldiers, and 
 with his ^merchantmen he could form a squadron equal to 
 that of the Grand Turk 
 
 " Look, look at that group of stately cavaliers ! Those 
 are the four and twenty knights. Aha, aha 1 There goes 
 that precious Fleming, too, whom, they say, the gentlemen 
 of the green cross have not challenged for heresy yet, thanks 
 to his influence with the magnates of Madrid. All he comes 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 7 
 
 to church for is to hear the music. But if Master Perez does 
 not draw from him with his organ tears as big as fists, then 
 sure it is that his soul isn't under his doublet, but sizzles in 
 the Devil's frying-pan. Alack, neighbor ! Trouble, trouble ! 
 I fear there is going to be a fight. I shall take refuge in 
 the church ; for, from what I see, there will be hereabouts 
 more blows than Pater Nosters. Look, look ! The Duke of 
 Alcala's people are coming round the corner of San Pedro's 
 square, and I think I spy the Duke of Medinasidonia's men 
 in Duenas alley. Didn't I tell you? 
 
 " Now they have caught sight of each other, now the two 
 parties stop short, without breaking their order, the groups 
 of bystanders dissolve, the police, who on these occasions 
 get pounded by both sides, slip away ,\ even the prefect, staff 
 of office and all, seeks the shelter of the portico, — and yet 
 they say that there is law to be had. 
 
 " For the poor 
 
 " There, there 1 already shields are shining through the 
 dark. Our Lord Jesus of All Power deliver us ! Now 
 the blows are beginning. Neighbor, neighbor ! this way 
 — before they close the doors. But hush ! What is this ? 
 Hardly have they begun when they leave off. What light is 
 that ? Blazing torches 1 A litter ! It's His Reverence the 
 Bishop. 
 
 " The most holy Virgin of Protection, on whom this very 
 instant I was calling in my heart, brings him to my aid. 
 Ah 1 But nobody knows what I owe to that Blessed Lady, — 
 how richly she pays me back for the little candles that I 
 burn to her every Saturday. — See him 1 How beautiful he 
 is with his purple vestments and his red cardinal's cap 1 
 God preserve him in his sacred chair as many centuries as 
 I wish to live myself ! If it were not for him, half Seville 
 would have been burned up by this time with these quarrels 
 of the dukes. See them, see them, the great hypocrites, how 
 
8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 they both press close to the litter of the prelate to kiss his 
 ring ! How they drop behind and, mingling with his house- 
 hold attendants, follow in his train I Who would dream that 
 those two who appear on such good terms, if within the half 
 hour they should meet in a dark street — that is, the dukes 
 themselves — God deliver me from thinking them cowards ; 
 good proof have they given of valor, warring more than once 
 against the enemies of Our Lord ; but the truth remains, that 
 if they should seek each other — and seek with the wish to 
 find — they'would find each other, putting end once for all 
 to these continuous scuffles, in which those who really do 
 the fighting are their kinsmen, their friends and their 
 servants. 
 
 " But come, neighbor, come into the church, before it is 
 packed full. Some nights like this it is so crowded that there 
 is not room left for a grain of wheat. The nuns have a prize 
 in their organist. When has the convent ever been in such 
 high favor as now ? I can tell you that the other sisterhoods 
 have made Master Perez magnificent offers, but there is 
 nothing strange about that, for the Lord Archbishop himself 
 has offered him mountains of gold to entice him to the cathe- 
 dral, — but he, not a bit of it ! He would sooner give up his 
 life than his beloved organ. You don't know Master Pe'rez ? 
 True enough, you are a newcomer in this neighborhood. 
 Well, he is a saint; poor, but the most charitable man alive. 
 With no other relative than his daughter and no other friend 
 than his organ, he devotes all his life to watching over the 
 innocence of the one and patching up the registers of the 
 other. Mind that the organ is old. But that counts for 
 nothing, he is so handy in mending it and caring for it that 
 its sound is a marvel. For he knows it so perfectly that 
 only by touch, — for I am not sure that I have told you the 
 4)Oor gentleman is blind_ from his birth. And how patiently 
 he bears his misfortune 1 When people ask him how much 
 
/ MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 9 
 
 he would give to see, he replies : ' Much, but not as much as 
 you think, for I have hopes.* ' Hopes of seeing ? * * Yes, 
 and very soon,' he adds, smiling like an angel. 'Already I 
 number seventy-six years ; however long my life may be, soon 
 I shall see God.' 
 
 " Poor dear 1 And he will see Him, for he is humble as 
 the stones of the street, which let all the world trample on 
 them. He always says that he is only a poor convent or- 
 ganist, when the fact is he could give lessons in harmony to 
 the very chapel master of the Cathedral, for he was, as it 
 
 ^^were, born to the art. His father held the same position 
 before him ; I did not know the father, but my mother — God 
 rest her soul ! — says that he always had the boy at the organ 
 with him to blow the bellows. Then the lad developed such 
 talent that, as was natural, he succeeded to the position on 
 
 V the death of his father. And what a touch is in his hands, 
 God bless them ! They deserve to be taken to Chicarreros 
 street and there enchased in gold. He always plays well, 
 always, but on a night like this he is a wonder. He has the 
 greatest devotion for this ceremony of the Midnight Mass, 
 and when the Host is elevated, precisely at twelve o'clock, 
 which is the moment Our Lord Jesus Christ came into the 
 world, the tones of his organ are the voices of angels. 
 
 " But, after all, why should I praise to you what you will 
 hear to-night ? It is enough to see that all the most distin- 
 guished people of Seville, even the Lord Archbishop himself, 
 come to a humble convent to listen to him ; and don't sup- 
 pose that it is only the learned people and those who are 
 versed in music that appreciate his genius, but the very 
 rabble of the streets. All these groups that you see arriving 
 with pine-torches ablaze, chorusing popular songs, broken by 
 rude outcries, to the accompaniment of timbrels, tambourines 
 and rustic drums, these, contrary to their custom, which is to 
 make disturbance in the churches, are still as the dead when 
 
lo ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Master Perez lays his hands upon the organ, and when the 
 Host is elevated, you can't hear a fly ; great tears roll down 
 from the eyes of all, and at the end is heard a sound like an 
 immense sigh, which is nothing else than the expulsion of 
 the breath of the multitude, held in while the music lasts. 
 But come, come ! The bells have stopped ringing, and the 
 mass is going to begin. Come inside. 
 
 " This night is Christmas Eve for all the world, but for 
 nobody more than for us." 
 
 So saying, the good woman who had been acting as cicerone 
 for her neighbor pressed through the portico of the Convent 
 of Santa Ines, and by dint of elbowing and pushing succeeded 
 in getting inside the church, disappearing amid the multitude 
 which thronged the inner spaces near the doors. 
 
 II. 
 
 The church was illuminated with astonishing brilliancy. 
 The flood of light which spread from the altars through all 
 its compass sparkled on the rich jewels of the ladies who, 
 kneeling on the velvet cushions placed before them by their 
 pages and taking their prayer-books from the hands of their 
 duennas, formed a brilliant circle around the choir-screen. 
 Grouped just behind them, on foot, wrapped in bright-lined 
 cloaks garnished with gold-lace, with studied carelessness 
 letting glimpses of their red and green crosses be seen, in 
 one hand the hat, whose plumes kissed the carpet, the other 
 hand resting upon the polished hilt of a rapier or caressing 
 the handle of an ornate dagger, the four and twenty knights, 
 with a large proportion of the highest nobility of Seville, 
 seemed to form a wall for the purpose of protecting their 
 daughters and their wives from contact with the populace. 
 This, swaying back and forth at the rear of the nave, with a 
 murmur like that of a surging sea, broke out into a joyous 
 acclaim, accompanied by the discordant sounds of the 
 
OF 
 
 MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 1 1 
 
 timbrels and tambourines, at the appearance of the arch- 
 bishop, who, after seating himself, surrounded by his at- 
 tendants, near the High Altar under a scarlet canopy, thrice 
 blessed the assembled people. 
 
 It was time for the mass to begin. 
 
 There passed, nevertheless, several minutes without the 
 appearance of the celebrant. The throng commenced to stir 
 about impatiently ; the knights exchanged low-toned words 
 with one another, and the archbishop sent one of his at- 
 tendants to the sacristy to inquire the cause of the delay. 
 
 " Master Perez has been taken ill, vefy ill, and it will be 
 impossible for him to come to the Midnight Mass." 
 
 This was the word brought back by the attendant. 
 
 The news spread instantly through the multitude. It 
 would be impossible to depict the dismay which it caused ; 
 suffice it to say that such a clamor began to arise in the 
 church that the prefect sprang to his feet, and the police 
 came in to enforce silence, mingling with the close-pressed, 
 surging crowd. 
 
 At that moment, a man with unpleasant features, thin, bony, 
 and cross-eyed, too, hurriedly made his way to the place where 
 the prelate was sitting. 
 
 " Master Perez is sick," he said. " The ceremony cannot 
 begin. If it is your pleasure, I will play the organ in his 
 absence ; for neither is Master Perez the first organist of the 
 world, nor at his death need this instrument be left unused 
 for lack of skill." 
 
 The archbishop gave a nod of assent, and already some of 
 the faithful, who recognized in that strange personage an 
 envious rival of the organist of Santa Ines, were breaking 
 out in exclamations of displeasure, when suddenly a startling 
 uproar was heard in the portico. 
 
 " Master Perez is here ! Master P^rez is here 1 '* 
 
12 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 At these cries from the press in the doorway, every one 
 looked around. 
 
 Master Perez, his face pallid and drawn, was in fact en-' 
 tering the church, brought in a chair about which all were 
 contending for the honor of carrying it upon their shoulders. 
 
 The commands of the physicians, the tears of his daughter 
 had not been able to keep him in bed. 
 
 " No," he had said. " This is the end, I know it, I know 
 it, and I would not die without visiting my organ, and this 
 night above all, Christmas Eve. Come, I wish it, I command 
 it ; let us go to the church." 
 
 His desire had been fulfilled. The people carried him in 
 their arms to the organ-loft, and the mass began. 
 
 At that instant the cathedral clock struck twelve. 
 
 The introit passed, and the Gospel, and the offertory, and 
 then came the solemn moment in which the priest, after hav- 
 ing blessed the Sacred Wafer, took it in the tips of his fingers 
 and began to elevate it. 
 
 A cloud of incense, rolling forth in azure waves, filled the 
 length and breadth of the church ; the little bells rang out 
 with silvery vibrations, and Master Perez placed his quiver- 
 ing hands upon the keys of the organ. 
 
 The hundred voices of its metal tubes resounded in a pro- 
 longed, majestic chord, which died away little by little, as if 
 a gentle breeze had stolen its last echoes. 
 
 To this opening chord, that seemed a voice lifted from 
 earth to heaven, responded a sweet and distant note, which 
 went on swelling and swelling in volume until it became a 
 torrent of pealing harmony. 
 
 It was the song of the angels, which, traversing the ethe- 
 real spaces, had reached the world. 
 
 Then there began to be heard a sound as of far-off hymns 
 entoned by the hierarchies of seraphim, a thousand hymns at 
 once, melting into one, which, nevertheless, was no more 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST I- 
 
 fthan accompaniment to a strange melody, — a melody that 
 seemed to float above that ocean of mysterious echoes as a 
 strip of fog above the billows of the sea. 
 
 One anthem after another died away ; the movement grew 
 simpler ; now there were but two voices, whose echoes 
 blended ; then one alone remained, sustaining a note as 
 brilliant as a thread of light. The priest bowed his face, 
 and above his gray head, across an azure mist made by the 
 smoke of the incense, appeared to the eyes of the faithful 
 the uplifted Host. At that instant the thrilling note which 
 Master Perez was holding began to swell and swell until an 
 outburst of colossal harmony shook the church, in whose 
 corners the straitened air vibrated and whose stained glass 
 shivered in its narrow Moorish embrasures. 
 
 From each of the notes forming that magnificent chord a 
 theme was developed, — some near, some far, these keen, 
 those muffled, until one would have said that the waters and 
 the birds, the winds and the woods, men and angels, earth 
 and heaven, were chanting, each in its own tongue, an anthem 
 of praise for the Redeemer's birth. 
 
 The multitude listened in amazement and suspense. In 
 all eyes were tears, in all spirits a profound realization of 
 the divine. 
 
 The officiating priest felt his hands trembling, for the Holy 
 One whom they upheld, the Holy One to whom men and 
 archangels did reverence, was God, was very God, and it 
 seemed to the priest that he had beheld the heavens open 
 and the Host become transfigured. 
 
 The organ still sounded, but its music was gradually sink- 
 ing away, like a tone dropping from echo to echo, ever more 
 remote, ever fainter with the remoteness, when suddenly a cry 
 rang out in the organ-loft, shrill, piercing, the cry of a woman. 
 
 The organ gave forth a strange, discordant sound, like a 
 sob, and then was still. 
 
14 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 The multitude surged toward the stair leading up to the 
 organ-loft, in whose direction all the faithful, startled out of 
 their religious ecstasy, were turning anxious looks. 
 
 " What has happened ? " " What is the matter ? " they 
 asked one of another, and none knew what to reply, and all 
 strove to conjecture, and the confusion increased, and the 
 excitement began to rise to a height which threatened to dis- 
 turb the order and decorum fitting within a church. 
 
 " What was it ? " asked the great ladies of the prefect who, 
 attended by his officers, had been one of the first to mount 
 to the loft, and now, pale and showing signs of deep grief, 
 was making his way to the archbishop, waiting in anxiety, 
 like all the rest, to know the cause of that disturbance. ' 
 
 " What has occurred ? " 
 
 "Master Perez has just died." 
 
 In fact, when the foremost of the faithful, after pressing 
 up the stairway, had reached the organ-loft, they saw the 
 poor organist fallen face down upon the keys of his old 
 instrument, which was still faintly murmuring, while his 
 daughter, kneeling at his feet, was vainly calling to him amid 
 sighs and sobs. 
 
 III. 
 
 " Good evening, my dear Dona Baltasara. Are you, too, 
 going to-night to the Christmas Eve Mass ? For my part, I 
 was intending to go to the parish church to hear it, but after 
 what has happened — '-' where goes John ? With all the town.' 
 And the truth, if I must tell it, is that since Master Petez 
 died, a marble slab seems to fall on my heart whenever I enter 
 Santa In^s. — Poor dear man ! He was a saint. I assure 
 you that I keep a piece of his doublet as a relic, and he de- 
 serves it, for by God and my soul it is certain that if our 
 Lord Archbishop would stir in the matter, our grandchildren 
 would see the image of Master Perez upon an altar. But 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 
 
 15 
 
 what hope of it ? * The dead and the gone are let alone.* 
 We're all for the latest thing now-a-days ; you understand 
 me. No ? You haven't an inkling of what has happened ? 
 It's true we are alike in this, — from house to church, and 
 from church to house, without concerning ourselves about 
 what is said or isn't said — except that I, as it were, on the 
 wing, a word here, another there, without the least curiosity 
 whatever, usually run across any news that may be going. 
 Well, then ! It seems to be settled that the organist of San 
 Roman, that squint-eye, who is always throwing out slurs 
 against the other organists, that great sloven, who looks 
 more like a butcher from the slaughter-house than a pro- 
 fessor of music, is going to play this Christmas Eve in place 
 of Master Perez. Now you must know, for all the world 
 knows and it is a public matter in Seville, that nobody was 
 willing to attempt it. Not even his daughter, though she is 
 herself an expert, and after her father's death entered the 
 convent as a novice. And naturally enough ; accustomed to 
 hear those marvellous performances, any other playing what- 
 ever must seem poor to us, however much we would like to 
 avoid comparisons. But no sooner had the sisterhood de- 
 cided that, in honor of the dead and as a token of respect to 
 his memory, the organ should be silent to-night, than — look 
 you ! — here comes along our modest friend, saying that he 
 is ready to play it. Nothing is bolder than ignorance. It is 
 true the fault is not so much his as theirs who have con- 
 sented to this profanation, but so goes the world. I 
 say, it's no trifle — this crowd that is coming. One would 
 think nothing had changed since last year. The same great 
 people, the same magnificence, the same pushing in the 
 doorway, the same excitement in the portico, the same throng 
 in the church. Ah, if the dead should rise, he would die 
 again rather than hear his organ played by hands like those. 
 The fact is, if what the people of the neighborhood have 
 
1 6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 told me is true, they are preparing a fine reception for the 
 intruder. When the moment comes for placing the hand 
 upon the keys, there is going to break out such a racket of 
 timbrels, tambourines and rustic drums that nothing else can 
 be heard. But hush ! there's the hero of the occation just 
 going into the church. Jesus ! what a showy jacket, what a 
 fluted ruff, what a high and mighty air ! Come, come, the 
 archbishop ai^rived a minute ago, and the mass is going to 
 begin. Come ; it looks as though this night would give us 
 something to talk about for many a day." 
 
 With these words the worthy woman, whom our readers 
 recognize by her dis^connected loquacity, entered Santa In^s, 
 opening a way through the press, as usual, by dint of shoving 
 and elbowing. 
 
 Already the ceremony had begun. 
 
 The church was as brilliant as the year before. 
 
 The new organist, after passing through the midst of the 
 faithful who thronged the nave, on his way to kiss the ring 
 of the prelate, had mounted to the organ-loft, where he was 
 trying one stop of the organ after another with a solicitous 
 gravity as affected as it was ridiculous. 
 
 Among the common people clustered at the rear of the 
 church , was heard a murmur, muffled an.d confused, sure 
 augury of the coming storm which would not be long in 
 breaking. 
 
 " He's a clown, who doesn't know how to do anything, not 
 even to look straight," said some. 
 
 " He's an ignoramus, who after having made the organ in 
 his own parish church worse than a rattle comes here to pro- 
 fane Master Perez's," said others. 
 
 And while one was throwing off his coat so as to beat his 
 drum to better advantage; and another was trying his timbrels, 
 and the clatter was increasing more and more, only here and 
 there could one be found to defend in lukewarm fashion that 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 17 
 
 alien personage, whose pompous and pedantic bearing formed 
 so strong a contrast to the modest manner and kindly courtesy 
 of the dead Master Pe'rez, 
 
 At last the looked-for moment came, the solemn moment 
 when the priest, after bowing low and murmuring the sacred 
 words, took the Host in his hands. The little bells rang out, 
 their chime like a rain of crystal notes ; the translucent waves 
 of incense rose, and the organ sounded. 
 
 At that instant a horrible din filled the compass of the 
 church, drowning the first chord. 
 
 Bagpipes, horns, timbrels, drums, all the instruments of 
 the populace raised their discordant voices at once, but 
 the confusion and the clang lasted but a few seconds. 
 All at once as the tumult had begun, so all at once it 
 ceased. 
 
 The second chord, full, bold, magnificent, sustained itself, 
 still pouring from the organ's metal tubes like a cascade of 
 inexhaustible, sonorous harmony. 
 
 Celestial 'songs like those that caress the ear in moments 
 of ecstasy, songs which the spirit perceives but the lip can- 
 not repeat ; fugitive notes of a far-off melody, which reach 
 us at intervals, sounding in the bugles of the wind ; the rustle 
 of leaves kissing one another on the trees with a murmur like 
 rain ; trills of larks which rise warbling from among the 
 flowers like a flight of arrows to the clouds ; nameless crashes, 
 overwhelming as the thunders of a tempest ; a chorus of 
 seraphim without rhythm or cadence, unknown harmony of 
 heaven which only the imagination understands ; soaring 
 hymns, that seem to mount to the throne of God like a foun- 
 tain of light and sound — all this was expressed by the organ's 
 hundred voices, with more vigor, more mystic poetry, more 
 weird coloring than had ever been known before. 
 
 When the organist came down from the loft, the crowd 
 
1 8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 which pressed up to the stairway was so great, and their 
 eagerness to see and praise him so intense, that the prefect, 
 fearing, and not witliout reason, that he would be suffo- 
 cated among them all, commanded some of the police to 
 open, by their staves, a path for him that he might reach the 
 High Altar where the prelate waited his arriVal. 
 
 " You perceive," said the archbishop, when the musician 
 was brought into his presence, " that I have come all the way 
 from my palace hither only to hear you. Will you be as cruel 
 as Master Pe'rez, who would never save me the journey by 
 playing the Midnight Mass in the cathedral ? " 
 
 " Next year," responded the organist, " I promise to give 
 you ''that pleasure, for not all the goTd of the earth would in- 
 duce me to play this organ again." 
 
 " And why not ? " interrupted the prelate. 
 
 " Because," replied the organist, striving to repress the 
 agitation revealed in the pallor of his face, — " because it is 
 old and poor, and one cannot express on it all that one 
 would." 
 
 The archbishop retired, followed by his attendants. One 
 by one, the litters of the great folk went filing away, lost to 
 sight in the windings of the neighboring streets ; the groups 
 of the portico melted, as the faithful dispersed in different 
 directions; and already the lay-sister who acted as gate- 
 keeper was about to lock the vestibule doors, when there 
 appeared two women, who, after crossing themselves and 
 muttering a prayer before the arched shrine of Saint Philip, 
 went their way, turning into Duenas alley. 
 
 " What would you have, my dear Dona Baltasara ? " one 
 of them was saying. " That's the way I'm made. Every 
 fool has his fancy. The barefooted Capuchins might assure 
 me that it was so and I wouldn't believe it in the least. 
 That man cannot have played what we have just been hear- 
 ing. A thousand times have I heard him in San Bartolom^, 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST ig 
 
 his parish church, from which the priest had to send him 
 away for his bad playing, — enough to make you stop your 
 ears with cotton. Besides, all you need is to look at his face, 
 which, they say, is the mirror of the soul. I remember, poor 
 dear man, as if I were seeing him now, — I remember Master 
 Perez's look when, on a night like this, he would come down 
 from the organ loft, after having entranced the audience with 
 his marvels. What a gracious smile, what a happy glow on 
 his face 1 Old as he was, he seemed like an angel. But this 
 fellow came plunging down the stairs as if a dog were bark- 
 ing at him on the landing, his face the color of the dead, and 
 — come now, my dear Dona Baltasara, believe me, believe 
 me with all your soul. I suspect a mystery in this." 
 
 With these last words, the two women turned the corner 
 of the street and disappeared. 
 
 We count it needless to inform our readers who one of 
 them was. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Another year had gone by. The abbess of the convent 
 of Santa Ines and the daughter of Master Perez, half hidden 
 in the shadows of the church choir, were talking in low tones. 
 The peremptory voice of the bell was calling from its tower 
 to the faithful, and occasionally an individual would cross 
 the portico, silent and deserted now, and after taking the 
 holy water at the door, would choose a place in a corner of 
 the nave, where a few residents of the neighborhood were 
 quietly waiting for the Midnight Mass to begin. 
 
 " There, you see," the mother superior was saying, " your 
 fear is excessively childish. There is nobody in the church. 
 All Seville is trooping to the cathedral to-night. Play the 
 organ and play it without the least uneasiness. We are only 
 the sisterhood here. Well ? Still you are silent, still your 
 breaths are like sighs. What is it ? What is the matter ? " 
 
20 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " I am — afraid," exclaimed the girl, in a tone of the deep- 
 est agitation. 
 
 "Afraid? Of what ? " 
 
 " I don't know — of something supernatural. Last night, 
 see, I had heard you say that you earnestly wished me to 
 play the organ for the mass and, pleased with this honor, I 
 thought I would look to the stops and tune it, so as to give 
 you a surprise to-day. I went into the choir — alone — I 
 opened the door which leads to the organ-loft. At that 
 moment the clock of the cathedral struck the hour — what 
 hour, I do not know. The peals were exceedingly mournful, 
 and many — many. They kept on sounding all the time that 
 I stood as if nailed to the threshold, and that time seemed 
 to me a century. 
 
 " The church was empty and dark. Far away, in the 
 hollow depth, there gleamed, like a single star lost in the sky 
 of night, a feeble light, the light of the lamp which burns on 
 the High Altar. By its faint rays, which only served to make 
 more visible all the deep horror of the darkness, I saw — I 
 saw — mother, do not disbelieve it — I saw a man who, in 
 silence and with his back turned toward the place where I 
 stood, was running over the organ-keys with one hand, while 
 he tried the stops with the other. And the organ sounded, 
 but it sounded in a manner indescribable. It seemed as if 
 each of its notes were a sob smothered within the metal tube 
 which vibrated with its burden of compressed air, and gave 
 forth a muffled tone, almost inaudible, yet exact and true. 
 
 " And the cathedral clock kept on striking, and that man 
 kept on running over the keys. I heard his very breathing. 
 
 " The horror of it had frozen the blood in my veins. In 
 my body I felt an icy chill and in my temples fire.,. Then I 
 longed to cry out, but could not. That man had turned his 
 face and looked at me, — no, not looked at me, for he was 
 blind. It was my father." 
 
MASTER PEREZ THE ORGANIST 21 
 
 " Bah, sister I Put away these fancies with which the 
 wicked enemy tries to trouble weak imaginations. Pray a 
 Pater Nosier and an Ave Maria to the archangel Saint 
 Michael, captain of the celestial hosts, that he may aid you 
 to resist the evil spirits. Wear on your neck a scapulary 
 which has been touched to the relics of Saint Pacomio, our 
 advocate against temptations, and go, go in power to the 
 organ-loft. The mass is about to begin, and the faithful are 
 growing impatient. Your father is in heaven, and thence, 
 instead of giving you a fright, he will descend to inspire his 
 daughter in this solemn service which he so especially 
 loved." 
 
 The prioress went to occupy her seat in the choir in the 
 centre of the sisterhood. The daughter of IMaster Perez 
 opened the door of the loft with trembling hand, sat down at 
 the organ, and the mass began. 
 
 The mass began, and continued without any unusual oc- 
 currence until the consecration. Then the organ sounded, 
 and at the same time came a scream from the daughter of 
 Master Perez. 
 
 The mother superior, the nuns, and some of the faithful 
 rushed up to the organ-loft. 
 
 '* Look at him ! look at him ! " cried the girl, fixing her 
 eyes, starting from their sockets, upon the organ-bench, from 
 which she had risen in terror, clinging with convulsed hands 
 to the railing of the organ-loft. 
 
 All eyes were fixed upon the spot to which her gaze was 
 turned. No one was at the organ, yet it went on sounding 
 — sounding as the archangels sing in their raptures of mystic 
 ecstasy. 
 
 " Didn't I tell you so a thousand times, my dear Dona 
 Baltasara — didn't I tell you so? There is a mystery here. 
 What ? You were not at the Christmas Eve Mass last night ? 
 
22 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 But, for all that, yoii must know what happened. Nothing 
 else is talked about in all Seville. The archbishop is furious, 
 and with good reason. To have missed going to Santa In^s 
 — to have missed being present at the miracle ! And for 
 what ? To hear a charivari, a rattle-go-bang, for people who 
 heard it tell me that what the inspired organist of San Bar- 
 tolome did in the cathedral was just that. I told you so. 
 The squint-eye could never have played that divine music of 
 last year, never. There is mystery about all this, a mystery 
 that is, in truth, the soul of Master Perez." 
 
THE EMERALD EYES 
 
 For a long time I have desired to write something with 
 this title. Now that the opportunity has come, I have in- 
 scribed it in capital letters at the top of the page and have 
 let my pen run at will. 
 
 I believe that I have seen eyes like those I have painted in 
 this legend. It may have been in my dreams, but I have 
 seen them. Too true it is that I shall not be able to de- 
 scribe them as they were, luminous, transparent as drops of 
 rain slipping over the leaves of the trees after a summer 
 sh^H. At all events, I count upon the imagination of my 
 re^^K to understand me in what we might call a sketch for 
 a picture which I will paint some day. 
 
 I. 
 
 " The stag is wounded — he is wounded ; no doubt of it. 
 There are traces of his yood on the mountain shrubs, and 
 in trying to leap one of those mastic trees his legs failed 
 him. Our young lord begins where others end. In my forty 
 years as huntsman I have not seen a better shot. But by 
 Saint Saturio, patron of Soria, cut him off at these hollies, 
 urge on the dogs, blow the horns till your lungs are empty, 
 and bury your spurs in the flanks of the horses. Do you not 
 see that he is going toward the fountain of the Poplars, and 
 if he lives to reach it we must give him up for lost ? " 
 
 The glens of the Moncayo flung from echo to echo the 
 braying of the horns and barking of the unleashed pack of 
 hounds ; the shouts of the pages resounded with new vigor, 
 while the confused throng of men, dogs and horses rushed . 
 
 23 
 
24 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 toward the point which Inigo, the head huntsman of the 
 Marquises of Almenar, indicated as the one most favorable 
 for intercepting the quarry. 
 
 But all was of no avail. When the fleetest of the grey- 
 hounds reached the hollies, panting, its jaws covered with 
 foam, already the deer, swift as an arrow, had cleared them 
 at a single bound, disappearing among the thickets of a 
 narrow path which led to the fountain. 
 
 " Draw rein 1 draw rein, every man 1 " then cried Ifiigo. 
 " It was the will of God that he should escape." 
 
 And the troop halted, the horns fell silent and the hounds, 
 at the call of the hunters, abandoned, snarling, the trail. 
 
 At that moment, the lord of the festival, Fernando ,de 
 Argensola, the heir of Almenar, came up with the company. 
 
 " What are you doing ? " he exclaimed, addressing his 
 huntsman, astonishment depicted on his features, anger 
 burning in his eyes. " What are you doing, idiot ? Do you 
 see that the creature is wounded, that it is the first to fall by 
 my hand, and yet you abandon the pursuit and let it give 
 you the slip to die in the depths of the forest ? Do you think 
 perchance that I have come to kill deer for the banquets of 
 wolves ? " 
 
 " Senory^ murmured Inigo between his teeth, " it is impos- 
 sible to pass this point." 
 
 " Impossible 1 And why ? '* 
 
 " Because this path," continued the huntsman, *' leads to 
 the fountain of the Poplars, the fountain of the Poplars in 
 whose waters dwells an evil spirit. He who dares trouble its 
 flow pays dear for his rashness. Already the deer will have 
 reached its borders ; how will you take it without drav/ing 
 on your head some fearful calamity ? We hunters are kings 
 of the Moncayo, but kings that pay a tribute. A quarry 
 which takes refuge at this mysterious fountain is a quarry 
 lost." 
 
 ^JS 
 
 ^^^;^ 
 
THE EMERALD EYES 25 
 
 "Lost ! Sooner will I lose the seigniory of my fathers, 
 sooner will I lose my soul into the hands of Satan than per- 
 mit this stag to escape me, the only one my spear has 
 wounded, the first fruits of my hunting. Do you see him ? 
 Do you see him ? He can still at intervals be made out 
 from here. His legs falter, his speed slackens ; let me go, 
 let me go 1 Drop this bridle or I roll you in the dust ! 
 Who knows if I will not run him down before he reaches the 
 fountain ? And if he should reach it, to the devil with it, its 
 untroubled waters and its inhabitants ! On, Lightning ! On, 
 my steed ! If you overtake him, I will have the diamonds 
 of my coronet set in a headstall all of gold for you.'* 
 
 Horse and rider departed like a hurricane. 
 
 Inigo followed them with his eyes till they disappeared in 
 the brush. Then he looked about him : all like himself re- 
 mained motionless, in consternation. 
 
 The huntsman exclaimed at last : 
 
 " Senores, you are my witnesses. 1 exposed myself to 
 death under his horse's hoofs to hold him back., I have ful- 
 filled my duty. Against the devil heroism does not avail. 
 To this point comes the huntsman with his crossbow ; be- 
 yond this, it is for the chaplain with his holy water to attempt 
 to pass." 
 
 IL 
 
 " You are pale ; you go about sad and gloomy. What 
 afflicts you? From the day, which I shall ever hold in 
 hate, on which you went to the fountain of the Poplars in 
 chase of the wounded deer, I should say an evil sorceress 
 had bewitched you with her enchantments. 
 
 " You do not go to the mountains now preceded by the 
 clamorous pack of hounds, nor does the blare of your horns 
 awake the echoes. Alone with these brooding fancies which 
 beset you, every morning you take your crossbow only to 
 
26 ROMANTIC LEGENLS OF SPAIN 
 
 plunge into the thickets and remain there until the sun goes 
 down. And when night darkens and you return to the castle, 
 white and weary, in vain I seek in the game-bag the spoils . 
 of the chase. What detains you so long far from those who 
 love you most ? " 
 
 While Inigo was speaking, Fernando, absorbed in his 
 thoughts, mechanically cut splinters from the ebony bench 
 with his hunting knife. 
 
 After a long silence, which was interrupted only by the 
 click of the blade as it slipped over the polished wood, the 
 young man, addressing his servant as if he had not heard a 
 single word, exclaimed : 
 
 *' liiigo, you who are an old man, you who know all the 
 haunts of the Moncayo, who have lived on its slopes pursu*. 
 ing wild beasts and in your wandering hunting trips have 
 more than once stood on its summit, tell me, have you ever 
 by chance met a woman who dwells among its rocks ? " 
 
 " A woman ! " exclaimed the huntsman with astonishment, 
 looking closely at him. 
 
 " Yes," said the youth. " It is a strange thing that has 
 happened to me, very strange. I thought I could keep this 
 secret always ; but it is no longer possible. It overflows my 
 heart and begins to reveal itself in my face. Therefore I 
 am going to tell it to you. You will help me solve the 
 mystery which enfolds this being who seems to exist only for 
 me, since no one knows her or has seen her, or can give me 
 any account of her." 
 
 The huntsman, without opening his lips, drew forward his 
 stool to place it near the ebony bench of his lord from whom 
 he did not once remove his affrighted eyes. The youth, 
 after arranging his thoughts, continued thus : 
 
 " From the day on which, notwithstanding your gloomy 
 predictions, I went to the fountain of the Poplars, and cross- 
 ing its waters recovered the stag which your superstition 
 
THE EMERALD EYES \ 27 
 
 would have let escape, my soul has been filled with a desire 
 for solitude. 
 
 " You do not know that place. See, the fountain springs 
 from a hidden source in the cavity of a rock, and falls in 
 trickling drops through the green, floating leaves of the 
 plants that grow on the border of its cradle. These drops, 
 which on falling glisten like points of gold and sound like 
 the notes of a musical instrument, unite on the turf and mur- 
 muring, murmuring with a sound like that of bees humming 
 about the flowers, glide on through the gravel, and forma 
 rill and contend with the obstacles in their way, and gather ~ 
 volume and leap and flee and run, sometimes with a laugh, 
 sometimes with sighs, until they fall into a lake. Into the 
 lake they fall with an indescribable sound. Laments, 
 words, names, songs, I know not what I have heard in that 
 sound when I have sat, alone and fevered, upon the huge 
 rock at whose feet the waters of that mysterious fountain leap 
 to bury themselves in a deep pool whose still surface is 
 scarcely rippled by the evening wind. 
 
 " Everything there is grand. Solitude with its thousand I 
 vague murmurs dwells in those places and transports the ! 
 mind with a profound melancholy. In the silvered leaves 
 of the poplars, in the hollows of the rocks, in the A\'aves of 
 the water it seems that the invisible spirits of nature talk 
 with us, that they recognize a brother in the immortal soul 
 of man. 
 
 ** When at break of dawn you would see me take my cross- 
 bow and go toward the mountain, it was never to lose my- 
 self among the thickets in pursuit of game. No, I went to 
 sit on the rim of the fountain, to seek in its waves — I know 
 not what — an absurdity ! The day I leaped over it on my 
 Lightning, I believed I saw glittering in its depths a marvel 
 — truly a marvel — the eyes of a woman ! 
 
 " Perhaps it may have been a fugitive ray of sunshine 
 
28 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 that wound, serpent like, through the foam ; perhaps one 
 of those flowers which float among the weeds of its bosom, 
 flowers whose calyxes seem to be emeralds — I do not know. 
 I thought I saw a gaze which fixed itself on mine, a look 
 which kindled in my breast a desire absurd, impossible of 
 realization, that of meeting a person with eyes like those. 
 
 " In my search, I went to that place day after day. 
 
 " At last, one afternoon — I thought myself the plaything 
 of a dream — but no, it is the truth ; I have spoken with her 
 many times as I am now speaking with you — one afternoon 
 I found, sitting where I had sat, clothed in a robe which 
 reached to the waters and floated on their surface, a woman - 
 beautiful beyond all exaggeration. Her hair was like gold ; 
 her eyelashes shone like threads of light, and between the 
 lashes flashed the restless eyes that I had seen — yes ; for 
 the eyes of that woman were the eyes which I bore stamped 
 upon my mind, eyes of an impossible color, the color " 
 
 " Green I " exclaimed Inigo, in accents of profound terror, 
 starting with a bound from his seat. 
 
 Fernando, in turn, looked at him as if astonished that 
 Inigo should supply what he was about to say, and asked 
 him with mingled anxiety and joy : 
 
 " Do you know her ? " 
 
 " Oh, no 1 " said the huntsman. '* God save me from 
 knowing her ! But my parents, on forbidding me to go 
 toward those places, told me a thousand times that the spirit, 
 goblin, demon or w^oman, who dwells in those waters, has 
 eyes of that color. I conjure you by that w^hich you love 
 most on earth not to return to the fountain of the Poplars. 
 One day or another her vengeance will overtake you, and 
 . you will expiate in death the crime of having stained her 
 waters." 
 
 ♦* By what I love most I " murmured the young man with 
 a sad smile. 
 
THE EMERALD EYES 29 
 
 " Yes," continued the elder. " By your parents, by your 
 kindred, by the tears of her whom heaven destines for your 
 wife, by those of a servant who watched beside your cradle." 
 
 " Do you know what I love most in this world ? Do you 
 know for what I would give the love of my father, the kisses 
 of her who gave me life, and all the affection which all the 
 women on earth can hold in store ? For one look, for only 
 one look of those eyes I How can I leave off seeking 
 them ? " 
 
 Fernando said these words in such a tone that the tear 
 which trembled on the eyelids of Inigo fell silently down his 
 cheek, while he exclaimed with a mournful accent : " The 
 will of Heaven be done 1 " 
 
 III. 
 
 " Who art thou ? What is thy fatherland ? Where dost 
 thou dwell ? Day after day. I come seeking thee, and see 
 neither the palfrey that brings thee hither, nor the servants 
 who bear thy litter. Rend once for all the veil of mystery in 
 which thou dost enfold thyself as in the heart of night. I 
 love thee and, highborn or lowly, I will be thine, thine 
 forever." 
 
 The sun had crossed the crest of the mountain. The 
 shadows were descending its slope with giant strides. The 
 breeze sighed amid the poplars of the fountain. The mist, 
 rising little by little from the surface of the lake, began- to 
 envelop the rocks of its margin. 
 
 Upon one of these rocks, on one which seemed ready to 
 topple over into the depths of the waters on whose surface 
 was pictured its wavering image, the heir of Almenar, on his 
 knees at the feet of his mysterious beloved, sought in vain 
 to draw from her the secret of her existence. 
 
 She was beautiful, beautiful and pallid as an alabaster 
 statue. One of her. tresses fell over her shoulders, entan- 
 
20 J ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 ^ 
 
 gling itself in the folds of her veil like a ray of sunlight 
 passing through clouds; and her eyes, within the circle of 
 her amber-colored lashes, gleamed like emeralds set in fretted 
 gold. 
 
 When the youth ceased speaking, her lips moved as for 
 utterance, but only exhaled a sigh, a sigh soft and sorrow- 
 ful like that of the gentle wave which a dying breeze drives 
 among the rushes. 
 
 " Thou answerest not," exclaimed Fernando, seeing his 
 hope mocked. " Wouldst thou have me credit what they 
 have told me of thee ? . Oh, no 1 Speak to me. I long to 
 know if thou lovest me ; I long to know if I may love thee, 
 if thou art a woman " 
 
 — " Or a demon. And if I were ? " 
 
 The youth hesitated a moment; a cold sweat ran through 
 his limbs ; the pupils of his eyes dilated, fixing themselves 
 with more intensity upon those of that woman and, fascinated 
 by their phosphoric brilliance, as though demented he ex- 
 claimed in a burst of passion : 
 
 *' If thou wert, I should love thee. . I should love thee as I 
 love thee now, as it is my destiny to love thee even beyond 
 this life, if there be any life beyond." 
 
 " Fernando," said the beautiful being then, in a voice like 
 
 music : " I love thee even more than thou lovest me ; in that 
 
 I, who am pure spirit, stoop to a mortal. I am not a woman 
 
 like those that live on earth. I am a woman worthy of thee 
 
 who art superior to the rest of humankind. I dwell in the 
 
 i depths of these waters, incorporeal like them, fugitive and 
 
 j transparent ; I speak with their murmurs and move with 
 
 Vtheir undulations. I do not punish him who dares disturb 
 
 ■ the fountain where I live ; rather I reward him with my love, 
 
 as a mortal superior to the superstitions of the common herd, 
 
 as a lover capable of responding to my strange and mysterious 
 
 embrace." 
 
THE EMERALD EYES 
 
 MoX: 
 
 31 
 
 While she was speaking, the youth, absorbed in the contem- 
 plation of her fantastic beauty, drawn on as by an unknown 
 force, approached nearer and nearer the edge of the rock. 
 The woman of the emerald eyes continued thus : 
 
 " Dost thou behold, behold the limpid depths of this lake, 
 behold these plants with large, green leaves \vhich wave in 
 its bosom ? They will give us a couch of emeralds and 
 corals and I — I will give thee a bliss unnamable, that bliss 
 which thou hast dreamed of in thine hours of delirium, and 
 which no other can bestow. — Come ! the mists of the lake 
 float over our brows like a pavilion of lawn, the waves call us 
 with their incomprehensible voices, the wind sings among the 
 poplars hymns of love ; come — come I " 
 
 Night began to cast her shadows, the moon shimmered on 
 the surface of the pool, the mist was driven before the rising 
 breeze, the green eyes glittered in the dusk like the will-o'- 
 the-wisps that run over the surface of impure waters. " Come, 
 come ! " these words were murmuring in the ears of Fernando 
 like an incantation, — " Come ! " and the mysterious woman 
 called him to the brink of the abyss where she was poised, 
 and seemed to offer him a kiss — a kiss — — 
 
 Fernando took one step toward her — another — and felt 
 arms slender and flexible twining about his neck and a cold 
 sensation on his burning lips, a kiss of snow — wavered, lost 
 his footing and fell, striking the water with a dull and mourn- 
 ful sound. 
 
 The waves leaped in sparks of light, and closed over his 
 body, and their silvery circles went widening, widening until 
 they died away on the banks. 
 
THE GOLDEN BRACELET 
 I. 
 
 She was beautiful, beautiful with that beauty which turns 
 a man dizzy ; beautiful with that beauty which in no wise 
 resembles our dream of the angels, and yet is supernatural ; 
 a diabolical beauty that the devil perchance gives to certain 
 beings to make them his instruments on earth. 
 
 He loved her — he loved her with that love which knows 
 not check nor bounds ; he loved her with that love which 
 seeks delight and finds but martyrdom ; a love which is akin 
 to bliss, yet which Heaven seems to cast on mortals for the 
 expiation of their sins. 
 
 She was wayward, wayward and unreasonable, like all the 
 women of the world. 
 
 He, superstitious, superstitious and valiant, like all the 
 men of his time. 
 
 Her name was Maria Antunez. 
 
 His, Pedro Alfonso de Orellana. 
 
 Both were natives of Toledo, and both had their homes in 
 the city which saw their birth. 
 
 The tradition which relates this marvellous event, an event 
 of many years since, tells nothing more of these two central 
 actors. 
 
 I, in my character of scrupulous historian, will not add a 
 single word of my own invention to describe them further. 
 
 II. 
 
 One day he found her in tears and asked her : 
 " Why dost thou weep ? " 
 
 32 
 

 I^e 
 
 l^^'TY 
 
 J£OBH\K. 
 
THE GOLDEN BRACELET 33 
 
 She dried her eyes, looked at him searchingly, heaved a 
 sigh and began to weep anew. 
 
 Then, drawing close to Maria, he took her hand, leaned 
 his elbow on the fretted edge of the Arabic parapet whence 
 the beautiful maiden was watching the river flow beneath, 
 and again he asked her : " Why dost thou weep ? " 
 
 The Tajo, moaning at the tower's foot, twisted in and out 
 amid the rocks on which is seated the imperial city. The 
 sun was sinking behind the neighboring mountains, the after- 
 noon haze was floating, a veil of azure gauze, and only the 
 monotonous sound of the water broke the profound stillness. 
 
 Maria exclaimed : " Ask me not why I weep, ask me not ; 
 for I would not know how to answer thee, nor thou how to 
 understand. In the souls of us women are stifling desires 
 which reveal themselves only in a sigh, mad ideas that cross 
 the imagination without our daring to form them into speech, 
 strange phenomena of our . mysterious nature which man 
 cannot even conceive. I implore thee, ask me not the cause 
 of my grief ; if I should reveal it to thee, perchance thou 
 wouldst reply with peals of laughter." 
 
 When these words were faltered out, again she bowed the 
 head and again he urged his questions. 
 
 The radiant damsel, breaking at last her stubborn silence, 
 said to her lover in a hoarse, unsteady voice : 
 
 " Thou wilt have it. It is a folly that will make thee laugh, 
 but be it so. I will tell thee, since thou dost crave to hear. 
 
 " Yesterday I was in the temple. They were celebrating 
 the feast of the Virgin ; her image, placed on a golden 
 pedestal above the High Altar, glowed like a burning coal; 
 the notes of the organ trembled, spreading from echo to echo 
 throughout the length and breadth of the church, and in the 
 choir the priests were chanting the Salve, Regina. 
 
 " I was praying ; I was praying, all absorbed in my relig- 
 ious meditations, when involuntarily I lifted my head, and 
 
34 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 my gaze sought the altar. I know not why my eyes from 
 that instant fixed themselves upon the image, but I speak 
 amiss — it was not on the image ; they fixed themselves upon 
 an object which until then I had not seen — an object which, 
 I know not why, thenceforth held all my attention. Do not 
 laugh ; that object was the golden bracelet that the Mother 
 of God wears on one of the arms in which rests her divine 
 Son. I turned aside my gaze and strove again to pray. Im- 
 possible. Without my will, my eyes moved back to the same 
 point. The altar lights, reflected in the thousand facets of 
 those diamonds, were multiplied prodigiously. Millions of 
 living sparks, rosy, azure, green and golden, were whirling 
 around the jewels like a storm of fiery atoms, like a dizzy 
 round of those spirits of flame which fascinate with their 
 brightness and their marvellous unrest. 
 
 " I left the church. I came home, but I came with that 
 idea fixed in imagination. I went to bed ; I could not sleep. 
 The night passed, a night eternal with one thought. At 
 dawn my eyelids closed and — believest thou ? — even in 
 slumber I saw crossing before me, dimming in the distance 
 and ever returning, a woman, a woman dark and beautiful, 
 who wore the ornament of gold and jewel work ; a woman, 
 yes, for it was no longer the Virgin, whom I adore and at 
 whose feet I bow ; it was a woman, another woman like my- 
 self, who looked upon me and laughed mockingly. * Dost 
 see it ? ' she appeared to say, showing me the treasure. 
 * How it glitters I It seems a circlet of stars snatched from 
 the sky some summer night. Dost see it ? But it is not thine, 
 and it will be thine never, never. Thou wilt perchance have 
 others that surpass it, others richer, if it be possible, but this, 
 this which sparkles so piquantly, so bewitchingly, never, 
 never.' I awoke, but with the same idea fixed here, then as 
 now, like a red-hot nail, diabolical, irresistible, inspired be- 
 yond a doubt by Satan himself. — And what then ? — Thou 
 
THE GOLDEN BRACELET ^^ 
 
 art silent, silent, and dost hang thy head. — Does not my folly 
 make thee laugh ? " 
 
 Pedro, with a convulsive movement, grasped the hilt of his 
 sword, raised his head, which he had, indeed, bent low and 
 said with smothered voice : 
 
 " Which Virgin has this jewel ? " 
 
 " The Virgin of the Sagrario," murmured Maria. 
 
 " The Virgin of the Sagrario ! " repeated the youth, with 
 accent of terror. " The Virgin of the Sagrario of the 
 cathedral ! " 
 
 •And in his features was portrayed for an instant the state 
 of his mind, appalled before a thought. 
 
 " Ah, why does not some other Virgin own it ? " he con- 
 tinued, with a tense, impassioned tone. " Why does not the 
 archbishop bear it in his mitre, the king in his crown, or the 
 devil between his claws ? I would tear it away for thee, 
 though its price were death or hell. But from the Virgin of 
 the Sagrario, our own Holy Patroness, — I — I who was born 
 in Toledo ! Impossible, impossible ! " 
 
 " Never ! " murmured Maria, in a voice that scarcely 
 reached the ear. *' Never ! " 
 
 And she wept again. 
 
 Pedro fixed a stupefied stare on the running waves of the 
 river — on the running waves, which flowed and flowed unceas- 
 ingly before his absent-thoughted eyes, breaking at the foot of 
 the tower amid the rocks on which is seated the imperial city. 
 
 III. 
 
 The cathedral of Toledo ! Imagine a forest of colossal 
 palm trees of granite, that by the interlacing of their branches 
 form a gigantic, magnificent arch, beneath which take refuge 
 and live, with the life genius has lent them, a whole creation 
 of beings, both fictitious and real. 
 
 Imagine an in comprehensible fall of shadow and light 
 
36 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 wherein the colored rays from the ogive windows meet and 
 are merged with the dusk of the nave; where the gleam 
 of the lamps struggles and is lost in the gloom of the 
 sanctuary. 
 
 Imagine a world of stone, immense as the spirit of our 
 religion, sombre as its traditions, enigmatic as its parables, 
 and yet you will not have even a remote idea of this eternal 
 monument of the enthusiasm and faith of our ancestors — 
 a monument upon which the centuries have emulously lav- 
 ished their treasures of knowledge, inspiration and the arts. 
 
 In ihe cathedral-heart dwells silence, majesty, the poetry 
 of mysticism, and a holy dread which guards those thresholds 
 against worldly thoughts and the paltry passions of earth. 
 
 Consumption of the body is stayed by breathing pure 
 mountain air; atheism should be cured by breathing this 
 atmosphere of faith. 
 
 But great and impressive as the cathedral presents itself 
 to our eyes at whatsoever hour we enter its mysterious and 
 sacred precinct, never does it produce an impression so pro- 
 found as in those days when it arrays itself in all the splendors 
 of religious pomp, when its shrines are covered with gold and 
 jewels, its steps with costly carpeting and its pillars with 
 tapestry. 
 
 Then, when its thousand silver lamps, aglow, shed forth a 
 flood of light, when a cloud of incense floats in air, and the 
 voices of the choir, the harmonious pealing of the organs, 
 and the bells of the tower make the building tremble from its 
 deepest foundations to its highest crown of spires, then it is 
 we comprehend, because we feel, the ineffable majesty of God 
 'who dwells within, gives it life with His breath and fills it 
 with the reflection of His glory. 
 
 The same day on which occurred the scene we have just 
 described, the last rites of the magnificent eight-day feast of 
 the Virgin were held in the cathedral. 
 
THE GOLDEN BRACELET . 37 
 
 The holy festival had attracted an immense multitude of 
 the faithful ; but already they had dispersed in all directions ; 
 already the lights of the chapels and of the High Altar had 
 been extinguished, and the mighty doors of the temple had 
 groaned upon" their hinges as they closed behind the last 
 departing worshipper, when forth from the depth of shadow, 
 and pale, pale as the statue of the tomb on which he leant 
 for an instant, while he conquered his emotion, there ad- 
 vanced a man, who came slipping with the utmost stealthi- 
 ness toward the screen of the central chapel. There the 
 gleam of a lamp made it possible to distinguish his features-. 
 
 It was Pedro. 
 
 What had passed between the two lovers to bring him to 
 the point of putting into execution an idea whose mere con- 
 ception had lifted his hair with horror ? That could never be 
 learned. 
 
 But there he was, and he was there to carry out his crimi- 
 nal intent. In his restless glances, in the trembling of his 
 knees, in the sweat which ran in great drops down his face, 
 his thought stood written. 
 
 The cathedral was alone, utterly alone, and drowned in 
 deepest hush. 
 
 Nevertheless, there were perceptible from time to time 
 suggestions of dim disturbance, creakings of wood maybe or 
 murmurs of the wind, or — who knows ? — perchance illusion 
 of the fancy, which in its excited moments hears and sees 
 and feels what is not '; but in very truth there sounded, now 
 here, now there, now behind him, now even at his side, some- 
 thing like sobs suppressed, something like the rustle of trail- 
 ing robes, and a muffled stir as of steps that go and come 
 unceasingly. 
 
 Pedro forced himself to hold his course ; he reached the 
 grating and mounted the first step of the chancel. All along 
 the inner wall of this chapel are ranged the tombs of kings. 
 
38 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 whose images of stone, with hand upon the sword-hilt, seem 
 to keep watch night and day over the sanctuary in whose 
 shade they take their everlasting rest. 
 
 " Onward ! " he murmured under his breath, and he strove 
 to move and could not. It seemed as if his feet were nailed 
 to the pavement. He lowered his eyes, and his hair stood 
 on end with horror. The floor of the chapel was made of 
 wide, dark burial slabs. 
 
 For a moment he believed that a cold and fleshless hand 
 was holding him there with strength invincible. The dying 
 lamps, which sparkled in the hollow aisles and transepts like 
 lost stars in the dark, wavered before his vision, the statues 
 of the sepulchres wavered and the images of the altar, all the 
 cathedral wavered, with its granite arcades and buttresses of 
 solid stone. 
 
 " Onward I " Pedro exclaimed again, as if beside himself; 
 he approached the altar and climbing upon it, he reached the 
 pedestal of the image. All the space about clothed itself in 
 weird and frightful shapes, all was shadow and flickering 
 light, more awful even than total darkness. Only the Queen 
 of Heaven, softly illuminated by a golden lamp, seemed to 
 smile, tranquil, gracious and serene, in the midst of all that 
 horror. 
 
 Nevertheless, that silent, changeless smile, which calmed 
 him for an instant, in the end filled him with fear, a fear 
 stranger and more profound than \vhat he had suffered 
 hitherto. 
 
 Yet he regained his self-control, shut his eyes so as not to 
 see her, extended his hand with a spasmodic movement and 
 snatched off the golden bracelet, pious offering of a sainted 
 archbishop, the golden bracelet whose value equalled a 
 fortune. 
 
 Now the jewel was in his possession ; his convulsed fingers 
 clutched it with superhuman force ; there was nothing left 
 
THE GOLDEN BRACELET 
 
 39 
 
 save to flee — to flee with it ; but for this it was necessary to 
 open his eyes, and Pedro was afraid to see, to see the image, 
 to see the kings of the sepulchres, the demons of the cor- 
 nices, the griffins of the capitals, the blotches of shadow 
 and flashes of light which, like ghostly, gigantic phantoms, 
 were moving slowly in the depths of the nave, now filled 
 ^with confused noises, unearthly and appalling. 
 
 At last he opened his eyes, cast one glance about him, and 
 from his lips escaped a piercing cry. 
 
 The cathedral was full of statues, statues which, clothed in 
 strange, flowing raiment, had descended from their niches 
 and were thronging all the vast compass of the church, staring 
 at him with their hollow eyes. 
 
 Saints, nuns, angels, devils, warriors, great ladies, pages, 
 hermits, peasants surrounded him on every side and were 
 massed confusedly in the open spaces and about the altar. 
 Before it there officiated, in presence of the kings who were 
 kneeling upon their tombs, the marble archbishops whom he 
 had seen heretofore stretched motionless upon their beds of 
 death, while a whole world of granite beasts and creeping 
 things, writhing over the paving-stones, twisting along the 
 buttresses, curled up in the canopies, swinging from the 
 vaulted roof, quivered into life like worms in a giant corpse, 
 fantastic, distorted, hideous. 
 
 He could resist no longer. His brows throbbed with ter- 
 rible violence ; a cloud of blood darkened his vision ; he 
 uttered a second scream, a scream heart-rending, inhuman, 
 and fell swooning across the altar. 
 
 When the sacristans found him crouching on the altar steps 
 the next morning, he still clutched the golden bracelet in both 
 hands and on seeing them draw near, he shrieked with dis- 
 cordant yells of laughter : 
 
 " Hers 1 hers ! " 
 
 The poor wretch had gone mad. 
 
THE RAY OF MOONSHINE 
 
 I DO not know whether this is history which seems Uke a 
 tale, or a tale which seems like history ; what I can affirm is 
 that in its core it contains a truth, a truth supremely sad, 
 which in all likelihood I, with my imaginative tendencies, will 
 be one of the last to take to heart. 
 
 Another with this idea would perhaps have made a book 
 of melancholy philosophy. I have written this legend that 
 those who see nothing of its deep meaning may at least 
 derive from it a moment of entertainment. 
 
 I. 
 
 He was noble, he had been born amid the clash of arms, 
 and yet the sudden blare of a war trumpet would not have 
 caused him to lift his head an instant or turn his eyes an 
 inch away from the dim parchment in which he was reading 
 the last song of a troubadour. 
 
 Those who desired to see him had no need to look for him 
 in the spacious court of his castle, where the grooms were 
 breaking in the colts, the pages teaching the falcons to fly, 
 and the soldiers employing their leisure days in sharpening 
 on stones the iron points of their lances. 
 
 "Where is Manrico ? Where is your lord ? " his mother 
 would sometimes ask. 
 
 " We do not know," the servants would reply. " Per- 
 chance he is in the cloister of the monastery of the Pena, 
 seated on the edge of a tomb, listening to see if he may sur- 
 
 40 
 
u 
 
 OF 
 CALlFOggi?' 
 
THE RA Y OF MOONSHINE 
 
 (^ 
 
 prise some word of the conversation of the dead ; or on 
 the bridge watching the river-waves chasing one another 
 under its arches, or curled up in the fissure of some rock 
 counting the stars in the sky, following with his eyes a cloud, 
 or contemplating the will-o'-the-wisps that flit like exhalations 
 over the surface of the marshes. Wherever he is, it is where 
 he has least company." 
 
 In truth, Manrico was a lover of solitude, and so extreme 
 a lover that sometimes he would have wished to be a body 
 without a shadow, because then his shadow would not follow 
 him everywhere he went. 
 
 He loved solitude, because in its bosom he would invent, : 
 giving free rein to his imagination, a phantasmal world, in- 
 habited by wonderful beings, daughters of his weird fancies 
 and his poetic dreams ; for Manrico was a poet, — so true a I 
 poet that never had he found adequate forms in which to i 
 \ utter his thoughts nor had he ever imprisoned them in \ 
 \words. i 
 
 He believed that among the red coals of the hearth there 
 dwelt fire-spirits of a thousand hues which ran like golden 
 insects along the enkindled logs or danced in a luminous 
 whirl of sparks on the pointed flames, and he passed long 
 hours of inaction seated on a low stool by the high Gothic 
 chimney-place, motionless, his eyes fixed on the fire. 
 
 He believed that in the depths of the waves of the river, 
 among the mosses of the fountain and above the mists of the 
 lake there lived mysterious women, sibyls, nymphs, undines, 
 who breathed forth laments and sighs, or sang and laughed 
 in the monotonous murmur of the water, a murmur to which 
 he listened in silence, striving to translate it. '. 
 
 In the clouds, in the air, in the depths of the groves, in 
 the clefts of the rocks, he imagined that he perceived forms, 
 or heard mysterious sounds, forms of supernatural beings, 
 indistinct words which he could not comprehend. 
 
42 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Love 1 He had been born to dream love, not to feel it. 
 He loved all women an instant, this one because she was 
 golden -haired, that one because she had red lips, another 
 because in walking she swayed as a river-reed. 
 
 Sometimes his delirium reached the point of his spending 
 an entire night gazing at the moon, which floated in heaven 
 in a silvery mist, or at the stars, which twinkled afar off like 
 the changing lights of precious stones. In those long nights 
 of poetic wakefulness, he would exclaim : " If it is true, as 
 the Prior of the Pena has told me, that it is possible those 
 points of light may be worlds, if it is true that people live on 
 that pearly orb which rides above the clouds, how beautiful 
 must the women of those luminous regions be ! and I shall 
 not be able to see them, and I shall not be able to love 
 them I What must their beauty be I And what their love ! " 
 
 Manrico was not yet so demented that the boys would run 
 after him, but he was sufficiently so to talk and gesticulate 
 to himself, which is where madness begins. 
 
 II. 
 
 Over the Douro, which ran lapping the weatherworn and 
 darkened stones of the walls of Soria, there is a bridge 
 leading from the city to the old convent of the Templars, 
 whose estates extended along the opposite bank of the river. 
 
 At the time to which we refer, the knights of the Order 
 had already abandoned their historic fortresses, but there 
 still remained standing the ruins of the large round towers 
 of their walls, — there still might be seen, as in part may be 
 seen to-day, covered with ivy and white morning-glories 
 the massive arches of their cloister and the long ogive 
 galleries of their courts of arms through which the wind 
 would breathe soft sighs, stirring the deep foliage. 
 
 In the orchards and in the gardens, whose paths the feet 
 of the monks had not trodden for many years, vegetation, 
 
THE RA Y OF MOONSHINE 43 
 
 left to itself, made holiday, without fear that the hand of 
 man should mutilate it in the effort to embellish. Climbing 
 plants crept upward twining about the aged trunks of the 
 trees ; the shady paths through aisles of poplars, whose leafy 
 tops met and mingled, were overgrown with turf; spear- 
 plumed thistles and nettles had shot up in the sandy roads, 
 and in the parts of the building which were bulging out, 
 ready to fall ; the yellow crucifera, floating in the wind like 
 the crested feathers of a helmet, and bell-flowers, white and 
 blue, balancing themselves, as in a swing, on their long 
 and flexible stems, proclaimed the conquest of decay and 
 ruin. 
 
 It was night, a summer night, mild, full of perfumes and 
 peaceful sounds, and with a moon, white and serene, high in 
 the blue, luminous, transparent heavens. 
 
 Manrico, his imagination seized by a poetic frenzy, after 
 crossing the bridge from which he contemplated for a 
 moment the dark silhouette of the city outlined against the 
 background of some pale, soft clouds massed on the horizon, 
 plunged into the deserted ruins of the Templars. 
 
 It was midnight. The moon, which had been slowly rising, 
 was now at the zenith, when, on entering a dusky avenue that 
 led from the demolished cloister to the bank of the Douro, 
 Manrico uttered a low, stifled cry, strangely compounded of 
 surprise, fear and joy. 
 
 In the depths of the dusky avenue he had seen moving 
 something white, which shimmered a moment and then van- 
 ished in the darkness, the trailing robe of a woman, of a 
 woman who had crossed the path and disappeared amid the 
 foliage at the very instant when the mad dreamer of absurd, 
 impossible dreams penetrated into the gardens. 
 
 An unknown w^oman ! — In this place! — At this hour I 
 " This, this is the woman of my quest," exclaimed Manrico, 
 and he darted forward in pursuit, swift as an arrow. 
 
44 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 III. 
 
 He reached the spot where he had seen the mysterious 
 woman disappear in the thick tangle of the branches. She 
 had gone. Whither ? Afar, very far, he thought he descried, 
 among the crowding trunks of the trees, something Hke a 
 shining, or a white, moving form. " It is she, it is she, who 
 has wings on her feet and flees like a shadow 1 " he said, 
 and rushed on in his search, parting with his hands the net- 
 work of ivy which was spread like a tapestry from poplar 
 to poplar. By breaking through brambles and parasitical 
 growths, he made his way to a sort of platform on which the 
 moonlight dazzled. — Nobody 1 — " Ah, but by this path, but 
 by this she slips away 1 " he then exclaimed. " I hear her 
 footsteps on the dry leaves, and the rustle of her dress as it 
 sweeps over the ground and brushes against the shrubs." 
 And he ran, — ran like a madman, hither and thither, and did 
 not find her. " But still comes the sound of her footfalls," 
 he murmured again. " I think she spoke ; beyond a doubt, 
 she spoke. The wind which sighs among the branches, the 
 leaves which seem to be praying in low voices, prevented my 
 hearing what she said, but beyond a doubt she fleets by 
 yonder path ; she spoke, she spoke. In what language ? I 
 know not, but it is a foreign speech." And again he ran 
 onward in pursuit, sometimes thinking he saw her, sometimes 
 that he heard her ; now noticing that the branches, among 
 which she had disappeared, were still in motion ; now im- 
 agining that he distinguished in the sand the prints of her 
 little feet ; again firmly persuaded that a special fragrance 
 which crossed the air from time to time was an aroma belong- 
 ing to that woman who was making sport of him, taking 
 pleasure in eluding him among these intricate growths of 
 briers and brambles. Vain attempt I 
 
 He wandered some hours from one spot to another, beside 
 
THE RAY OF MOONSHINE 4^ 
 
 himself, now pausing to listen, now gliding with the utmost 
 precaution over the herbage, now in frantic and desperate 
 race. 
 
 Pushing on, pushing on through the immense gardens 
 which bordered the river, he came at last to the foot of the 
 cliff on which rises the hermitage of San Saturio. " Perhaps 
 from this height I can get my bearings for pursuing my 
 search across this confused labyrinth," he exclaimed, climb- 
 ing from rock to rock with the aid of his dagger. 
 
 He reached the summit whence may be seen the city in 
 the distance and, curving at his feet, a great part of the 
 Douro, compelling its dark, impetuous stream onward through 
 the winding banks that imprison it. 
 
 Manrico, once on the top of the cliff, turned his gaze in 
 every direction, till, bending and fixing it at last on a certain 
 point, he could not restrain an oath. 
 
 The sparkling moonlight glistened on the wake left behind 
 by a boat, which, rowed at full speed, was making for the 
 opposite shore. 
 
 In that boat he thought he had distinguished a white and 
 slender figure, a woman without doubt, the woman whom he 
 had seen in the grounds of the Templars, the woman of his 
 dreams, the realization of his wildest hopes. He sped down 
 the cliff with the agility of a deer, threw his cap, whose tall, 
 full plume might hinder him in running, to the ground, and 
 freeing himself from his heavy velvet cloak, shot like a 
 meteor toward the bridge. 
 
 He believed he could cross it and reach the city before the 
 boat would touch the further bank. Folly ! When Manrico, 
 panting and covered with sweat, reached the city gate, already 
 they who had crossed the Douro over against San Saturio 
 were entering Soria by one of the posterns in the wall, which, 
 at that time, extended to the bank of the river whose waters 
 mirrored its gray battlements. 
 
46 ^ ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 IV. 
 
 Although his hope of overtaking those who had entered by 
 the postern gate of San Saturio was dissipated, that of trac- 
 ing out the house which sheltered them in the city was not 
 therefore abandoned by our hero. With his mind fixed upon 
 this idea, he entered the town and, taking his way toward the 
 ward of San Juan, began roaming its streets at hazard. 
 
 The streets of Soria were then, and they are to-day, narrow, 
 dark and crooked. A profound silence reigned in them, a 
 silence broken only by the distant barking of a dog, the bar- 
 ring of a gate or the neighing of a charger, whose pawing made 
 the chain which fastened him to the manger rattle in the 
 subterranean stables. 
 
 Manrico, with ear attent to these vague noises of the night, 
 which at times seemed to be the footsteps of some person 
 who had just turned the last corner of a deserted street, at 
 others, the confused voices of people who were talking behind 
 him and whom every moment he expected to see at his side, 
 spent several hours running at random from one place to 
 another. 
 
 At last he stopped beneath a great stone mansion, dark and 
 very old, and, standing there, his eyes shone with an inde- 
 scribable expression of joy. In one of the high ogive 
 windows of what we might call a palace, he saw a ray of soft 
 and mellow light which, passing through some thin drap- 
 eries of rose-colored silk, was reflected on the time-black- 
 ened, weather-cracked wall of the house across the way. 
 
 " There is no doubt about it ; here dwells my unknown 
 lady," murmured the youth in a low voice, without removing 
 his eyes for a second from the Gothic window. " Here she 
 dwells I She entered by the postern gate of San Saturio, — 
 by the postern gate of San Saturio is the way to this ward 
 — in this ward there is a house where, after midnight, there 
 
THE RA Y OF MOONSHINE 47 
 
 is some one awake — awake ? Who can it be at this hour if 
 not she, just returned from her nocturnal excursions ? There 
 is no more room for doubt ; this is her home." 
 
 In this firm persuasion and revolving in his head the 
 maddest and most capricious fantasies, he awaited dawn 
 opposite the Gothic window where there was a light all night 
 and from which he did not withdraw his gaze a moment. 
 
 When daybreak came, the massive gates of the arched 
 entrance to the mansion, on whose keystone was sculptured 
 the owner's coat of arms, turned ponderously on their hinges 
 with a sharp and prolonged creaking. A servitor appeared 
 on the threshold with a bunch of keys in his hand, rubbing 
 his eyes, and showing as he yawned a set of great teeth which 
 might well rouse envy in a crocodile. 
 
 For Manrico to see him and to rush to the gate was the 
 work of an instant. 
 
 " Who lives in this house ? What is her name ? Her 
 country ? Why has she come to Soria ? Has she a hus- 
 band ? Answer, answer, animal ! " This was the salutation 
 which, shaking him violently by the shoulder, Manrico hurled 
 at the poor servitor, who, after staring at him a long 
 while with frightened, stupefied eyes, replied in a voice broken 
 with amazement : 
 
 " In this house lives the right honorable Senor don Alonso 
 de Valdecuellos, Master of the Horse to our lord, the King, 
 He has been wounded in the war with the Moors and is now 
 in this city recovering from his injuries." 
 
 "Well! well! His daughter?" broke in the impatient 
 youth. " His daughter, or his sister, or his wife, or who- 
 ever she may be ? " 
 
 " He has no woman in his family." 
 
 " No woman ! Then who sleeps in that chamber there, 
 where all night long I have seen a light burning ? " 
 
48 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " There ? There sleeps my lord Don Alonso, who, as he 
 ^ is ill, keeps his lamp burning till dawn." 
 
 A thunderbolt, suddenly falling at his feet, would not have 
 given Manrico a greater shock than these words. 
 
 V. 
 
 " I must find her, I must find her ; and if I find her, I am 
 almost certain I shall recognize her. How ? — I cannot tell 
 — but recognize her I must. The echo of her footstep, or a 
 single word of hers which I may hear again ; the hem of her 
 robe, only the hem which I may see again would be enough 
 to make me sure of her. Night and day I see floating before 
 my eyes those folds of a fabric diaphanous and whiter than 
 snow, night and day there is sounding here within, within my 
 head, the soft rustle of her raiment, the vague murmur of 
 her unintelligible words. — What said she ? — What said she ? 
 Ah, if I might only know what she said, perchance — but yet 
 without knowing it, I shall find her — I shall find her^ny 
 heart tells me so, and my heart deceives me never. — It is 
 true that I have unavailingly traversed all the streets of 
 Soria, that I have passed nights upon nights in the open air, 
 a corner-post ; that I have spent more than twenty golden 
 coins in persuading duennas and servants to gossip ; that I 
 gave holy water in St. Nicholas to an old crone muffled up 
 so artfully in her woollen mantle that she seemed to me a 
 goddess ; and on coming out, after matins, from the collegiate 
 church, in the dusk before the dawn, I followed like a fool 
 the litter of the archdeacon, believing that the hem of his 
 vestment was that of the robe of my unknown lady — but it 
 matters not — I must find her, and the rapture of possessing 
 her will assuredly surpass the labors of the quest. 
 
 " What will her eyes be ? They should be azure, azure 
 and liquid as the sky of night. How I delight in eyes of 
 that color I They are so expressive, so dreamy, so — yes. 
 
THE RA V OF MOONSHINE 40 
 
 — no doubt of it ; azure her eyes should be, azure they are, 
 assuredly ; — and her tresses black, jet black and so long that 
 they wave upon the air — it seems to me t saw them waving 
 that night, like her robe, and they were black — I do not de- 
 ceive myself, no ; they were black. 
 
 " And how well azure eyes, very large and slumbrous, and 
 loose tresses, waving and dark, become a tall woman — for — 
 she is tall, tall and slender, like those angels above the portals 
 of our basilicas, angels whose oval faces the shadows of their 
 granite canopies veil in mystic twilight. 
 
 " Her voice ! — her voice I have heard — her voice is soft 
 as the breathing of the wind in the leaves of the poplars, 
 and her walk measured and stately like the cadences of a 
 musical instrument. 
 
 " And this woman, who is lovely as the loveliest of my 
 youthful dreams, who thinks as I think, who enjoys what I 
 enjoy, who hates what I hate, who is a twin spirit of my spirit, 
 jRrho is the complement of my being, must she not feel moved 
 on meeting me ? Must she not love me as I shall love her, 
 as I love her already, with all the strength of my life, with 
 every faculty of my soul ? 
 
 " Back, back to the place where I saw her for the first 
 and only time that I have seen her. Who knows but that, 
 capricious as myself, a lover of solitude and mystery like all 
 dreamy souls, she may take pleasure in wandering among 
 the ruins in the silence of the night ? " 
 
 Two months had passed since the servitor of Don Alonso 
 de Valdecuellos had disillusionized the infatuated Manrico, 
 two months in every hour of which he had built a castle in 
 the air only for reality to shatter with a breath ; two months 
 during which he had sought in vain that unknown woman 
 for whom an absurd love had been growing in his soul, 
 thanks to his still more absurd imaginations ; two months 
 had flown since his first adventure when now, after crossing. 
 
50 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 absorbed in these ideas, the bridge which leads to the convent 
 of the Templars, the enamored youth plunged again into the 
 intricate pathways of the gardens. 
 
 VI. 
 
 The night was calm and beautiful, the full moon shone 
 high in the heavens, and the wind sighed with the sweetest 
 of murmurs among the leaves of the trees. 
 
 Manrico arrived at the cloister, swept his glance over the 
 enclosed green and peered through the massive arches of 
 the arcades. It was deserted. 
 
 He went forth, turned his steps toward the dim avenue 
 that leads to the Douro, and had not yet entered it when 
 there escaped from his lips a cry of joy. 
 
 He had seen floating for an instant, and then disappearing, 
 the hem of the white robe, of the white robe of the woman 
 of his dreams, of the woman whom now he loved like a 
 madman. 
 
 He runs, he runs in his pursuit, he reaches the spot where 
 he had seen her vanish ; but there he stops, fixes his terrified 
 eyes upon the ground, remains a moment motionless, a slight 
 nervous tremor agitates his limbs, a tremor which increases, 
 which increases, and shows symptoms of an actual convulsion 
 — and he breaks out at last into a peal of laughter, laughter 
 loud, strident, horrible. 
 
 That white object, light, floating, had again shone before 
 his eyes, it had even glittered at his feet for an instant, only 
 for an instant. 
 
 It was a moonbeam, a moonbeam which pierced from time 
 to time the green vaulted roof of trees when the wind moved 
 their boughs. 
 
 Several years had passed. Manrico, crouched on a settle 
 by the deep Gothic chimney of his castle, almost motionless 
 and with a vague, uneasy gaze like that of an idiot, would 
 
THE RA Y OF MOONSHINE 
 
 51 
 
 scarcely take notice either of the endearments of his mother 
 or of the attentions of his servants. 
 
 " You are young, you are comely," she would say to him, 
 " why do you languish in solitude ? Why do you not seek a 
 woman whom you may love, and whose love may make you 
 happy ? " 
 
 " Love ! Love 'is a ray of moonshine," murmured the 
 youth- 
 
 " Why do you not throw off this lethargy ? " one of his 
 squires would ask. " Arm yourself in iron from head to 
 foot, bid us unfurl to the winds your illustrious banner, and 
 let us march to the war. In war is glory." 
 
 " Glory ! — Glory is a ray of moonshine." 
 
 " Would you like to have me recite you a ballad, the latest 
 that Sir Arnaldo, the Provencal troubadour, has composed ? " 
 
 " No ! no ! " exclaimed the youth, straightening himself 
 angrily on his seat, " I want nothing — that is — yes, I want — 
 I want you should leave me alone. Ballads — women — glory 
 — happiness — lies are they all — vain fantasies which we 
 shape in our imagination and clothe according to our whim, 
 and we love them and run after them — for what ? for what? 
 To find a ray of moonshine." 
 
 Manrico was mad ; ,at least, all the world thought so. For 
 myself, on the contrary, I think what he had done was to 
 regain his senses. 
 
THE DEVIL'S CROSS 
 
 Whether you believe it or not matters little. My grand- 
 father told it to my father ; my father related it to me, and I 
 now recount it to you, although it may serve for nothing more 
 than to pass an idle hour. 
 
 I. 
 
 Twilight was beginning to spread its soft, dim wings over 
 the picturesque banks of the Segre, when after a fatiguing 
 day's travel we reached Bellver, the end of our journey. 
 
 Bellver is a small town situated on the slope of a hill, 
 beyond which may be seen, rising like the steps of a colossal 
 granite amphitheatre, the lofty, enclouded crests of the 
 Pyrenees. 
 
 The white villages that encircle the town, sprinkled here 
 and there over an undulating plain of verdure, appear from a 
 distance like a flock of doves which have lowered their ffight 
 to quench their thirst in the waters of the river. 
 
 A naked crag, at whose foot the river makes a bend and on 
 whose summit may still be seen ancient architectural remains, 
 marks the old boundary line between the earldom of Urgel 
 and the most important of its fiefs. 
 
 At the right of the winding path which leads to this point, 
 going up the river and following its curves and luxuriant 
 banks, one comes upon a cross. 
 
 The stem and the arms are of iron ; the circular base on 
 which it rests is of marble, and the stairway that leads to it 
 of dark and ill-fitted fragments of hewn stone. 
 
 The destructive action of time, which has covered the 
 metal with rust, has broken and worn away the stone of 
 
 52 
 
THE DEVIL'S CROSS ^^ 
 
 this monument in whose crevices grow certain climbing 
 plants, mounting in their interwoven growth until they crown 
 it, while an old, wide-spreading oak serves it as canopy. 
 
 I was some moments in advance of my travelling com- 
 panions, and halting my poor beast, I contemplated in silence 
 that cross, mute and simple expression of the faith and piety 
 of other ages. 
 
 At that instant a world of ideas thronged my imagination, 
 — ideas faint and fugitive, without definite form, which were 
 yet bound together, as by an invisible thread of light, by the 
 profound solitude of those places, the deep silence of the 
 gathering night and the vague melancholy of my soul. 
 
 Impelled by a religious impulse, spontaneous and indefin- 
 able, I dismounted mechanically, uncovered, commenced to 
 search my memory for one of those prayers which I was 
 taught when a child, — one of those prayers that, later in 
 life, involuntarily escaping from our lips, seem to lighten 
 the burdened heart and, like tears, relieve sorrow, which 
 takes these natural outlets. 
 
 I had begun to murmur such a prayer, when suddenly I 
 felt myself violently seized by the shoulders. 
 
 I turned my head. A man was standing at my side. 
 
 He was one of our guides, a native of the region, who, 
 with an indescribable expression of terror depicted on his 
 face, strove to drag me away with him and to cover my head 
 with the hat which I still held in my hands. 
 
 My first glance, half astonishment, half anger, was equiv- 
 alent to a sharp, though silent, interrogation. 
 
 The poor fellow, without ceasing his efforts to withdraw 
 me from that place, replied to it with these words which then 
 I could not comprehend but which had in them an accent of 
 sincerity that impressed me : — " By the memory of your 
 mother 1 by that which you hold most sacred in the world, 
 senorito^ cover your head and flee faster than flight itself 
 
54 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 from that cross. Are you so desperate that, the help of 
 God not being enough, you call on that of the Devil ? " 
 
 I stood a moment looking at him in silence. Frankly, 
 I thought he was a madman ; but he went on with equal 
 vehemence : 
 
 " You seek the frontier ; well, then, if before this cross you 
 ask that heaven will give you aid, the tops of the neighboring 
 mountains will rise, in a single night, to the invisible stars, 
 so that we shall not find the boundary in all our life." 
 
 I could not help smiling. 
 
 " You take it in jest ? — You think perhaps that this is a 
 holy cross like the one in the porch of our church? " 
 
 " Who doubts it ? " 
 
 " Then you are mistaken out and out, for this cross — 
 saving its divine association — is accursed ; this cross belongs 
 to a demon and for that reason is called The Devil's Cross." 
 
 " The Devil's Cross 1 " I repeated, yielding to his insistence 
 without accounting to myself for the involuntary fear which 
 began to oppress my spirit, and which repelled me as an un- 
 known force from that place. " The Devil's Cross ! Never 
 has my imagination been wounded with a more inconsistent 
 union of two ideas so absolutely at variance. A cross 1 and 
 — the Devil's ! Come, come 1 When we reach the town you 
 must explain to me this monstrous incongruity." 
 
 During this short dialogue our comrades, who had spurred 
 their sorry nags, joined us at the foot of the cross. I told 
 them briefly what had taken place : I remounted my hack, 
 and the bells of the parish were slowly calling to prayer when 
 we alighted at the most out-of-the-way and obscure of the 
 inns of Bellver. 
 
 II. 
 
 Rosy and azure flames were curling and crackling all along 
 the huge oak log which burned in the wide fire-place ; our 
 
THE DEVI US CROSS ce 
 
 shadows, thrown in wavering grotesques on the blackened 
 walls, dwindled or grew gigantic according as the blaze 
 emitted more or less brilliancy ; the alderwood cup, now 
 empty, now full (and not with water), like the buckets of an 
 irrigating wheel, had been thrice passed round the circle that 
 we formed about the fire, and all were awaiting impatiently 
 the story of The Devil's Cross, promised us by way of dessert 
 after the frugal supper which we had just eaten, when 
 our guide coughed twice, tossed down a last draught of 
 wine, wiped his mouth on the back of his hand and began 
 thus : 
 
 " It was a long, long time ago, how long I cannot say, but 
 the Moors were occupying yet the greater part of Spain, our 
 kings were called counts, and the towns and villages were 
 held in fief by certain lords, who in turn rendered homage 
 to others more powerful, when that event which I am about 
 to relate took place." 
 
 After this brief historical introduction, the hero of the 
 occasion remained silent some few moments, as if to arrange 
 his thoughts, and proceeded thus : 
 
 " Well ! the story goes that in that remote time this town 
 and some others formed part of the patrimony of a noble 
 baron whose seigniorial castle stood for many centuries upon 
 the crest of a crag bathed by the Segre, from which it takes 
 its name. 
 
 " Some shapeless ruins that, overgrown with wild 
 mustard and moss, may still be seen upon the summit from 
 the road which leads to this town, testify to the truth of my 
 story. 
 
 " I do not know whether by chance or through some deed 
 of shame it came to pass that this lord, who was detested by 
 his vassals for his cruelty, and for his evil disposition refused 
 admission to court by the king and to their homes by his 
 neighbors, grew weary of living alone with his bad temper 
 
^6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 and his cross-bowmen on the top of the rock where his fore- 
 fathers had hung their nest of stone. 
 
 " Night and day he taxed his wits to find some amusement 
 consonant with his character, which was no easy matter, since 
 he had grown tired of making war on his neighbors, beating 
 his servants and hanging his subjects. 
 
 " At this time, the chronicles relate, there occurred to him, 
 though without precedent, a happy idea. 
 
 " Knowing that the Christians of other nations were pre- 
 paring to go forth, united in a formidable fleet, to a marvellous 
 country in order to reconquer the sepulchre of our Lord Jesus 
 Christ which was in possession of the Moors, he determined 
 to join their following. 
 
 " Whether he entertained this idea with intent of atoning 
 for his sins, which were not few, by shedding blood in so 
 righteous a cause ; or whether his object was to remove to a 
 place where his vicious deeds were not known, cannot be 
 said ; but it is true that to the great satisfaction of old and 
 young, of vassals and equals, he gathered together what 
 money he could, released his towns, at a heavy price, from 
 their allegiance, and reserving of his estates no more than 
 the crag of the Segre and the four towers of the castle, his 
 ancestral seat, disappeared between the night and the 
 morning. 
 
 " The whole district drew a long breath, as if awakened 
 from a nightmare. 
 
 " Now no longer clusters of men, instead of fruits, hung 
 from the trees of their orchards ; the young peasant girls no 
 longer feared to go, their jars upon their heads, to draw water 
 from the wells by the wayside ; nor did the shepherds lead 
 their flocks to the Segre by the roughest secret paths, fearing 
 at every turn of the steep track to encounter the cross-bowmen 
 of their dearly beloved lord. 
 
 " Thus three years elapsed. The story of the Wicked 
 
THE DEVILS CROSS 57 
 
 Count, for by that name only was he known, had come to be 
 the exclusive possession of the old women, who in the long, 
 long winter evenings would relate his atrocities with hollow 
 and fearful voice to the terrified children, while mothers 
 would affright their naughty toddlers and crying babies by 
 saying : ' Here comes the Count of the Segre I ' When behold ! 
 I know not whether by day or by night, whether fallen from 
 heaven or cast forth by hell, the dreaded Count appeared 
 indeed, and, as we say, in flesh and bone, in the midst of his 
 former vassals. 
 
 " I forbear to describe the effect of this agreeable surprise. 
 You can imagine it better than I can depict it, merely from 
 my telling you that he returned claiming his forfeited rights ; 
 that if he went away evil, he came back worse ; and that if 
 he was poor and without credit before going to the war, now 
 he could count on no other resources than his desperation, 
 his lance and a half dozen adventurers as profligate and im- 
 pious as their chieftain. 
 
 " As was natural, the towns refused to pay tribute, from 
 which at so great cost they had bought exemption, but the 
 Count fired their orchards, their farm-houses and their crops. 
 
 " Then they appealed to the royal justice of the realm, but 
 the Count ridiculed the letters mandatory of his sovereign 
 lords ; he nailed them over the sally-port of his castle and 
 hung the bearers from an oak. 
 
 " Exasperated, and seeing no other way of salvation, at 
 last they made a league with one another, commended them- 
 selves to Providence and took up arms ; but the Count 
 gathered his followers, called the Devil to his aid, mounted 
 his rock and made ready for the struggle. 
 
 " It began, terrible and bloody. There was fighting with all 
 sorts of weapons, in all places and at all hours, with sword 
 and fire, on the mountain and in the plain, by day and by 
 night. 
 
jjS ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " This was not fighting to live ; it was living to fight. 
 
 " In the end the cause of justice triumphed. You shall 
 hear how. 
 
 " One dark, intensely dark night, when no sound was 
 heard on earth nor a single star shone in heaven, the lords 
 of the fortress, elated by a recent victory, divided the booty 
 and, drunk with the fume of the liquors, in the midst of their 
 mad and boisterous revel intoned sacrilegious songs in praise 
 of their infernal patron. 
 
 " As I have said, nothing was heard around the castle save 
 the echo of the blasphemies which throbbed out into the 
 black bosom of the night like the throbbing of lost souls 
 wrapped in the hurricane folds of hell. 
 
 " Now the careless sentinels had several times fixed their 
 eyes on the hamlet which rested in silence and, without fear 
 of a surprise, had fallen asleep leaning on the thick staves of 
 their lances, when, lo and behold I a few villagers, resolved 
 to die and protected by the darkness, began to scale the crag 
 of the Segre whose crest they reached at the very moment of 
 midnight. 
 
 " Once on the summit, that which remained for them to 
 do required little time. The sentinels passed with a single 
 bound the barrier which separates sleep from death. Fire, 
 applied with resinous torches to drawbridge and portcullis, 
 leaped with lightning rapidity to the walls, and the scaling- 
 party, favored by the confusion and making their way through 
 the flames, put an end to the occupants of that fortress in the 
 twinkling of an eye. 
 
 " All perished. 
 
 " When the next day began to whiten the lofty tops of the 
 junipers, the charred remains of the fallen towers were still 
 smoking, and through their gaping breaches it was easy to 
 discern, glittering as the light struck it, where it hung sus- 
 pended from one of the blackened pillars of the banquet hall, 
 
r 
 
 TWii? DEVIL'S CROSS 
 
 59 
 
 the armor of the dreaded chieftain whose dead body, covered 
 with blood and dust, lay between the torn tapestries and the 
 hot ashes, confounded with the corpses of his obscure com- 
 panions. 
 
 " Time passed. Briers began to creep through the de- 
 serted courts, ivy to climb the dark heaps of masonry, and the 
 blue morning-glory to sway and swing from the very turrets. 
 The changeful sighs of the breeze, the croaking of the bifds 
 of night, and the soft stir of reptiles gliding through the tall 
 weeds alone disturbed from time to time the deathly silence 
 of that accursed place. The unburied bones of its former 
 inhabitants lay white in the moonlight and still there could 
 be seen the bundled armor of the Count of the Segre hanging 
 from the blackened pillar of the banquet hall. 
 
 " No one dared touch it, but a thousand fables were cur- 
 rent concerning it. It was a constant source of foolish 
 reports and terrors among those who saw it flashing in the 
 sunlight by day, or thought they heard in the depths of 
 the night the metallic sound of its pieces as they struck one 
 another when the wind moved them, with a prolonged and 
 doleful groan. 
 
 " Notwit,hstanding all the stories which were set afloat con- 
 cerning the armor and which the people of the surrounding 
 region repeated in hushed tones one to another, they were 
 no more than stories, and the only positive result was a con- 
 stant state of fear that every one tried for his own part to 
 dissimulate, putting, as we say, a brave face on it. 
 
 " If the matter had gone no further, no harm would have 
 been done. But the Devil, who apparently was not satisfied 
 with his v/ork, began, no doubt with the permission of God, 
 that so the country might expiate its sins, to take a hand in 
 the game. 
 
 " From that moment the tales, which until then had been 
 nothing more than vague rumors without any show of truth, 
 
6o ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 began to assume consistency and to grow from day to day 
 more probable. 
 
 " Finally there came nights in which all the village-folk 
 were able to see a strange phenomenon. 
 
 "Amid the shadows in the distance, now climbing the 
 steep, twisting paths of the crag of the Segre, now wander- 
 ing among the ruins of the castle, now seeming to oscillate 
 in the air, mysterious and fantastic lights were seen gliding, 
 crossing, vanishing and reappearing to recede in different 
 directions, — lights whose source no one could explain. 
 
 " This was repeated for three or four nights during the 
 space of a month and the perplexed villagers looked in dis- 
 quietude for the result of those conventicles, for which cer- 
 tainly they were not kept waiting long. Soon three or four 
 homesteads in flames, a number of missing cattle, and the 
 dead bodies of a few travellers, thrown from precipices, 
 alarmed all the region for ten leagues about. 
 
 " Now no doubt remained. A band of evildoers were 
 harboring in the dungeons of the castle. 
 
 " These desperadoes, who showed themselves at first only 
 very rarely and at definite points of the forest which even to 
 this day extends along the river, finally came to hold almost 
 all the passes of the mountains, to lie in ambush by the roads, 
 to plunder the valleys and to descend like a torrent on the 
 plain where, slaughtering indiscriminately, they did not leave 
 a doll with its head on. 
 
 " Assassinations multiplied ; young girls disappeared and 
 children were snatched from their cradles despite the lamen- 
 tations of their mothers to furnish those diabolical feasts at 
 which, it was generally believed, the sacramental vessels stolen 
 from the profaned churches were used as goblets. 
 
 " Terror took such possession of men's souls that, when 
 the bell rang for the Angelus, nobody dared to leave his 
 
THE DEVI US CROSS 6i 
 
 house, though even there was no certain security against the 
 banditti of the crag. 
 
 " But who were they ? Whence had they come ? What 
 was the name of their mysterious chief? This was the 
 enigma which all sought to explain, but which thus far no 
 one could solve, although it was noticed that from this time 
 on the armor of the feudal lord had disappeared from the 
 place it had previously occupied, and afterwards various 
 peasants had affirmed that the captain of this inhuman crew 
 marched at its head clad in a suit of mail which, if not the 
 same, was its exact counterpart. 
 
 " But in the essential fact, when stripped of that fantastic 
 quality with which fear augments and embellishes its cher- 
 ished creations, there was nothing necessarily supernatural 
 Hor strange. 
 
 " What was more common in outlaws than the barbarities 
 for which this band was distinguished or more natural than 
 that their chief should avail himself of the abandoned armor 
 of the Count of the Segre ? 
 
 " But the dying revelations of one of his followers, taken 
 prisoner in the latest affray, heaped up the measure of evi- 
 dence, convincing the most incredulous. Less or more in 
 words, the substance of his confession was this : 
 
 " * I belong,' he said, * to a noble family. My youthful 
 irregularities, my mad extravagances, and finally my crimes 
 drew upon my head the wrath of my kindred and the curse 
 of my father, who, at his death, disinherited me. Finding 
 myself alone and without any resources whatever, it was the 
 Devil, without doubt, who must needs suggest to me the idea 
 of gathering together some youths in a situation similar to 
 my own. These, seduced by the promise of a future of dis- 
 sipation, liberty and abundance, did not hesitate an instant 
 to subscribe to my designs. 
 
 " * These designs consisted in forming a band of young 
 
62 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 men of gay temper, unscrupulous and reckless, who thence- 
 forward would live joyously on the product of their valor and 
 at the cost of the country, until God should please to dispose 
 of each according to His will, as happens to me this day. 
 
 " * With this object we chose this district as the theatre of 
 our future expeditions, and selected as the point most suit- 
 able for our gatherings the abandoned castle of the Segre, a 
 place peculiarly secure, not only because of its strong and 
 advantageous position, but as defended against the peasantry 
 by their superstitions and dread. 
 
 " * Gathered one night under its ruined arcades, around a 
 bonfire that illumined with its ruddy glow the deserted 
 galleries, a heated dispute arose as to which of us should be 
 chosen chief. 
 
 " ' Each one alleged his merits ; I advanced my claims ; 
 already some were muttering together with threatening looks, 
 and others, whose voices were loud in drunken quarrel, had 
 their hands on the hilts of their poniards to settle the ques- 
 tion, when we suddenly heard a strange rattling of armor, 
 accompanied by hollow, resounding footsteps which became 
 more and more distinct. We all cast around uneasy, sus- 
 picious glances. We rose and bared our blades, determined 
 to sell our lives dear, but we could only stand motionless on 
 seeing advance, with firm and even tread, a man of lofty 
 stature, completely armed from head to foot, his face covered 
 with the visor of his helmet. Drawing his broad-sword, 
 which two men could scarcely wield, and placing it upon one 
 of the charred fragments of the fallen arcades, he exclaimed 
 in a voice hollow and deep like the murmurous fall of sub- 
 terranean waters : 
 
 " * -^ any one of you dare to be first ^ while I dwell in the 
 castle of the Segre, let him take up this sword, emblem of power, 
 
 " * All were silent until, the first moment of astonishment 
 passed, with loud voices we proclaimed him our captain, 
 
THE DEVIL'S CROSS 6j 
 
 offering him a glass of our wine. This he declined by signs, 
 perchance that he need not reveal his face, which in vain we 
 strove to distinguish across the iron bars hiding it from our 
 eyes. 
 
 " ' Nevertheless we swore that night the most terrible oaths, 
 and on the following began our nocturnal raids. In these, 
 our mysterious chief went always at our head. Fire does not 
 stop him, nor dangers intimidate him, nor tears move him. 
 He never speaks, but when blood smokes on our hands, 
 when churches fall devoured by the flames, when women 
 flee affrighted amid the ruins, and children utter screams of 
 pain, and the old men perish under our blows, he answers 
 the groans, the imprecations and the lamentations with a 
 loud laugh of savage joy. 
 
 '' ' Never does he lay aside his arms nor lift the visor of 
 his helmet after victory nor take part in the feast nor yield 
 himself to slumber. The swords that strike him pierce his 
 armor without causing death or drawing blood ; fire reddens 
 His coat of mail and yet he pushes on undaunted amid the 
 flames, seeking new victims ; he scorns gold, despises beauty, 
 and is not moved by ambition. 
 
 " * Among ourselves, some think him a madman, others a 
 ruined noble who from a remnant of shame conceals his 
 face, and there are not wanting those who are persuaded that 
 it is the yery Devil in person.' 
 
 " The author of these revelations died with a mocking 
 smile on his lips and without repenting of his sins ; divers 
 of his comrades followed him at different times to meet their 
 punishment, but the dreaded chief, to whom continually 
 gathered new proselytes, did not cease his ravages. 
 
 " The unhappy inhabitants of the region, more and more 
 harassed and desperate, had not yet achieved that pitch of 
 resolution necessary to put an end, once for all, to this order 
 of things, every day more insupportable and grievous. 
 
64 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " Adjoining the hamlet and hidden in the depths of a dense 
 forest, there dwelt at this time, in a little hermitage dedicated 
 to Saint Bartholomew, a holy man of godly and exemplary 
 life, whom the peasants always held in an odor of sanctity, 
 thanks to his wholesome counsels and sure predictions. 
 
 " This venerable hermit, to whose prudence and proverbial 
 wisdom the people of Bellver committed the solution of their 
 difficult problem, after seeking divine aid through his patron 
 saint, who, as you know, is well acquainted with the Devil, 
 and on more than one occasion has put him in a tight place, 
 advised that they should lie in ambush during the night at 
 the foot of the stony road which winds up to the rock on 
 whose summit stands the castle. He charged them at the 
 same time that, once there, they should use no other weapons 
 to apprehend the Enemy than a wonderful prayer which he 
 had them commit to memory, and with which the chronicles 
 assert that Saint Bartholomew had made the Devil his 
 prisoner. 
 
 " The plan was put into immediate execution, and its suc- 
 cess exceeded all hopes, for the morrow's sun had not lit the 
 high tower of Bellver when its inhabitants gathered in groups 
 in the central square, telling one another with an air of mystery 
 how, that night, the famous captain of the banditti of the 
 Segre had come into the town bound hand and foot and 
 securely tied to the back of a strong mule. 
 
 " By what art the actors in this enterprise had brought it 
 to such fortunate issue no one succeeded in finding out nor 
 were they themselves able to tell ; but the fact remained 
 that, thanks to the prayer of the Saint or to the daring of his 
 devotees, the attempt had resulted as narrated. 
 
 " As soon as the news began to spread from mouth to 
 mouth and from house to house, throngs rushed into the 
 streets with loud huzzas and were soon massed before 
 the doors of the prison. The parish bell called together the 
 
THE DEVIL'S CROSS. 65 
 
 civic body, the most substantial citizens met in council, and 
 all awaited in suspense the hour when the criminal should 
 appear before his improvised judges. 
 
 " These judges, who were authorized by the sovereign 
 power of Urgel to administer themselves justice prompt and 
 stern to those malefactors, deliberated but a moment, after 
 which they commanded that the culprit be brought before 
 them to receive his sentence. 
 
 " As I have said, as in the central square, so in the streets 
 through which the prisoner must pass to the place where he 
 should meet his judges, the impatient multitude thronged like 
 a clustered swarm of bees. Especially at the gateway of 
 the prison the popular excitement mounted from moment to 
 moment, and already animated dialogues, sullen mutterings 
 and threatening shouts had begun to give the warders anxiety, 
 when fortunately the order came to bring forth the criminal. 
 
 " As he appeared below the massive arch of the prison 
 portal, in complete armor, his face covered with the visor, a 
 low, prolonged murmur of admiration and surprise rose from 
 the compact multitude which with difficulty opened to let him 
 pass. 
 
 " All had recognized in that coat of mail the well-known 
 armor of the Count of the Segre, that armor which had been 
 the object of the most gloomy traditions while it had been 
 hanging from the ruined walls of the accursed stronghold. 
 
 " This was that armor ; there was left no room for doubt. 
 All had seen the black plume waving from his helmet's crest 
 in the battles which formerly they had fought against their 
 lord ; all had seen it, blowing in the morning breeze, like 
 the ivy of the flame-gnawed pillar on which the armor had 
 hung since the death of its owner. But who could be the 
 unknown personage who was wearing it now ? Soon it 
 would be known ; at least, so they thought. Events will 
 show how this expectation, like many another, was frustrated 
 
66 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 and how out of this solemn act of justice, from which might 
 have been expected a complete revelation of the truth, there 
 resulted new and more inexplicable confusions. 
 
 " The mysterious bandit arrived finally at the Council Hall 
 and a profound silence followed the murmurs which had 
 arisen among the bystanders on hearing resound beneath 
 the lofty arches of that chamber the click of his golden spurs. 
 One of the members of the tribunal in a slow and uncertain 
 voice asked his name, and all anxiously listened that they 
 might not lose one word of his response, but the warrior 
 only shrugged his shoulders lightly with an air of contempt 
 and insult, which could but irritate his judges, who exchanged 
 glances of surprise. 
 
 " Three times the question was repeated, and as often 
 received the same or a similar reply. 
 
 " • Have him lift his visor ! Have him show his face 1 
 Have him show his face 1 ' the citizens present at the trial 
 began to shout. * Have him show his face ! We will see if 
 then he dare insult us with his contempt, as he does now 
 hidden in his mail.' 
 
 " * Show your face,' demanded the same member of the 
 tribunal who had before addressed him. 
 
 " The warrior remained motionless. 
 
 " * I command you by the authority of this council.* 
 
 " The same answer. 
 
 " ' By the authority of this realm.* 
 
 " Nor for that. 
 
 " Indignation rose to its height, even to the point where 
 one of the guards, throwing himself upon the criminal, whose 
 pertinacious silence was enough to exhaust the patience of a 
 saint, violently opened his visor. A general cry of surprise 
 escaped from those within the hall, who remained for an in- 
 stant smitten with an inconceivable amazement. 
 
 " The cause was adequate. 
 
 I 
 
THE DEVIVS CROSS 67 
 
 " The helmet, whose iron visor, as all could see, was partly 
 lifted toward the forehead, partly fallen over the shining steel 
 gorget, was empty, — entirely empty. 
 
 " When, the first moment of terror passed, they would have 
 touched it, the armor shivered slightly and, breaking asunder 
 into its various pieces, fell to the floor with a dull, strange 
 clang. 
 
 " The greater part of the spectators, at the sight of the new 
 prodigy, forsook the room tumultuously and rushed in terror 
 to the square. 
 
 " The news spread with the speed of thought among the 
 multitude who were awaiting impatiently the result of the trial ; 
 and such was the alarm, the excitement and the clamor, that 
 no one longer doubted what the popular voice had asserted 
 from the first — that the Devil, on the death of the Count of 
 the Segre, had inherited the fiefs of Bellver. 
 
 " At last the tumult subsided, and it was decided to re- 
 turn the miraculous armor to the dungeon. 
 
 " When this was so bestowed, they despatched four envoys, 
 who, as representing the perplexed town, should present the 
 case to the royal Count of Urgel and the archbishop. In a 
 few days these envoys returned with the decision of those 
 dignitaries, a decision brief and comprehensive. 
 
 " ' Let the armor be hanged,' they said', * in the central 
 square of the town ; if the Devil occupies it, he will find it 
 necessary to abandon it or to be strangled with it.' 
 
 " The people of Bellver, enchanted with so ingenious a 
 solution, again assembled in council, ordered a very high gal- 
 lows to be erected in the square, and when once more the mul- 
 titude filled the approaches to the prison, went thither for the 
 armor in a body with all the civic dignity which the import- 
 ance of the case demanded. 
 
 " When this honorable delegation arrived at the massive 
 arch giving entrance to the building, a pallid and distracted 
 
68 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 man threw himself to the ground in the presence of the as- 
 tonished bystanders, exclaiming with tears in his eyes : 
 
 " * Pardon, senores, pardon 1 " 
 
 " * Pardon I For whom ? ' said some, ' for the Devil, who 
 dwells in the armor of the Count of the Segre ? ' 
 
 " * For me,' continued with shaking voice the unhappy man 
 in whom all recognized the chief warden of the prison, ' for 
 me — because the armor — has disappeared.' 
 
 " On hearing these words, amazement was painted on the 
 faces of as many as were in the portico ; silent and motion- 
 less, so they would have remained God knows how long if 
 the following narrative of the terrified keeper had not caused 
 them to gather in groups around him, greedy for every word. 
 
 " * Pardon me, senores^' said the poor warden, * and I will 
 conceal nothing from you, however much it may be against 
 me.' 
 
 " All maintained silence and he went on as follows : 
 
 " * I shall never succeed in giving the reason, but the fact 
 is that the story of the empty armor always seemed to me a 
 fable manufactured in favor of some noble personage whom 
 perhaps grave reasons of public policy did not permit the 
 judges to make known or to punish. 
 
 " ' I was ever of this belief — a belief in which I could not 
 but be confirmed by the immobility in which the armor re- 
 mained from the hour when, by the order of the tribunal, it 
 was brought a second time to the prison. In vain, night 
 after night, desiring to surprise its secret, if secret there were, 
 I crept up little by little and listened at the cracks of the iron 
 door of its dungeon. Not a sound was perceptible. 
 
 " * In vain I managed to observe it through a small hole 
 made in the wall ; thrown upon a little straw in one of the 
 darkest corners, it remained day after day disordered and 
 motionless. 
 
 " * One night, at last, pricked by curiosity and wishing to 
 
THE DEVIL'S CROSS 69 
 
 convince myself that this object of terror had nothing 
 mysterious about it, I Hghted a lantern, went down to the 
 dungeons, drew their double bolts and, not taking the pre- 
 caution to shut the doors behind me, so firm was my belief 
 that all this was no more than an old wives' tale, entered the 
 cell. Would I had never done it ! Scarcely had I taken a 
 few steps when the light of my lantern went out of itself and 
 my teeth began to chatter and my hair to rise. Breaking 
 the profound silence that encompassed me, I had heard 
 something like a sound of metal pieces which stirred and 
 clanked in fitting themselves together in the gloom. 
 
 " ' My first movement was to throw myself towatd the door 
 to bar the passage, but on grasping its panels I felt upon my 
 shoulders a formidable hand, gauntleted, which, after jerking 
 me violently aside, flung me upon the threshold. There I 
 remained until the next morning when my subordinates found 
 me unconscious and, on reviving, only able to recollect that 
 after my fall I had seemed to hear, confusedly, a sounding 
 tread accompanied by the clatter of spurs, which little by little 
 grew more distant until it died away.* 
 
 " When the warden had finished, profound silence reigned, 
 on which there followed an infernal outbreak of lamentations, 
 shouts and threats. 
 
 " It was with difficulty that the more temperate could con- 
 trol the populace, who, infuriated at this last turn of affairs, 
 demanded with fierce outcry the death of the inquisitive 
 author of their new disappointment. 
 
 " At last the tumult was quieted and the people began to 
 lay plans for a fresh capture. This attempt, too, had a 
 satisfactory outcome. 
 
 " At the end of a few days, the armor was again in the 
 power of its foes. Now that the formula was known and 
 the help of Saint Bartholomew secured, the thing was no 
 longer very difficult. 
 
yo ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " But yet something remained to be done ; in vain, after 
 conquering it, they hanged it from a gallows ; in vain they 
 exercised the utmost vigilance for the purpose of giving it 
 no opportunity to escape by way of the upper world. But as 
 soon as two fingers* breadth of light fell on the scattered 
 pieces of armor, they fitted themselves together and, clinkity 
 clank, made off again to resume their raids over mountain 
 and plain, which was a blessing indeed. 
 
 " This was a story without an end. 
 
 " In so critical a state of affairs, the people divided among 
 themselves the pieces of the armor that, perchance for the 
 hundredth time, had come into their possession, and prayed 
 the pious hermit, who had once before enlightened them with 
 his counsel, to decide what they should do with it. 
 
 " The holy man ordained a general fast. He buried him- 
 self for three days in the depths of a cavern that served 
 him as a retreat and at their end bade them melt the diabol- 
 ical armor and with this and some hewn stones from the 
 castle of the Segre, erect a cross. 
 
 " The work was carried through, although not without new 
 and fearful prodigies which filled with terror the souls of the 
 dismayed inhabitants of Bellver. 
 
 " As soon as the pieces thrown into the flames began to 
 redden, long and deep groans seemed to come out of the 
 great blaze, within whose circle of fuel the armor leapt as if 
 it were alive and felt the action of the fire. A whirl of sparks 
 red, green and blue danced on the points of the spiring 
 flames and twisted about hissing, as if a legion of devils, 
 mounted on these, would fight to free their lord from that 
 torment. 
 
 " Strange, horrible, was the process by which the incan- 
 descent armor lost its form to take that of a cross. 
 
 " The hammers fell clanging with a frightful uproar upon 
 the anvil, where twenty sturdy smiths beat into shape the 
 
THE n EVIL'S CROSS. 
 
 71 
 
 bars of boiling metal that quivered and groaned beneath the 
 blows. 
 
 " Already the arms of the sign of our redemption were 
 outspread, already the upper end was beginning to take form, 
 when the fiendish, glowing mass writhed anew, as if in fright- 
 ful convulsion, and enfolding the unfortunate workmen, who 
 struggled to free themselves from its deadly embrace, glit- 
 tered in rings like a serpent or contracted itself in zigzag like 
 lightning. 
 
 " Incessant labor, faith, prayers and holy water succeeded, 
 at last, in overcoming the infernal spirit, and the armor was 
 converted into a cross. 
 
 " This cross it is you have seen to-day, the cross in which 
 the Devil who gives it its name is bound. Before it the young 
 people in the month of May place no clusters of lilies, nor do 
 the shepherds uncover as they pass by, nor the old folk kneel ; 
 the strict admonitions of the priest scarcely prevent the boys 
 from stoning it. 
 
 " God has closed His ears to all supplications offered Him 
 in its presence. In the winter, packs of wolves gather about 
 the juniper which overshadows it to rush upon the herds ; 
 banditti wait in its shade for travellers whose slain bodies 
 they bury at its foot, and when the tempest rages, the light- 
 nings deviate from their course to meet, hissing, at the head 
 of this cross and to rend the stones of its pedestal." 
 
THREE DATES 
 
 In a portfolio which I still treasure, full of idle drawings 
 made during some of my semi-artistic excursions to the city 
 of Toledo, are written three dates. 
 
 The events whose memory these figures keep are up to a 
 certain point insignificant. 
 
 Nevertheless, by recollecting them I have entertained my- 
 self on certain wakeful nights in shaping a novel more or less 
 sentimental or sombre, in proportion as my imagination found 
 itself more or less exalted, and disposed toward the humor- 
 ous or tragic view of life. 
 
 If on the morning following one of these darkling, delirious 
 reveries, I had tried to write out the extraordinary episodes of 
 the impossible fictions which I invented before my eyelids 
 utterly closed, these romances, whose dim denouement finally 
 floats undetermined on that sea between waking and sleep, 
 would assuredly form a book of preposterous inconsistencies 
 but original and peradventure interesting. 
 
 This is not what I am attempting now. These light — one 
 might almost say impalpable — fantasies are in a sense like 
 butterflies which cannot be caught in the hands without there 
 being left between the fingers the golden dust of their wings. 
 
 I am going to confine myself, then, to the brief narration 
 of three events which are wont to serve as headings for the 
 chapters of my dream-novels ; the three isolated points which 
 I am accustomed to connect in my mind by a series of ideas 
 like a shining thread ; the three themes, in short, upon which 
 I play thousands on thousands of variations, amounting to 
 what might be called absurd symphonies of the imagination. 
 
 72 
 
THREE DATES 
 
 I. 
 
 73 
 
 There is in Toledo a narrow street, crooked and dim, 
 which guards so faithfully the traces of the hundred genera- 
 tions that have dwelt in it, which speaks so eloquently to the 
 eyes of the artist and reveals to him so many secret points 
 of affinity between the ideas and customs of each century, 
 and the form and special character impressed upon even its 
 most insignificant works, that I would close the entrances 
 with a barrier and place above the barrier a shield with this 
 device : 
 
 " In the name of poets and artists, in the name of those 
 who dream and of those who study, civilization is forbidden 
 to touch the least of these bricks with its destructive and 
 prosaic hand." 
 
 At one of the ends of this street, entrance is afforded by a 
 massive arch, flat and dark, which provides a covered passage. 
 
 In its keystone is an escutcheon, battered now and cor- 
 roded by the action of the years ; in it grows ivy which, 
 blown by the air, floats above the helmet, that crowns it, like 
 a plumy crest. 
 
 Below the vaulting and nailed to the wall is seen a shrine 
 with a sacred picture of blackened canvas and undecipher- 
 able design, in frame of gilt rococo, with its lantern hanging 
 by a cord and with its waxen votive offerings. 
 
 Leading away from this arch, which enfolds the whole place 
 in its shadow, giving to it an undescribable tint of mystery 
 and sadness, extend on the two sides of the street lines of 
 dusky, dissimilar, odd-looking houses, each having its indi- 
 vidual form, size and color. Some are built of rough, uneven 
 stones, without other adornment than a few armorial bearings 
 rudely carved above the portal ; others are of brick, with an 
 Arab arch for entrance, two or three Moorish windows open- 
 ing at caprice in a thick, fissured wall, and a glassed observa- 
 
74 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 tion turret topped by a lofty weather-vane. Some have a 
 general aspect which does not belong to any order of archi- 
 tecture and yet is a patchwork of all ; some are finished 
 models of a distinct and recognized style, some curious ex- 
 amples of the extravagances of an artistic period. 
 
 Here are some that boast a wooden balcony with incon- 
 gruous roof ; there are others with a Gothic window freshly 
 whitened and adorned with pots of flowers ; and yonder is 
 one with crudely colored tiles set into its door-frame, huge 
 spikes in its panels, and the shafts of two columns, perhaps 
 taken from a Moorish castle, mortised into the wall. 
 
 The palace of a grandee converted into a tenement-house ; 
 the home of a pundit occupied by a prebendary ; a Jewish 
 synagogue transformed into a Christian church ; a convent 
 erected on the ruins of an Arab mosque whose minaret is 
 still standing ; a thousand strange and picturesque contrasts ; 
 thousands on thousands of curious traces left by distinct races, 
 civilizations and epochs epitomized, so to speak, on one hun- 
 dred yards of ground. All the past is in this one street, 
 — a street built up through many centuries, a narrow, dim, 
 disfigured street with an infinite number of twists where each 
 man in building his house had jutted out or left a corner or 
 made an angle to suit his own taste, regardless of level, height 
 or regularity, — a street rich in uncalculated combinations of 
 lines, whh a veritable wealth of whimsical details, with so 
 many, many chance effects that on every visit it offers to the 
 student something new. 
 
 When I was first at Toledo, while I was busying myself in 
 making a few sketch-book notes of San Jua?i de los Reyes^ I 
 had to go through this street every afternoon in order to reach 
 the convent from the little inn, with hotel pretensions, where 
 I lodged. 
 
 Almost always I would traverse the street from one end to 
 the other without meeting a single person, without any further 
 
 ,# 
 
CLOISTER OF SAN JUAN DE LOS REYES 
 
OF TH€ 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
THREE DATES y^ 
 
 sound than my own footfalls disturbing the deep silence, with- 
 out even catching a chance glimpse, behind balcony-blind, 
 door-screen or casement-lattice, of the wrinkled face of a peer- 
 ing old woman, or the great black eyes of a Toledan girl. 
 Sometimes I seemed to myself to be walking through the 
 midst of a deserted city, abandoned by its inhabitants since 
 ages far remote. 
 
 Yet one afternoon, on passing in front of a very ancient, 
 gloomy mansion, in whose lofty, massive walls might be seen 
 three or four windows of dissimilar form, placed without order 
 or symmetry, I happened to fix my attention on one of these. 
 It was formed by a great ogee arch surrounded by a wreath 
 of sharply pointed leaves. The arch was closed in by a light 
 wall, recently built and white as snow. In the middle of this, 
 as if contained in the original window, might be seen a little 
 casement with frame and gratings painted green, with a flower- 
 pot of blue morning-glories whose sprays were clambering up 
 over the granite-work, and with panes of leaded glass cur- 
 tained by white cloth thin and translucent. 
 
 The window of itself, peculiar as it was, would have been 
 enough to arrest the gaze, but the circumstance most effec- 
 tive in fixing my attention upon it was that, just as I turned 
 my head to look at it, the curtain had been lifted for a moment 
 only to fall again, concealing from my eyes the person who 
 undoubtedly was at that same instant looking after me. 
 
 I pursued my way preoccupied with the idea of the window, 
 or, rather, the curtain, or, to put it still more clearly, the woman 
 who had raised it, for beyond all doubt only a woman could 
 be peeping out from that window so poetic, so white, so green, 
 so full of flowers, and when I say a woman, be it understood 
 that she is imaged as young and beautiful. 
 
 The next afternoon I passed the house, — passed with the 
 same close scrutiny ; I rapped down my heels sharply, aston- 
 ishing the silent street with the clatter of my steps, a clatter 
 
76 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 that repeated itself in responsive echoes, one after another ; 
 I looked at the window and the curtain was raised again. 
 
 The plain truth is that behind the curtain I saw nothing 
 at all ; but by aid of the imagination I seemed to discern a 
 figure, — the figure, in fact, of a woman. 
 
 That day twice or thrice I fell into a muse over my draw- 
 ing. And on other days I passed the house, and always when 
 I was passing the curtain would be raised again, remaining 
 so till the sound of my steps was lost in the distance and I 
 from afar had looked back at it for the last time. 
 
 My sketches were making but little progress. In that 
 cloister of San Juan de los Reyes, in that cloister so mys- 
 terious and bathed in so profound a melancholy, — seated on 
 the broken capital of a column, my portfolio on my knees, 
 my elbows on my portfolio, and my head between my hands, 
 — to the music of water which flows there with an incessant 
 murmur, to the rustling of leaves under the evening wind in 
 the wild, forsaken garden, what dreams did I not dream of 
 that window and that woman ! I knew her ; I knew her 
 name and even the color of her eyes. 
 
 I would see her crossing the wide and lonely courts of that 
 most ancient house, rejoicing them with her presence as a 
 sunbeam gilds a pile of ruins. Again I would seem to see 
 her in a garden of very lofty, very shadowy walls, among 
 colossal, venerable trees, such as there ought to be at the 
 back of that sort of Gothic palace where she lived, gathering 
 flowers and seating herself alone on a stone bench and there 
 sighing while she plucked them leaf from leaf thinking on — 
 who knows ? Perchance on me. Why say perchance ? As- 
 suredly on me. Oh, what dreams, what follies, what 
 poetry did that window awaken in my soul while I abode at 
 Toledo I 
 
 But my allotted time for sojourning in that city went by. 
 One day, heavy of heart and pensive of mood, I shut up all 
 
THREE DATES 77 
 
 my drawings in the portfolio, bade farewell to the world of 
 fancy, and took a seat in the coach for Madrid. 
 
 Before the highest of the Toledo towers had faded on the 
 horizon, I thrust my head from the carriage window to see it 
 once more, and remembered the street. 
 
 I still held the portfolio under my arm, and on taking my 
 seat again, while we rounded the hill which suddenly hid the 
 city from my eyes, I drew out my pencil and set down a date. 
 It is the first of the three, and the one which I call the Date 
 of the Window. 
 
 11. 
 
 At the end of several months, I again had an opportunity 
 to leave the Capital for three or four days. I dusted my 
 portfolio, tucked it under my arm, provided myself with a 
 quire of paper, a half-dozen pencils and a few napoleons 
 and, deploring the fact that the railroad was not yet finished, 
 .crowded myself into a public stage that I might journey in 
 reverse order through the scenes of Tirso's famous comedy 
 From Toledo to Madrid. 
 
 Once installed in the historic city, I devoted myself to 
 visiting again the spots which had most excited my interest 
 on my former trip, and certain others which as yet I knew 
 only by name. 
 
 Thus I let slip by, in long, solitary rambles among the 
 most ancient quarters of the town, the greater part of the 
 time which I could spare for my little artistic expedition, 
 finding a veritable pleasure in losing myself in that confused 
 labyrinth of blind lanes, narrow streets, dark passages and 
 steep, impracticable heights. 
 
 One afternoon, the last that I might at that time remain 
 in Toledo, after one of these long wanderings in unknown 
 ways, I arrived — by what streets I can scarcely tell — at a 
 great deserted square, apparently forgotten by the very in- 
 
yS ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 habitants of the city and hidden away, as it were, in one 
 of its most remote nooks. 
 
 The filth and the rubbish cast out in this square from time 
 immemorial had identified themselves, if I may say so, with 
 the earth in such a manner as to present the broken and 
 mountainous aspect of a miniature Switzerland. On the 
 hillocks and in the valleys formed by these irregularities were 
 growing at their own will wild mallows of colossal proportions, 
 circles of giant nettles, creeping tangles of white morning- 
 glories, stretches of that nameless, common herb, small, fine 
 and of a darkish green, and among these, swaying gently in 
 the light breath of the air, overtopping like kings all the other 
 parasitic plants, the no less poetic than vulgar yellow mustard, 
 true flower of wastes and ruins. 
 
 Scattered along the ground, some half buried, others al- 
 most hidden by the tall weeds, might be seen an infinite 
 number of fragments of thousands on thousands of diverse 
 articles, broken and thrown out on that spot in different 
 epochs, where they were in process of forming strata in 
 which it would be easy to follow out a course of genealogical 
 history. 
 
 Moorish tiles enamelled in various colors, sections of 
 marble and of jasper columns, fragments of brick of a hun- 
 dred varying kinds, great blocks covered with verdure and 
 moss, pieces of wood already nearly turned to dust, remains 
 of antique panelling, rags of cloth, strips of leather, and 
 countless other objects, formless, nameless, were what at first 
 sight appeared on the surface, even while the attention was 
 caught and the eyes dazzled by glancing sparks of light 
 sprinkled over the green like a handful of diamonds flung 
 broadcast and which, on closer survey, proved to be nothing 
 else than tiny bits of glass and of glazed earthenware, — pots, 
 plates, pitchftfs,-^that, flashing back the sunlight, counter- 
 feited a very heaven of microscopic, glittering stars. 
 
 4 
 
THREE DA TES 79 
 
 Such was the flooring of that square, though actually paved 
 in some places with small pebbles of various colors arranged 
 in patterns, and in others covered with great slabs of slate, 
 but in the main, as we have just said, like a garden of par- 
 asitic plants or a waste and weedy field. 
 
 Nor were the buildings which outlined its irregular form 
 less strange and worthy of study. On one side it was bounded 
 by a line of dingy little . houses, the roofs twinkling with 
 chimneys, weathercocks and overhangs, the marble guard- 
 posts fastened to the corners with iron rings, the balconies 
 low or narrow, the small windows set with flower-pots, and 
 the hanging lantern surrounded by a wire network to protect 
 its smoky glass from the missiles of the street urchins. 
 
 Another boundary was constituted by a great, time-black- 
 ened wall full of chinks and crevices, from which, amid 
 patches of moss, peeped out, with little bright eyes, the heads 
 of various reptiles, — a wall exceedingly high, formed of bulky 
 blocks sprinkled over with hollows for doors and balconies 
 that had been closed up with stone and mortar, and on one 
 of whose extremities joined, forming an angle with it, a wall 
 of brick stripped of its plaster and full of rough holes, 
 daubed at intervals with streaks of red, green and yellow and 
 crowned with a thatch of hay, in and out of which ran sprays 
 of climbing plants. 
 
 This was no more, so to speak, than the side scenery of 
 the strange stage-setting which, as I made my way into the 
 square, suddenly presented itself to view, captivating my 
 mind and holding it spell-bound for a space, for the true 
 culminating point of the panorama, the edifice which gave it 
 its general tone, rose at the rear of the square, more whim- 
 sical, more original, infinitely more beautiful in its artistic 
 disorder than all the buildings about. 
 
 "Here is what I have been wanting to find," I exclaimed 
 on seeing it, and seating myself on a rough piece of marble, 
 
8o ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 placing my portfolio on my knees and sharpening a pencil, 
 I made ready to sketch, though only in outline, its irregular 
 and eccentric form that I might ever keep it in memory. , 
 
 If I could fasten on here with wafers the very slight and 
 ill-drawn sketch of this building that I still keep, imperfect 
 and impressionistic though it is, it would save me a mountain 
 of words, giving to my readers a truer idea of it than all the 
 descriptions imaginable. 
 
 But since this may not be, I will try to depict it as best I 
 can, so that the readers of these lines may form a remote 
 conception if not of its infinite details, at least of its effect as 
 a whole. 
 
 Imagine an Arab palace with horse-shoe portals, its walls 
 adorned by long rows of arches with hundreds of intercross- 
 ings, running over a stripe of brilliant tiles ; here is seen 
 the recess of an arched window, cut in two by a group of 
 slender colonnettes and enclosed in a frame of exquisite, 
 fanciful ornament ; there rises a watch-tower with its light 
 and airy turret, roofed with glazed tiles of green and yellow, 
 its keen golden arrow losing itself in the void ; further on is 
 descried the cupola that covers a chamber painted in gold 
 and blue, or lofty galleries closed with green Venetian blinds 
 which on opening reveal gardens with walks of myrtle, groves 
 of laurel, and high-jetting fountains. All is unique, all har- 
 monious, though unsymmetrical ; all gives one a glimpse of 
 the luxury and the marvels of its interior ; all lets one divine 
 the character and the customs of its inmates. 
 
 The wealthy Arab who owned this edifice finally abandons 
 it ; the process of the years begins to disintegrate the walls, 
 dim their colors and even corrode their marbles. A king of 
 Castile then chooses for his residence that already crumbling 
 palace, and at this point he breaks the front, opening an ogee 
 and adorning it with a border of escutcheons through whose 
 midst is curled a garland of thistles and clover ; yonder he 
 
THREE DATES 8i 
 
 raises a massive fortress-tower of hewn stone with narrow 
 loopholes and pointed battlements ; further along he builds 
 on a wing of lofty, gloomy rooms, where may be seen, in 
 curious fellowship, stretches of shining tiles, dusky vaulting, 
 or a solitary Arab window, or a horse-shoe arch, light 
 and elegant, giving entrance to a Gothic hall, austere and 
 grand. 
 
 But there comes a day when the king, too, abandons this 
 dwelling, passing it over to a community of nuns, and these 
 in their turn remodel it, adding new features to the already 
 strange physiognomy of the Moorish palace. They lattice 
 the windows ; between two Arab arches they set the symbol 
 of their faith, carved in granite ; where tamarinds and laurels 
 used to grow they plant sad and gloomy cypresses ; and 
 making use of some remnants of the old edifice, and build- 
 ing on top of others, they form the most picturesque and in- 
 congruous combinations conceivable. 
 
 Above the main portal of the church, where may be dimly 
 seen, as if enveloped in the mystic twilight made by the 
 shadows of their canopies, a broadside of saints, angels and 
 virgins at whose feet are twisted — among acanthus leaves — 
 stone serpents, monsters and dragons, rises a slender min- 
 aret filagreed over with Moorish work ; close below the loop- 
 holes of the battlemented walls, whose merlons are now broken, 
 they place a shrine with a sacred fresco ; and they close up 
 the great slits with thin partitions decorated with little squares 
 like a chess-board ; they put crosses on all the pinnacles, 
 and finally they rear a spire full of bells which peal mourn- 
 fully night and day calling to prayer, — bells which swing at 
 the impulsion of an unseen hand, bells whose far-off sound 
 sometimes draws from the listener tears of involuntary grief. 
 
 Still the years are passing and are bathing in a dull, mellow, 
 nondescript hue the whole edifice, harmonizing its colors and 
 sowing ivy in its crevices. 
 
$2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 White storks hang their nests on the tower-vane, martins 
 build under the eaves, swallows in the granite canopies, and 
 the owls choose for their haunt lofty holes left by fallen 
 stones, whence on cloudy nights they affright superstitious 
 old women and timid children with the phosphoric gleam 
 of their round eyes and their shrill, uncanny hoots. 
 
 Only all these changes of fortune, only all these special 
 circumstances could have resulted in a building so individual, 
 so full of contrasts, of poetry and of memories ag^the one 
 which on that afternoon presented itself to my view and 
 which to-day I have essayed, albeit in vain, to describe by 
 words. 
 
 I had drawn it in part on one of the leaves of my sketch- 
 book. The sun was scarcely gilding the highest spires of 
 the city, the evening breeze was beginning to caress my 
 brow, when rapt in the ideas that suddenly had assailed me 
 on contemplating the silent remains of other eras more poetic 
 than the material age in which we live, suffocating in its utter 
 prose, I let my pencil slip from my fingers and gave over the 
 drawing, leaning against the wall at my back and yielding 
 myself up completely to the visions of imagination. Of what 
 was I thinking ? I do not know that I can tell. I clearly 
 saw epoch succeeding epoch, walls falling and other walls 
 rising in their stead. I saw men or, rather, women giving 
 place to other women, and the first and those who came after 
 changing into dust and flying like dust upon the air, a puff 
 of wind bearing away beauty, — beauty which had been wont 
 to call forth secret sighs, to engender passions, to be the 
 source of ecstasies ; then — what know I ? — all confused of 
 thought, I saw many things jumbled together, — boudoirs of 
 cunning work, with clouds of perfume and beds of flowers, 
 strait and dreary cells with prayer-stool and crucifix, at the 
 foot of the crucifix an open book, and upon the book a skull ; 
 stern and stately halls, hung with tapestries and adorned with 
 
THREE DA TES 
 
 83 
 
 trophies of war ; and many women passing and still repassing 
 before my gaze, tall nuns pale and thin, brown concubines 
 with reddest lips and blackest eyes ; great dames of faultless 
 profile, high bearing and majestic gait. 
 
 All these things I saw ; and many more of those which, 
 though visioned, cannot be remembered ; of those so im- 
 material that it is impossible to confine them in the narrow 
 compass of a word, — when suddenly I gave a bound upon 
 my seat and, passing my hand over my eyes to convince my- 
 self that I was not still dreaming, leaping up as if moved by 
 a nerve-spring, I fastened my gaze on one of the lofty turrets 
 of the convent. I had seen — there is no room for doubt 
 — perfectly had I seen a hand of transcendent whiteness, 
 which, reaching out from one of the apertures of those turrets 
 mortared like chess-boards, had waved several times as if 
 greeting me with a mute and loving sign. And it was I 
 whom it greeted ; there was no possibility of a mistake ; I 
 was alone, utterly alone in the square. 
 
 In vain I waited till night, nailed to that spot and without 
 removing my eyes for an instant from the turret; fruitlessly 
 I often returned to take up my watch again on the dark 
 stone which had served me for seat that afternoon when I 
 saw appear the mysterious hand, already the object of my 
 dreams by night and wildest fantasies by day. I beheld it 
 nevermore. 
 
 And finally came the hour when I must depart from Toledo, 
 leaving there, as a useless and ridiculous burden, all the 
 illusions which in its bosom had been raised in my mind. I 
 turned with a sigh to put my papers together in my portfolio ; 
 but before securing them there, I wrote another date, the 
 second, the one which I know as the Date of the Hand. As 
 I wrote it, I noticed for a moment the earlier, that of the 
 Window, and could not but smile at my own folly. 
 
84 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 III. 
 
 From the time of the strange occurrence which I have just 
 related until my return to Toledo, there elapsed about a year, 
 during which the memory of that afternoon was still present 
 to my imagination, at first constantly and in full detail, then 
 less often, and at last so vaguely that I even came to believe 
 sometimes that I had been the sport of an illusive dream. 
 
 Nevertheless, scarcely had I arrived at the city which 
 some with good reason call the Spanish Rome than this 
 recollection beset me anew and under its spell I set forth in 
 absent-minded fashion to roam the streets, without deter- 
 mined direction, with no preconceived purpose of making 
 my way to any special point. 
 
 The day was gloomy with that gloom which invades all 
 that one hears and sees and feels. The sky was the color 
 of lead, and under its melancholy shadow the houses seemed 
 older, quainter and duskier than ever. The wind moaned 
 along the tortuous, narrow streets, bearing upon its gusts, 
 like the lost notes of a mysterious symphony, unintelligible 
 words, the peal of bells, and echoes of heavy, far-off blows. 
 The damp, chill air froze the soul with its icy breath. 
 
 I wandered for several hours through the most remote and 
 deserted parts of the city, rapt in a thousand confused imag- 
 inings ; and, contrary to my custom, with a gaze all vague 
 and lost in space, nor could my attention be aroused by any 
 playful detail of architecture, by any monument of an un- 
 known style, by any marvellous and hidden work of sculpture, 
 by any one, in short, of those rare features for whose minute 
 examination I had been wont to pause at every step, at times 
 when only artistic and antiquarian interests held sway in my % 
 mind. 
 
 The sky was continually growing darker ; the wind was 
 blowing more strongly and more boisterously; and a fine 
 
THREE DATES. 85 
 
 sleet had begun to fall, very keen and penetrating, when un- 
 wittingly, — for I was still ignorant of the way — and as if borne 
 thither by an impulse which I could not resist, an impulse 
 whose occult force had brought me to the spot whither my 
 thoughts were tending, I found myself in the lonely square 
 which my readers already know. 
 
 On finding myself in that place I sprang to clear conscious- 
 ness from out the depths of that lethargy in which I had 
 been sunken, as if awakened from profound slumber by a 
 violent shock. 
 
 I looked about me. All was as I described it — nay, it 
 was more dreary. I know not whether this gloom was due 
 to the darkness of the sky, the lack of verdure, or the state 
 of my own spirit, but the truth is that between the feeling 
 with which I first contemplated that spot and this later im- 
 pression there was all the distance which lies Between poetic 
 melancholy and personal bitterness. 
 
 For some moments I stood gazing at the sombre convent, 
 now more sombre than ever to my eyes, and I was already 
 on the point of withdrawing when my ears were wounded by 
 the sound of a bell, a bell of broken, husky voice, which was 
 tolling slowly, while in vivid contrast it was accompanied by 
 something like a little clapper-bell which suddenly began to 
 revolve with the rapidity of a ringing so sharp and so in- 
 cessant that it seemed to have been seized by an attack of 
 vertigo. 
 
 Nothing was ever stranger than that edifice, whose black 
 silhouette was outlined against the sky like that of a cliff 
 bristling with thousands of freakish points, speaking with 
 tongues of bronze through bells that seemed moved by the 
 touch of invisible powers, the one weeping with smothered 
 sobs, the other laughing with shrill, wild outcry, like the 
 laughter of a madwoman. 
 
 At intervals and confused with the bewildering clamor of 
 
86 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the bells, I seemed to hear, too, something like the indistinct 
 notes of an organ and the words of a sacred, solemn chant. 
 
 I changed my intention ; and instead of departing I ap- 
 proached the door of the church and asked one of the ragged 
 beggars squatted on the stone steps : 
 
 " What is going on here ? " 
 
 " A taking of the veil," the mendicant answered, interrup- 
 ting the prayer which he was muttering between his teeth to 
 resume it later, although not until he had kissed the bit of 
 copper that I dropped into his hand as I put my question. 
 
 I had never been present at that ceremony, nor had I ever 
 seen the interior of the convent church. Both considerations 
 impelled me to enter. 
 
 The church was high and dark ; its aisles were defined by 
 two rows of pillars made up of slender columns gathered into 
 sheaves and resting on broad octagonal bases, while from 
 their rich crowning of capitals sprang the vaulting of the 
 strong ogee arches. The High Altar was placed at the 
 further end under a cupola of Renaissance style decorated 
 with great shield-bearing angels, grifhns, a profusion of foli- 
 age on the finials, cornices with gilded moldings and rosettes, 
 and odd, elaborate frescoes. Bordering the aisles might be 
 seen a countless number of dusky chapels, in whose recesses 
 were burning a few lamps like stars lost in a cloudy sky. 
 Chapels there were of Arab architecture, Gothic, rococo ; 
 some enclosed by magnificent iron gratings ; some by humble 
 wooden rails ; some submerged in shadow with an ancient 
 marble tomb before the altar ; some brightly lighted, with an 
 image clad in tinsel and surrounded by votive offerings of 
 silver and wax, together with little bows of gay-colored 
 ribbon. 
 
 The fantastic light which illuminated all the church, whose 
 structural confusion and artistic disorder were entirely in 
 keeping with the rest of the convent, tended to enhance its 
 
THREE DATES 8y 
 
 effect of mystery. From the lamps of silver and copper, 
 suspended from the vaulting, from the altar-candles, from the 
 narrow ogive windows and Moorish casements of the walls, 
 were shed rays of a thousand diverse hues, — white, stealing 
 in from the street by little skylights in the cupola ; red, spread- 
 ing their glow from the great wax-candles before the shrines ; 
 green, blue, and a hundred other diverse tints making their 
 way through the stained glass of the rose-windows. All these 
 lustres, insufficient to flood that sacred place with adequate 
 light, seemed at certain points to blend in strife, while others 
 stood out, clear patches of brightness, over against the veiled, 
 dim depths of the chapels. Despite the solemnity of the rite 
 which was there taking place, but few of the faithful were in 
 attendance. The ceremony had commenced some time ago 
 and was now nearing its close. The priests who officiated at 
 the High Altar were, at that moment, enveloped in a cloud of 
 azure incense which swayed slowly through the air, as they 
 descended the carpeted steps to take their way to the choir 
 where the nuns were heard intoning a psalm. 
 
 I, too, moved toward that spot with the intent of peering 
 through the double gratings which isolated the choir from 
 the rest of the church. It seemed borne in upon me that I 
 must know the face of that woman of whom I had seen only 
 — and for one instant — the hand ; and opening my eyes to 
 their widest extent and dilating the pupils in the effort to 
 give them greater power and penetration, I strained my gaze 
 on to the deepest recesses of the choir. Fruitless attempt ; 
 across the interwoven irons, little or nothing could be seen. 
 Some white and black phantoms moving amidst a gloom 
 against which fought in vain the inadequate radiance of a 
 few tall wax candles ; a long line of lofty, crocketed sedilia, 
 crowned with canopies, beneath which might be divined, 
 veiled by the dusk, the indistinct figures of nuns clad in long 
 flowing robes ; a crucifix illuminated by four candles and 
 
SS ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Standing out against the dark background of the picture as 
 those points of high light which, on the canvases of Rem- 
 brandt, make the shadows more palpable ; this was the 
 utmost that could be discerned from the place where I stood. 
 
 The priests, covered with their gold-bordered copes, pre- 
 ceded by acolytes who bore a silver cross and two great 
 candles, and followed by others who swung censers that shed 
 perfume all about, advancing through the throng of the faith- 
 ful who kissed their hands and the hems of their vestments, 
 finally reached the choir-screen. 
 
 Up to this moment I had not been able to distinguish, 
 amid the other vague phantoms, that of the maiden who 
 was about to consecrate herself to Christ. 
 
 Have you never seen, in those last instants of twilight, a 
 shred of mist rise from the waters of a river, the surface of 
 a fen, the waves of the sea, or the deep heart of a mountain 
 tarn, — a shred of mist that floats slowly in the void, and now 
 looks like a woman moving, walking, trailing her gown be- 
 hind her, now like a white veil fastening the tresses of an 
 invisible sylph, now a ghost which rises in the air hiding its 
 yellow bones beneath a winding-sheet against which is still 
 seen outlined its angular shape ? Such was the hallucination 
 I experienced in beholding draw near the screen, as if de- 
 taching herself from the sombre depth of the choir, that 
 white, tall, most lightly moving form. 
 
 The face I could not see. She had placed herself exactly 
 in front of the candles which lit up the crucifix ; and their 
 gleam, making a halo about her head, had left the rest ob- 
 scure, bathing her in a wavering shadow. 
 
 Profound silence reigned ; all eyes were fixed on her, and 
 the final act of the ceremony began. 
 
 The abbess, murmuring some unintelligible words, words 
 which in their turn the priests repeated with deep and hollow 
 voice, caught from the virgin's brow the en wreathing crown 
 
THREE DATES gg 
 
 of blossoms and flung it far away. — Poor flowers ! They 
 were the last she was to wear, that woman, sister of the 
 flowers even as all women are. 
 
 Then the abbess despoiled her of her veil, and her fair 
 tresses poured in a golden cascade down her back and 
 shoulders, which they were suffered to cover but an instant, 
 for at once there began to be heard, in the midst of that pro- 
 found silence reigning among the faithful, a sharp, metallic 
 chckity-click which set the nerves twitching, and first the 
 magnificent waves of hair fell from the forehead they had 
 shaded, and then those flowing locks that the fragrant air 
 must have kissed so many times slipped over her bosom and 
 dropped upon the floor. 
 
 Again the abbess fell to murmuring the unintelligible words ; 
 the priest repeated them ; and once more all was silence in 
 the church. Only from time to time were heard, afar off, 
 sounds like long-drawn, dreadful moans. It was the wind 
 complaining as it broke upon the edges of the battlements 
 and towers, and shuddering as it passed the colored panes 
 of the ogive windows. 
 
 She was motionless, motionless and pallid as a maiden of 
 stone wrenched from the niche of a Gothic cloister. 
 
 And they despoiled her of the jewels which covered her 
 arms and throat, and finally they divested her of her wedding 
 robe, that raiment which seemed to have been wrought that 
 a lover might break its clasps with a hand trembling for bliss 
 and passion. 
 
 The mystic Bridegroom was awaiting the bride. Where ? 
 Beyond the doors of death ; lifting, undoubtedly, the stone 
 of the sepulchre and calling her to enter, even as the timid 
 bride crosses the threshold of the sanctuary of nuptial love, 
 for she fell to the floor prostrate as a corpse. As if she were 
 clay, the nuns strewed her body with flowers, intoning a most 
 mournful psalm ; a murmur went up from amid the multitude, 
 
90 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 and the priests with their deep and hollow voices commenced 
 the service for the dead, accompanied by those instruments 
 that seem to weep, augmenting the unfathomable fear which 
 the terrible words they pronounce inspire of themselves. 
 
 De profundis clamavi a te ! chanted the nuns from the 
 depths of the choir with plaintive, lamenting voices. 
 
 Dies irae, dies ilia I responded the priests in thunderous, 
 awful echo, and therewith the bells pealed slowly, tolling for 
 the dead, and between the peals the metal was heard to vi- 
 brate with a strange and dolorous drone. 
 
 I was touched; flo, not touched — terrified. I believed 
 that I was in presence of the supernatural, that I felt the 
 heart of my own life torn from me, and that vacancy was 
 closing in upon me ; I felt that I had just lost something 
 precious, as a father, a mother, or a cherished wife, and I 
 suffered that immeasurable desolation which death leaves 
 behind wheresoever it passes, a desolation nameless, inde- 
 scribable, to be comprehended only by those who have had it 
 to bear. 
 
 I was still rooted to that spot with wildly staring eyes, 
 quaking from head to foot and half beside myself, when the 
 new nun rose from the ground. The abbess robed her in 
 the habit of the order, the sisters took lighted candles in their 
 hands and, forming two long lines, led her in procession back 
 to the further side of the choir. 
 
 There, amid the shadows, I saw the sudden glint of a ray 
 of light ; the door of the cloister was opened. As she stepped 
 beneath the lintel, the nun turned for the last time toward 
 the altar. The brightness of all the lights suddenly shone 
 upon her, and I could see her face. As I saw it, I had to 
 choke back a cry. 
 
 I knew that woman ; not that I had ever seen her, but I 
 knew her from the visions of my dreams ; she was one of those 
 beings whom the soul foretells or perchance remembers from 
 
THREE DATES 91 
 
 another better world which, in our descent to this, some of us 
 do not altogether forget. 
 
 I took two steps forward ; I longed to call to her — to cry 
 out — I know not what — giddiness assailed me ; but at that 
 instant the cloister door shut — forever. The silver bells rang 
 blithely, the priests raised a Hosanfia^ clouds of incense swept 
 through the aia-, the organ poured forth from a hundred metal 
 mouths a torrent of thunderous harmony, and the bells of the 
 tower began to chime, swinging with a frightful ecstasy. 
 
 That mad and clamorous glee made my hair rise on my 
 head. I looked about searching for the parents, family, 
 motherless children of that woman. I found none. 
 
 " Perhaps she was alone in the world," I said, and could 
 not repress a tear. 
 
 " God grant thee in the cloister the happiness which He 
 denied thee in the world 1 " simultaneously exclaimed an old 
 woman by my side, and she sobbed and groaned, clutching 
 the grating. 
 
 " Do you know her ? " I asked. 
 
 " The poor dear ! Indeed I knew her. I saw her born 
 and I have nursed her in my arms." 
 
 " And why does she take the veil ? " 
 
 " Because she found herself alone in the world. Her father 
 and mother died of the cholera on one and the same day, a 
 little more than a year ago. Seeing her an orphan and un- 
 protected, the dean gave her a dowry so that she might 
 enter the sisterhood ; and now you see — what else was there 
 to do ? " 
 
 " And who was she ? " 
 
 " Daughter of the steward of the Count of C , whom 
 
 I served until his death." 
 
 " Where did he live ? " 
 
 When I heard the name of the street, I could not repress 
 an exclamation of surprise. 
 
92 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 A line of light, that line of light which is as swift as thought, 
 running brightly through the obscurity and confusion of the 
 mind, uniting experiences far removed from one another and 
 marvellously binding them together, connected my vague 
 memories and I understood — or believed that I understood 
 —all. 
 
 This date, which has no name, I have not written any- 
 where, — nay ; I bear it written there where only I may read 
 it and whence it shall never be erased. 
 
 Occasionally in recalling these events, even now in relat- 
 ing them here, I have asked myself : — 
 
 Some day in the mysterious hour of twilight, when the 
 breath of the spring zephyr, warm and laden with perfumes, 
 penetrates even into the recesses of the most retired dwell- 
 ings, bearing there an airy touch of memory, of the world, 
 must not a woman, alone, lost in the dim shades of a Gothic 
 cloister, her cheek upon her hand, her elbow resting on the 
 embrasure of an ogive window, have exhaled a sigh as 
 the recollection of these dates crossed her imagination ? 
 
 Who knows ? 
 
 Oh 1 if she sighed, where might that sigh be ? 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKULL 
 
 The King of Castile was going to the Moorish war and, in 
 order to contend with the enemies of the faith, he had sent a 
 martial summons to all the flower of his nobility. The silent 
 streets of Toledo now resounded night and day with the 
 stirring sound of kettle-drums and trumpets ; and in the 
 Moorish gateway of Visagra, or in that of Cambron, or in 
 the narrow entrance to the ancient bridge of St. Martin, not 
 an hour passed without one's hearing the hoarse cry of the 
 sentinels proclaiming the arrival of some knight who, pre- 
 ceded by his seigniorial banner and followed by horsemen 
 and foot-soldiers, had come to join the main body of the 
 Castilian army. 
 
 The time which remained before taking the road to the 
 frontier and completing the order of the royal hosts was spent 
 in public entertainments, lavish feasts and brilliant tourna- 
 ments, iintil at last, on the evening before the day appointed 
 by His Highness for the setting out of the army, a grand 
 ball closed the festivities. 
 
 On the night of the ball, the royal palace presented a 
 singular appearance. In the spacious courts might be seen, 
 promiscuously mingled around huge bonfires, a motley mul- 
 titude of pages, soldiers, crossbowmen and hangers-on, who, 
 some grooming their chargers and polishing their arms pre- 
 paratory to combat, others bewailing with outcries and blas- 
 phemies the unforeseen turns of Fortune, personified for them 
 in the cast of the dice, and others chorusing the refrain of a 
 martial ballad which a minstrel was chanting to the accom- 
 
 93 
 
94 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 paniment of a rude violin ; others still buying of a palmer 
 cockle-shells, crosses and girdles hallowed by the touch of 
 the sepulchre of Santiago, or greeting with wild outbursts of 
 laughter the jokes of a clown, or practising on the trumpets 
 the battle-airs of the several seigniories, or telling old stories 
 of chivalry and love adventures, or of miracles recently per- 
 formed, — all contributed their quota to an infernal, undistin- 
 guishable uproar impossible to describe in words. 
 
 Above that tumultuous ocean of war songs, noise of ham- 
 mers smiting anvils, creaking of files that bit the steel, stamp- 
 ing of horses, insolent voices, irrepressible laughter, disorderly 
 shouts and intemperate reproaches, oaths and all manner of 
 strange, discordant sounds, there floated at intervals like a 
 breath of harmony the distant music of the ball. 
 
 This, which was taking place in the salons of the second 
 story of the palace, offered in its turn a picture, if not so 
 fantastic and capricious, more dazzling and magnificent. 
 
 Through galleries of far extent which formed an intricate 
 labyrinth of slender columns and ogees of fretted stone delicate 
 as lace ; through great halls hung with tapestries on which 
 silk and gold had pictured with a thousand diverse colors 
 scenes of love, of the chase and of war, — halls adorned with 
 trophies of arms and escutcheons over which was shed a sea 
 of sparkling light from innumerable lamps, suspended from 
 the loftiest vaults, and from candelabras of bronze, silver and 
 gold, fastened into the massive blocks of the walls ; on all 
 sides, wherever the eyes turned, might be seen floating and 
 drifting hither and thither a cloud of beautiful ladies in rich, 
 gold-embroidered garments, nets of pearls imprisoning their 
 tresses, necklaces of rubies blazing upon their breasts, feather 
 fans with ivory handles hanging from their wrists, veils of 
 white laces caressing their cheeks ; and joyous throngs of 
 gallants with velvet sword-belts, brocaded jackets and silken 
 trousers, morocco buskins, full-sleeved mantelets \^ith pointed 
 
THE VISAGRA GATE 
 

 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKULL 95 
 
 hoods, poniards with ornamental hilts, and rapiers polished, 
 thin and light. 
 
 But in that bright and shining assemblage of youthful 
 cavaliers and ladies, whom their elders, seated in the high 
 larch chairs which encircled the royal dais, with smiles of 
 joy saw defiling by, there was one woman who attracted 
 attention for her incomparable loveHness, one who had been 
 hailed Queen of Beauty in all the tournaments and courts of 
 love of the period, one whose colors the most valiant knights 
 had adopted as their emblem, one whose charms were the 
 theme of the songs of the troubadours most proficient in the 
 gay science, one toward whom all eyes turned with wonder, 
 for whom all hearts sighed in secret, around whom might be 
 seen gathering with eagerness, like humble vassals in the 
 train of their mistress, the most illustrious scions of the 
 Toledan nobility assembled at the ball that night. 
 
 Those presumptive gallants who were continually in the 
 retinue of the Dona Ines de Tordesillas, for such was the 
 name of this celebrated beauty, were never discouraged in 
 their suit despite her haughty and disdainful character. One 
 was emboldened by a smile which he thought he detected on 
 her lips ; another, by a gracious look which he deemed he 
 had surprised in her eyes ; another, by a flattering word, the 
 slightest sign of preference, or a vague promise. Each in 
 silence cherished the hope that he would be her choice. Yet 
 among them all there were two particularly prominent for 
 their assiduity and devotion, two who to all appearance, if not 
 the acknowledged favorites of the beauty, might claim to be 
 the farthest advanced upon the path to her heart. These 
 two knights, equals in birth, valor and chivalric accomplish- 
 ments, subjects of the same king and aspirants for the same 
 lady, were Alonso de Carrillo. and Lope de Sandoval. 
 
 Both were natives of Toledo ; together they had first borne 
 arms ; and on one and the same day, their eyes meeting those 
 
gS ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 of Dona Ines, both had conceived a hidden and ardent love 
 for her, a love that for some time grew in secrecy and silence, 
 but at length came to an involuntary betrayal of itself in their 
 actions and conversation. 
 
 At the tournaments in the Zocodover, at the floral games 
 of the court, whenever opportunity was presented for rivalry 
 in gallantry or wit, both knights had availed themselves of 
 it with eagerness, desirous to win distinction under the eyes 
 of their lady; and that night, impelled doubtless by the same 
 passion, changing their helmets for plumes and their mail for 
 brocade and silk, standing together by the seat where she 
 rested a moment after a turn through the salons, they began 
 to engage in a brilliant contest of exquisite and ingenious 
 phrases or keen and covert epigrams. 
 
 The lesser stars of that sparkling constellation, forming a 
 gilded semicircle around the two gallants, laughed and cheered 
 on the delicate strife ; and the fair lady, the prize of that 
 word-tournament, approved with a scarcely perceptible smile 
 the flashes of wit, elegantly phrased or full of hidden mean- 
 ing, whether they fell from the lips of her adorers like a light 
 wave of perfume flattering to her vanity, or leapt forth like a 
 sharp arrow seeking to pierce the opponent in his most vul- 
 nerable point, his self-love. 
 
 Already with each sally the courtly combat of wit and gal- 
 lantry was growing fiercer ; the phrases were still civil in 
 form, but terse and dry, and in the speaking, accompanied 
 though it was by a slight curving of the lips in semblance of 
 a smile, unconcealable lightnings of the eyes betrayed that 
 repressed anger which raged in the breasts of the rivals. 
 
 It was a situation that could not be sustained. The lady, 
 so perceiving, had risen to make another tour of the salons, 
 when an incident occurred that broke down the barrier of 
 formal courtesy which had hitherto restrained the two enam- 
 oured youths. Perchance intentionally, perchance through 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKULL oy 
 
 carelessness, Dona Ines had let fall upon her lap one of her 
 perfumed gloves whose golden buttons she had amused her- 
 self in pulling off one by one during the conversation. As 
 she rose, the glove slipped between the wide silken plaits of 
 her dress and fell upon the carpet. Seeing it drop, all the 
 knights who formed her brilliant retinue bent eagerly to re- 
 cover it, disputing with one another the honor of a slight 
 inclination of her head as a reward of their gallantry. 
 
 Noting the precipitation with which all stooped to pick 
 up her glove, a half smile of satisfied vanity appeared on the 
 lips of the haughty Dona Ines. With a gesture of general 
 acknowledgment to the cavaliers who had shown such eager- 
 ness to serve her, the lady, with a lofty, arrogant mien and 
 scarcely glancing in that direction, reached out her hand for 
 the glove toward Lope and Alonso, the first to reach it. In 
 fact, both youths had seen the glove fall close to their feet, 
 both had stooped with equal haste to pick it up and, on 
 rising, each held it seized by one end. On seeing them 
 immovable, looking silent defiance each upon the other, and 
 both determined not to give up the glove which they had 
 just raised from the floor, the lady uttered a light, involuntary 
 cry, stifled by the murmur of the astonished spectators. The 
 whole presented a threatening scene, that there in the royal 
 castle and in the presence of the king might be designated 
 as a serious breach of courtesy. 
 
 Lope and Alonso, notwithstanding, remained motionless, 
 mute, scanning each other from head to foot, showing no sign 
 of the tempest in their souls save by a slight nervous tremor 
 which shivered through their limbs as if they had been at- 
 tacked by a sudden fever. 
 
 The murmurs and exclamations were reaching a climax. 
 The people began to group themselves around the principal 
 actors in the scene. Dona Ines, either bewildered or taking 
 delight in prolonging the situation, was moving to and fro as 
 
98 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 if seeking refuge or escape from the eyes of the throng 
 whose numbers were continually augmented. Catastrophe 
 now seemed inevitable. The two young men had already 
 exchanged a few words in an undertone, and each, while 
 still with one hand holding the glove in a convulsive grip, 
 seemed instinctively to be seeking with the other the golden 
 hilt of his poniard, when the crowd of spectators respectfully 
 opened and there appeared the king. 
 
 His brow was tranquil. There was neither indignation in 
 his countenance nor anger in his bearing. 
 
 He surveyed the scene ; one glance was sufficient to put 
 him in command of the situation. With all the grace of the 
 most accomplished page, he drew the glove from the young 
 knights' hands ^which, as though moved by a spring, opened 
 without difficulty at the touch of their sovereign, and turning 
 to Dona Ines de Tordesillas, who, leaning on the arm of a 
 duenna, seemed about to faint, said with a firm though con- 
 trolled voice, as he presented the glove : 
 
 " Take it, senora^ and be careful not to let it fall again, 
 lest when you recover it, you find it stained with blood." 
 
 By the time the king had finished speaking. Dona Ines, 
 we will not undertake to say whether overcome by emotion, 
 or in order to retreat more gracefully from the situation, had 
 swooned in the arms of those about her. 
 
 Alonso and Lope, the former crushing in silence between 
 his hands his velvet cap whose plume trailed along the carpet, 
 and the latter biting his lips till the blood came, fixed each 
 other with a stubborn, intense stare. 
 
 A stare at that crisis was equivalent to a blow, a glove 
 thrown in the face, a challenge to mortal combat. 
 
 II. 
 
 At midnight, the king and queen retired to their chamber. 
 The ball was at an end, and the inquisitive folk outside, who, 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKULL go 
 
 forming groups and circles in the vicinity of the palace, had 
 been impatiently awaiting this moment, ran to station them- 
 selves beside the steep road, up in the balconies along the 
 route, and in the central square of the city, known as the 
 Zocodover. 
 
 For an hour or two there reigned, at these points and in 
 the adjacent streets, clamor, bustle, activity indescribable. 
 Everywhere might be seen squires caracoling on their richly 
 caparisoned steeds, masters-at-arms with showy vestments full 
 of shields and heraldic devices, drummers dressed in gay 
 colors, soldiers in shining armor, pages in velvet cloaks and 
 plumed hats, footmen who preceded luxurious chairs and 
 litters covered with rich cloth. The great, blazing torches 
 borne by the footmen cast a rosy glow upon the multitude, 
 who, with wondering faces, open mouths and frightened eyes, 
 saw with amazement all the chief nobility of Castile passing 
 by, surrounded on that occasion by fabulous splendor and 
 pomp. 
 
 Then, by degrees, the noise and excitement subsided, the 
 stained glass in the lofty ogive windows of the palace ceased 
 to shine, the last cavalcade passed through the close-packed 
 throngs, the rabble in their turn began to disperse in all 
 directions, disappearing among the shadows of the puzzling 
 labyrinth formed by those dark, narrow, tortuous streets, and 
 now the deep silence of the night was broken only by the 
 far-off call of some sentinel, the footsteps of some lingerer 
 whose curiosity had left him to the last, the clang of bolts 
 and bars in closing gates, when on the summit of the stone 
 stairway which leads to the platform of the palace, there ap- 
 peared a knight, who, after looking on all sides as if seeking 
 some one who should have been expecting him, slowly de- 
 scended to the Cuesta del Alcazar, by which he took his 
 way toward the Zocodover. 
 
 On arriving at the square, he halted a moment and cast a 
 
lOO ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 searching glance around. The night was dark, not a star 
 glistened in the sky, nor in all the square could a single light 
 be seen ; yet afar off, and in the same direction in which he 
 began to perceive a slight sound as of approaching footsteps, 
 he believed he saw the figure of a man, without doubt the same 
 whom he had seemed to await with such impatience. 
 
 The knight who had just quitted the castle for the Zoco- 
 dover was Alonso Carrillo, who, on account of the post of 
 honor which he held near the person of the king, had been 
 kept on attendance in the royal chamber until that hour. 
 The man coming to meet him out of the shadows of the 
 arcades which surround the square was Lope de Sandoval. 
 When the two knights were face to face, they exchanged a 
 few sentences in suppressed voices. 
 
 " I thought you would be expecting me," said the one. 
 
 " I hoped that you would surmise as much," answered the 
 other. 
 
 " Where shall we go ? " 
 
 " Wherever there can be found four handsbreadth of ground 
 to turn around in and a ray to give us light." 
 
 This briefest of dialogues ended, the two young men 
 plunged into one of the narrow streets leading out from 
 the Zocodover and vanished in the darkness like those phan- 
 toms of the night, which, after terrifying for an instant the 
 beholder, dissolve into atoms of mist and are lost in the depth 
 of the shadows. 
 
 A long time they went on, traversing the streets of Toledo, 
 seeking a suitable place to end their quarrel, but the darkness 
 of the night was so dense that the duel seemed impossible. 
 Yet both wished to fight and to fight before the whitening of 
 the east ; for at dawn the royal hosts were to go forth, and 
 Alonso with them. 
 
 So they pressed on, threading at random deserted squares, 
 dusky alleys, long and gloomy passages, till at last they saw 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKc^LL id 
 
 shining in the distance a light, a Hght small and waning, about 
 which the mist formed a circle of ghostly, glimmering lustre. 
 
 They had reached the Street of the Christ, and the radiance 
 discernible at one end seemed to come from the small lantern 
 which illuminated then and illuminates still the image that 
 gives the street its name. 
 
 On seeing it, both let escape an exclamation of joy and, 
 quickening their steps toward it, were not long in finding 
 themselves near the shrine in which it burned. 
 
 An arched recess in the wall, in the depths of which might 
 be seen the image of the Redeemer, nailed to the cross, with 
 a skull at his feet, a rude board covering for protection from 
 the weather, and a small lantern hung by a cord, swaying 
 with the wind and shedding a faint effulgence, constituted 
 the entire shrine. About it clung festoons of ivy which had 
 sprung up among the dark and broken stones forming, as it 
 were, a curtain of verdure. 
 
 The cavaliers, after reverently saluting the image of Christ 
 by removing their military caps and murmuring a short prayer, 
 glanced over the ground, threw off their mantles and, each 
 perceiving the other to be ready for the combat and both giv- 
 ing the signal by a slight motion of the head, crossed swords. 
 But scarcely had the blades touched when, before either of 
 the combatants had been able to take a single step or strike 
 a blow, the light suddenly went out, leaving the street plunged 
 in utter darkness. As if moved by the same thought, the two 
 antagonists, on finding themselves surrounded by that instan- 
 taneous gloom, took a step backward, lowered the points of 
 their swords to the ground and raised their eyes to the lantern, 
 whose light, a moment before extinguished, began to shine 
 anew at the very instant the duel was suspended. 
 
 " It must have been some passing gust that lowered the 
 flame," exclaimed Carrillo, placing himself again on guard, 
 and giving warning to Lope, who seemed preoccupied. 
 
jljba-. « - < . ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Lope took a step forward to recover the lost ground, ex- 
 tended his arm and the blades touched once more, but at their 
 touching the light again went out of itself, remaining thus until 
 the swords separated. 
 
 " In truth, but this is strange I " murmured Lope, gazing 
 at the lantern which had begun spontaneously to burn again. 
 The gleam, slowly wavering with the wind, spread a tremu- 
 lous, wonderful radiance over the yellow skull placed at the 
 feet of Christ. 
 
 " Bah 1 " said Alonso, " it must be because the holy woman 
 who has charge of the lamp cheats the devotees and scants 
 the oil, so that the light, almost out, brightens and then 
 darkens again in its dying agony." 
 
 Thus speaking, the impetuous youth placed himself once 
 more in attitude of defence. His opponent did the same ; 
 but this time, not only were they enveloped in a thick and 
 impenetrable gloom, but simultaneously there fell upon their 
 ears the deep echo of a mysterious voice like those long sighs 
 of the south-west wind which seems to complain and articu- 
 late words as it wanders imprisoned in the crooked, narrow 
 and dim streets of Toledo. 
 
 What was uttered by that fearful and superhuman voice 
 never could be learned ; but on hearing it, both youths were 
 seized with such profound terror that their swords dropped 
 from their hands, their hair stood on end, and over their 
 bodies, shaken by an involuntary tremor, and down their 
 pallid and distorted brows a cold sweat like that of death 
 began to flow. 
 
 The light, for the third time quenched, for the third time 
 shone again and dispelled the dark. 
 
 " Ah 1 " exclaimed Lope, beholding him who was now his 
 opponent, in other days his best friend, astounded like him- 
 self, like himself pale and motionless, " God does not mean to 
 permit this combat, for it is a fratricidal contest ; because a 
 
THE CHRIST OF THE SKULL 103 
 
 duel between us is an offence to heaven in whose sight we 
 have sworn a hundred times eternal friendship." And saying 
 this he threw himself into the arms of Alonso, who clasped 
 him in his own with unspeakable strength and fervor. 
 
 III. 
 
 Some moments passed during which both youths indulged 
 in every endearment of friendship and love. Alonso spoke 
 first and, in accents touched by the scene which we have 
 just related, exclaimed, addressing his comrade : 
 
 " Lope, I know that you love Dona Ines ; perhaps not as 
 much as I, but you love her. Since a duel between us is im- 
 possible, 1-et us agree to place our fate in her hands. Let us 
 go and seek her, let her decide with free choice which of 
 us shall be the happy one, which the wretched. Her decision 
 shall be respected by both, and he who does not gain her favor 
 shall to-morrow go forth with the King of Toledo and shall 
 seek the comfort of forgetfulness in the excitement of war." 
 
 "Since you wish it, so let it be," replied Lope. 
 
 And arm in arm the two friends took their way toward the 
 cathedral beneath whose shadow, in a palace of which there 
 are now no remains, dwelt Dona Ines de Tordesillas. 
 
 It was early dawn, and as some of the kindred of 
 Dona Ines, among them her brothers, were to march the 
 coming day with the royal army, it was not impossible that 
 early in the morning they could gain admittance to her 
 palace. 
 
 Inspired by this hope they arrived, at last, at the base of 
 the Gothic tower of the church, but on reaching that point a 
 peculiar noise attracted their attention and, stopping in one 
 of the angles, concealed among the shadows of the lofty 
 buttresses that support the walls, they saw, to their amaze- 
 ment, a man emerging from a window upon the balcony of 
 their lady's apartments in the palace. He lightly descended 
 
104 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 to the ground by the help of a rope and, finally, a white 
 figure. Dona Ines undoubtedly, appeared upon the balcony 
 and, leaning over the fretted parapet, exchanged tender 
 phrases of farewell with her mysterious lover. 
 
 The first motion of the two youths was to place their hands 
 on their sword-hilts, but checking themselves, as though 
 struck by a common thought, they turned to look on one an- 
 other, each discerning on the other's face a look of astonish- 
 ment so ludicrous that both broke forth into loud laughter, 
 laughter which, rolling on from echo to echo in the silence of 
 the night, resounded through the square even to the palace. 
 
 Hearing it, the white figure vanished from the balcony, a 
 noise of slamming doors was heard, and then silence resumed 
 her reign. 
 
 On the following day, the queen, seated on a most sumpt- 
 uous dais, saw defile past her the hosts who were marching 
 to the war against the Moors. At her side were the principal 
 ladies of Toledo. Among them was Dona Ines de Tordesillas 
 on whom this day, as ever, all eyes were bent. But it seemed 
 to her that they wore a different expression from that to which 
 she was accustomed. She would have said that in all the 
 curious looks cast upon her lurked a mocking smile. 
 
 This discovery could not but disquiet her, remembering, as 
 she did, the noisy laughter which, the night before, she had 
 thought she heard at a distance in one of the angles of the 
 square, while she was closing her balcony and bidding adieu 
 to her lover ; but when she saw among the ranks of the army 
 marching below the dais, sparks of fire glancing from their 
 brilliant armor, and a cloud of dust enveloping them, the two 
 reunited banners of the houses of Carrillo and Sandoval ; 
 when she saw the significant smile which the two former 
 rivals, on saluting the queen, directed toward herself, she 
 comprehended all. The blush of shame reddened her face 
 and tears of chagrin glistened in her eyes. 
 
THE WHITE DOE 
 
 In a small town of Aragon, about the end of the thirteenth 
 century or a little later, there lived retired in his seigniorial 
 castle a renowned knight named Don Dionis, who, having 
 served his king in the war against the infidels, was then 
 taking his ease, giving himself up to the merry exercise of 
 hunting, after the wearisome hardships of war. 
 
 It chanced once to this cavalier, engaged in his favorite 
 diversion, accompanied by his daughter whose singular 
 beauty, of the blond type extraordinary in Spain, had won 
 her the name of White Lily, that as the increasing heat of 
 the day began to tell upon them, absorbed in pursuing a 
 quarry in the mountainous part of his estate, he took for his 
 resting-place during the hours of the siesta a glen through 
 which ran a rivulet leaping from rock to rock with a soft and 
 pleasant sound. 
 
 It might have been a matter of some two hours that Don 
 Dionis had lingered in that delectable retreat, reclining on 
 the delicate grass in the shade of a black-poplar grove, talk- 
 ing affably with his huntsmen about the incidents of the day, 
 while they related one to another more or less curious ad- 
 ventures that had befallen them in their hunting experiences, 
 when along the top of the highest ridge and between alterna- 
 ting murmurs of the wind which stirred the leaves on the 
 trees, he began to perceive, each time more near, the sound 
 of a little bell like that of the leader of a flock. 
 
 In truth, it was really that, for very soon after the first 
 hearing of the bell, there came leaping over the thick under- 
 
io6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 growth of lavender and thyme, descending to the opposite 
 bank of the rivulet, nearly a hundred lambs white as snow, 
 and behind them appeared their shepherd with his pointed 
 hood drawn over his brows to protect him from the vertical 
 rays of the sun and with his shoulder-bag swung from the end 
 of a stick. 
 
 " Speaking of remarkable adventures," exclaimed on see- 
 ing him one of the huntsmen of Don Dionfs, addressing his 
 lord, " here is Esteban, the shepherd-lad, who has been now 
 for some time more of a fool than God made him, which was 
 fool enough. He can give us an amusing half-hour by 
 relating the cause of his continual frights." 
 
 " But what is it that happens to this poor devil ? " ex- 
 claimed Don Dionis with an air of piqued curiosity. 
 
 " A mere trifle," continued the huntsrnan in a jesting tone. 
 " The case is this — that without having been born on Good 
 Friday, or bearing a birthmark of the cross, or, so far as one 
 can infer from his regular Christian habits, binding himself 
 to the Devil, he finds himself, not knowing why or whence, 
 endowed with the most marvellous faculty that any man ever 
 possessed, unless it be Solomon, who, they say, understood 
 even the language of birds." 
 
 " And with what does this remarkable faculty have to 
 do?" 
 
 " It has to do," pursued the huntsman, " as he affirms, and 
 he swears and forswears it by all that is most sacred, with a 
 conspiracy among the deer which course through these 
 mountains not to leave him in peace, the drollest thing 
 about it being that on more than one occasion he has sur- 
 prised them in the act of contriving the pranks they were 
 going to play on him and after those tricks had been carried 
 through he has overheard the noisy bursts of laughter with 
 which they applaud them." 
 
 While the huntsman was thus speaking, Constanza, as the 
 
THE WHITE DOE 107 
 
 beautiful daughter of Don Dioriis was named, had drawn 
 near the group of sportsmen and, as she appeared curious to 
 hear the strange experience of Esteban, one of them ran on 
 to the place where the young shepherd was watering his flock 
 and brought him into the presence of his lord, who, to dispel 
 the perturbation and evident embarrassment of the poor 
 peasant, hastened to greet him by name, accompanying the 
 salutation with a benevolent smile. 
 
 Esteban was a boy of nineteen or twenty years, robust in 
 build, with a small head sunken between his shoulders, little 
 blue eyes, a wavering, stupid glance like that of albinos, a 
 flat nose, thick, half open Hps, low forehead, complexion fair 
 but tanned by the sun, and hair which fell partly over his 
 eyes and partly around his face, in rough red locks like the 
 mane of a sorrel nag. 
 
 Such, more or less exactly, was Esteban in point of phys- 
 ique. In respect to his character, it could be asserted with- 
 out fear of denial on his own part or on that of any one who 
 knew him, that he was an entirely honest, simple-hearted 
 lad, though, like a true peasant, a Httle suspicious and 
 malicious. 
 
 As soon as the shepherd had recovered from his confusion, 
 Don Dionis again addressed him and, in the most serious 
 tone in the world, feigning an extraordinary interest in 
 learning the details of the event to which his huntsman had 
 referred, put to him a multitude of questions to which Esteban 
 began to reply evasively, as if desirous of escaping any dis- 
 cussion of the subject. 
 
 Constrained, nevertheless, by the demands of his lord and 
 the entreaties of Constanza, who seemed most curious and 
 eager that the shepherd should relate his astounding adven- 
 tures, he decided to talk freely, but not without casting a 
 distrustful glance about him as though fearing to be over- 
 heard by others than those present, and scratching his head 
 
log ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 three or four times in the effort to connect his recollections 
 or find the thread of his narrative, before at last he thus 
 began : 
 
 " The fact is, my lord, that as a priest of Tarazona to 
 whom, not long ago, I went for help in. my troubles, told me, 
 wits don't serve against the Devil, but mum! finger on lip, 
 many good prayers to Saint Bartholomew — who, none better, 
 knows his knaveries — and let him have his sport ; for God, 
 who is just, and sits up thereon high, will see that all comes 
 right in the end. 
 
 " Resolved on this course I had decided never again to say 
 a word to any one about it, — no, not for anything ; but I will 
 do it to-day to satisfy your curiosity, and in good sooth, if, 
 after all, the Devil calls me to account and goes to troubling 
 me in punishment for my indiscretion, I carry the Holy 
 Gospels sewed inside my sheepskin coat, and with their help, 
 I think that, as at other times, I may make telling use of a 
 cudgel." 
 
 " But, come ! " exclaimed Don Dionis, out of patience with 
 the digressions of the shepherd, which it seemed would never 
 end, " let the whys and wherefores go, and come directly to 
 the subject." 
 
 " I am coming to it," calmly replied Esteban, and after 
 calling together, by dint of a shout and a whistle, the lambs 
 of which he had not lost sight and which were now beginning 
 to scatter over the mountain-side, he scratched his head again 
 and proceeded thus : 
 
 " On the one hand, your own continual hunting trips, and 
 on the other, the persistency of those trespassers who, what 
 with snare and what with crossbow, hardly leave a deer alive 
 in twenty days' journey round about, had, a little time ago, 
 so thinned out the game in these mountains that you could 
 not find a stag in them, not though you would give one of 
 your eyes. 
 
THE WHITE DOE IOq 
 
 " I was speaking of this in the town, seated in the porch 
 of the church, where after mass on Sunday I was in the habit 
 of joining some laborers who till the soil in Veraton, when 
 some of them said to me : 
 
 " • Well, man, I don't know why it is you fail to run across 
 them, since, as for us, we can give you our word that we don't 
 once go down to the ploughed land without coming upon their 
 tracks, and it is only three or four days since, without going 
 further back, a herd, which, to judge by their hoof-prints, 
 must have numbered more than twenty, cut down before its 
 time a crop of wheat belonging to the care-taker of the Virgen 
 del Romeral.' 
 
 " * And in what direction did the track lead ? ' I asked the 
 laborers, with a mind to see if I could fall in with the herd. 
 
 " * Toward the Lavender Glen,' they replied. 
 
 " This information did not enter one ear to go out at the 
 other ; that very night I posted myself among the poplars. 
 During all its hours I kept hearing here and there, far off as 
 well as near by, the trumpeting of the deer as they called one 
 to another, and from time to time I felt the boughs stirring 
 behind me ; but however sharply I looked, the truth is, I 
 could distinguish nothing. 
 
 " Nevertheless, at break of day, when I took the lambs to 
 water, at the bank of the stream, about two throws of the 
 sling from the place where we now are, and in so dense a 
 shade of poplars that not even at mid-day is it pierced by 
 a ray of sunshine, I found fresh deer-tracks, broken branches, 
 the stream a little roiled and, what is more peculiar, among 
 the deer-tracks the short prints of tiny feet no larger than 
 the half of the palm of my hand, without any exaggeration." 
 
 On saying this, the boy, instinctively seeming to seek a 
 point of comparison, directed his glance to the foot of Con- 
 stanza, which peeped from beneath her petticoat shod in a 
 dainty sandal of yellow morocco, but as the eyes of Don 
 
no ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Dionfs and of some of the huntsmen who were about him 
 followed Esteban's, the beautiful girl hastened to conceal it, 
 exclaiming in the most natural voice in the world : 
 
 " Oh, no ! unluckily mine are not so tiny, for feet of this 
 size are found only among the fairies of whom the trouba- 
 dours sing." 
 
 " But I did not give up with this," continued the shepherd, 
 when Constanza had finished. " Another time, having con- 
 cealed myself in another hiding-place by which, undoubtedly, 
 the deer would have to pass in going to the glen, at just about 
 midnight sleep overcame me for a little, although not so much 
 but that I opened my eyes at the very moment when I per- 
 ceived the branches were stirring around me. I opened my 
 eyes, as I have said; I rose with the utmost caution .and, 
 listening intently to the confused murmur, which every 
 moment sounded nearer, I heard in the gusts of wind some- 
 thing like cries and strange songs, bursts of laughter, and 
 three or four distinct voices which talked together with a 
 chatter and gay confusion like that of the young girls at the 
 village when, laughing and jesting on the way, they return in 
 groups from the fountain with their water-jars on their heads. 
 
 " As I gathered from the nearness of the voices and close- 
 by crackle of twigs which broke noisily in giving way to that 
 throng of merry maids, they were just about to come out of 
 the thicket on to a little platform formed by a jut of the 
 mountain there where I was hid when, right at my back, as 
 near or jiearer than I am to you, I heard a new voice, fresh, 
 fine and vibrant, which said — believe it, senores^ it is as true 
 as that I have to die — it said, clearly and distinctly, these 
 
 very words : 
 
 "' Hither, hither, comrades dear! 
 That dolt of an Esteban is here I * " 
 
 On reaching this point in the shepherd's story, the by- 
 standers could no longer repress the merriment which for 
 
THE WHITE DOE j j j 
 
 many minutes had been dancing in their eyes and, giving 
 free rein to their mirth, they broke into clamorous laughter. 
 ^Among the first to begin to laugh, and the last to leave off, 
 'were Don Dioni's, who, notwithstanding his air of dignity, 
 Icould not but take part in the general hilarity, and his 
 [daughter Constanza, who, every time she looked at Esteban, 
 all in suspense and embarrassment as he was, fell to laugh- 
 ing again like mad till the tears sprang from her eyes. 
 
 The shepherd-lad, for his part, although without heeding 
 the effect his story had produced, seemed disturbed and 
 irestless, and while the great folk laughed to their hearts' 
 [content at his simple tale, he turned his face from one side 
 the other with visible signs of fear and as if trying to 
 Idescry something beyond the intertwined' trunks of the 
 [trees. 
 
 What is it, Esteban, what is the matter ? " asked one of 
 |the huntsmen, noting the growing disquietude of the poor 
 Iboy, who now was fixing his fright-ened eyes on the laughing 
 daughter of Don Dionis, and again gazing all around him 
 with an expression of astonishment and dull dismay : 
 
 " A very strange thing is happening to me," exclaimed 
 Esteban. " When, after hearing the words which I have 
 just repeated, I quickly sat upright to surprise the person 
 who had spoken them, a doe white as snow leaped from the 
 very copse in which I was hidden and, taking a few prodi- 
 gious bounds over the tops of the evergreen oaks and mastic 
 trees, sped away, followed by a herd of deer of the natural 
 color ; and these, like the white one who was guiding them, 
 did not utter the cries of deer in flight, but laughed with 
 great peals of laughter, whose echo, I could swear, is sound- 
 ing in my ears at this moment." 
 
 " Bah, bah, Esteban ! " exclaimed Don Dionis, with a jest- 
 ing air, " follow the counsels of the priest of Tarazona ; do 
 not talk of your adventures with the joke-loving deer, lest 
 
1 1 2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN. 
 
 the Devil bring it to pass that in the end you lose the Httle 
 sense you have, and since now you are provided with the 
 gospels and know the prayer of Saint Bartholomew, return 
 to your lambs which are beginning to scatter through the 
 glen. If the evil spirits tease you again, you know the 
 remedy — Pater Noster and a big stick." 
 
 The shepherd, after putting away in his pouch a half loaf 
 of white bread and a piece of boar's meat, and in his stomach 
 a mighty draught of wine, which, by order of his lord, one 
 of the grooms gave him, took leave of Don Dionfs and his 
 daughter and had scarcely gone four steps when he began 
 whirling his sling, casting stones from it to gather the lambs 
 together. 
 
 As, by this time, Don Dionfs observed that, what with one 
 diversion and another, the hours of heat were now passed 
 and the light afternoon breeze was beginning to stir the 
 leaves of the poplars and to freshen the fields, he gave orders 
 to his retinue to make ready the horses which were grazing 
 loose in the grove hard by ; and when ever)rthing was prepared, 
 he signalled to some to slip the leashes, and to others to blow 
 the horns and, sallying forth in a troop from the poplar-grove, 
 took up the interrupted chase. " 
 
 II. 
 
 Among the huntsmen of Don Dionfs was one named 
 Garces, the son of an old servitor of the house and therefore 
 held in high regard by the family. 
 
 Garcds was of about the age of Constanza, and from early 
 boyhood had been accustomed to anticipate the least of her 
 wishes and to divine and gratify the lightest of her whims. 
 
 He amused himself in his moments of leisure in sharpen- 
 ing with his own hand the pointed arrows of her ivory cross- 
 bow ; he broke in the colts for her mounts ; he trained her 
 
THE WHITE DOE n^ 
 
 favorite hounds in the arts of the chase and tamed her falcons 
 for which he bought at the fairs of Castile red hoods em- 
 )roidered with gold. 
 
 But as for the other huntsmen, the pages and the common 
 folk in the service of Don Dionis, the delicate attentions of 
 rarces and the marks of esteem with which his superiors 
 distinguished him had caused them to hold him in a sort of 
 general dislike, even to the point of saying, in their envy, 
 that all his assiduous efforts to anticipate the caprices of his 
 mistress revealed the character of a flatterer and a sycophant. 
 Yet there were not wanting those who, more keen-sighted or 
 malicious than the rest, believed that they detected in the 
 young retainer's devotion signs of an ill-dissembled passion. 
 
 If this were really so, the secret love of Garces had more 
 than abundant excuse in the incomparable charms of Con- 
 stanza. He must needs have had a breast of stone, and a 
 heart of ice, who could remain unmoved day after day at the 
 side of that woman, peerless in her beauty and her bewitching 
 graces. 
 
 The Lily of the Moncayo they called her for twenty leagues 
 around, and well she merited this soubriquet, for she was so 
 exquisite, so white and so delicately flushed that it would 
 seem that God had made her, like the lilies, of snow and 
 gold. 
 
 Nevertheless, among the neighboring gentry it was whis- 
 pered that the beautiful Lady of Veraton was not so pure of 
 blood as she was fair, and that despite her bright tresses and 
 her alabaster complexion, she had had a gipsy mother. How 
 much truth there was in these rumors no one could say, for, 
 in fact, Don Dionis had in his youth led an adventurous life, 
 and after fighting long under the banner of the King of 
 Aragon, from whom he received among other rewards the 
 fief of the Moncayo, had gone to Palestine, where he wandered 
 for some years, finally returning to estabHsh himself in his 
 
114 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 castle of Veraton with a little daughter born, doubtless, on 
 foreign soil. The only person who could have told anything 
 about the mysterious origin of Constanza, having attended 
 Don Dionfs in his travels abroad, was the father of Garce's, 
 and he had died some time since without saying a single 
 word on the subject, not even to his own son who, at various 
 times and with manifestations of great interest, had questioned 
 him. 
 
 The temperament of Constanza, with its swift alternations 
 from reserve and melancholy to mirth and glee ; the singular 
 vividness of her imagination ; her wild moods ; her extraor- 
 dinary ways ; even the peculiarity of having eyes and eye- 
 brows black as night while her complexion was white and 
 rosy and her hair as bright as gold, had contributed to fur- 
 nish food for the gossip of the countryside ; and even Garc^s 
 himself, who knew her so intimately, had come to the con- 
 clusion that his liege lady was something apart and did not 
 resemble the rest of womankind. 
 
 Present, as the other huntsmen were, at the narration of 
 Esteban, Garces was perhaps the only one who listened with 
 genuine curiosity to the details of the shepherd's incredible 
 adventure ; and though he could not help smiling when the 
 lad repeated the words of the white doe, no sooner had he 
 left the grove in which they had taken their siesta, .than 
 he began to revolve in his mind the most ridiculous fancies. 
 
 " Without doubt this tale of the talking of the deer is a 
 sheer delusion of Esteban's, who is a perfect simpleton," the 
 young huntsman said to himself as, mounted on a powerful 
 sorrel, he followed step by step the palfrey of Constanza, 
 who seemed also somewhat preoccupied and was so silent 
 and so withdrawn from the group of hunters as scarcely to 
 take any part in the sport. " Yet who can say that in the 
 story which this poor fool tells there may not be a grain of 
 truth ? " thought on the young retainer. " We have seen 
 
THE WHITE DOE n^ 
 
 stranger things in the world, and a white doe may indeed 
 exist, since if we can credit the folk-songs, Saint Hubert, the 
 patron of huntsmen, had one. Oh, if I could take a white- 
 doe alive for an offering to my lady ! " 
 
 Thus thinking and dreaming, Garces passed the afternoon ; 
 and when the sun began to descend behind the neighboring 
 hills, and Don Dionis gave the order to his retinue for the 
 return to the castle, he slipped away from the company un- 
 noticed and went in search of the shepherd through the 
 densest and most entangled coverts of the mountain. 
 
 Night had almost completely closed in when Don Dionis 
 arrived at the gates of his castle. Immediately there was 
 placed before him a frugal collation and he sat down with 
 his daughter at the table. 
 
 " And Garces, where is he ? " asked Constanza, noticing 
 that her huntsman was not there to serve her as usual. . 
 
 " We do not know," the other attendants hastened to reply. 
 " He disappeared from among us near the glen and we have 
 not seen him since." 
 
 At that instant Garces arrived, all breathless, his forehead 
 still covered with perspiration, but with the most happy and 
 satisfied expression imaginable. 
 
 " Pardon me, my lady," he exclaimed, addressing Con- 
 stanza, " pardon me if I have been wanting a moment in my 
 duty, but there whence I came at my horse's best speed, 
 there, as here, I was busied only in your service." 
 
 *' In my service ? " repeated Constanza. " I do not un- 
 derstand what you mean." 
 
 " Yes, my lady, in your service," repeated the youth, " for 
 I have ascertained that the white doe really does exist. Be- 
 sides Esteban, it is vouched for by various other shepherds, 
 who swear they have seen it more than once ; and with their 
 aid I hope in God and in my patron Saint Hubert to bring 
 it, living or dead, within three days to you at the castle." 
 
1 1 6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " Bah I Bah 1 " exclaimed Constanza with a jesting air, 
 while the derisive laughter, more or less dissimulated, of the 
 bystanders chorused her words. " Have done with midnight 
 hunts and with white does. Bear in mind that the Devil 
 loves to tempt the simple ; and if you persist in following at 
 his heels, he will make you a laughing-stock like poor 
 Esteban." 
 
 " My lady," interrupted Carets with a broken voice, con- 
 cealing as far as possible the anger which the merry scoffs 
 of his companions stirred in him, " I have never yet had to 
 do with the Devil and consequently I am not acquainted 
 with his practices ; but, for myself, I swear to you that, do 
 all he can, he will not make me an object of laughter, for 
 that is a privilege I know how to tolerate in yourself alone." 
 
 Constanza saw the effect which her mocking had produced 
 on the enamoured youth, but desiring to test his patience to 
 the uttermost, she continued in the same tone : 
 
 *' And what if, on aiming at the doe, she salutes you with 
 another laugh like that which Esteban heard, or flings it into 
 your very face, and you, hearing those supernatural peals of 
 merriment, let fall your bow from your hands, and before you 
 recover from the fright, the white doe has vanished swifter 
 than lightning — what then ? " 
 
 " Oh, as for that I " exclaimed Garces, " be sure that if I 
 can speed a shaft before she is out of bowshot, although she 
 play me more tricks than a juggler ; although she speak to 
 me, not in the language of the country, but in Latin like the 
 Abbot of Munilla, she will not get off without an arrow-head 
 in her body." 
 
 At this stage in the conversation, Don Dionfs joined in 
 with a forced gravity through which might be detected the 
 entire irony of his words, and began to give the now perse- 
 cuted boy the most original counsels in the world, in case he 
 
THE WHITE DOE 117 
 
 should suddenly meet with the demon changed into a white 
 doe. 
 
 At each new suggestion of her father, Constanza fixed her 
 eyes on the distressed Garces, and broke into extravagant 
 laughter, while his fellow-servitors encouraged the jesting 
 with glances of intelligence and ill-disguised delight. 
 
 Only with the close of the supper ceased this scene, in 
 which the credulity of the young hunter was, so to speak, 
 the theme on which the general mirth played variations, 
 so that when the cloth was removed and Don Dionis and 
 Constanza had withdrawn to their apartments, and all the 
 inmates of the castle had gone to rest, Garces remained for 
 a long time irresolute, debating whether, notwithstanding the 
 jeers of his liege lord and lady, he would stand firm to his 
 purpose, or absolutely abandon the enterprise. 
 
 " What the devil," he exclaimed, rousing himself from the 
 state of uncertainty into which he had fallen. " Greater harm 
 than that which has overtaken me cannot come to pass and 
 if, on the other hand, what Esteban has told us is true, oh, 
 then, how sweet will be the taste of my triumph ! " 
 
 Thus speaking, he fitted a shaft to his crossbow — not 
 without having made the sign of the cross on the point of 
 the arrow — and swinging it over his shoulder, he directed 
 his steps toward the postern gate of the castle to take the 
 mountain path. 
 
 When Garces reached the glen and the point where, ac- 
 cording to the instructions of Esteban, he was to lie in wait 
 for the appearance of the deer, the moon was slowly rising 
 behind the neighboring mountains. 
 
 Like a good hunter, well-practised in his craft, he spent a 
 
 considerable time, before selecting a suitable place for an 
 
 ambush, in going to and fro, scanning the byways and paths 
 
 thereabouts, the grouping of the trees, the irregularities of 
 
 " the ground, the curves of the river and the depth of its waters. 
 
1 1 8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 At last, after completing this minute examination of the 
 locality, he hid himself upon a sloping bank near some black 
 poplars whose high and interlacing tops cast a dark shadow, 
 and at whose feet grew a clump of mastic shrubs high 
 enough to conceal a man lying prone on the ground. 
 
 The river, which, from the mossy rocks where it rose, came 
 following the windings of the rugged fief of the Moncayo to 
 enter the glen by a cascade, thence went gliding on, bathing 
 the roots of the willows that shaded its bank, or playing 
 with a murmurous ripple among the stones rolled down from 
 the mountain, until it fell into a pool very near the point 
 which served the hunter for a hiding-place. 
 
 The poplars, whose silvered leaves the wind stirred with 
 the sweetest rustle, the willows which, leaning over the limpid 
 current, bedewed in it the tips of their pale branches, and the 
 crowded groups of evergreen oaks about whose trunks honey- 
 suckles and blue morning-glories clambered and twined, 
 formed a thick wall of foliage around this quiet river-pool. 
 
 The wind, stirring the leafy curtains of living green which 
 spread round about their floating shadow, let penetrate at 
 intervals a stealthy ray of light that gleamed like a flash 
 of silver over the surface of the motionless, deep waters. 
 
 Hidden among the bushes, his ear attent to the slightest 
 sound, and his gaze fixed upon the spot where, according to 
 his calculations, the deer should come. Carets waited a long 
 time in vain. 
 
 Everything about him remained buried in a deep calm. 
 
 Little by little, and it might well be that the lateness of the 
 hour — for it was past midnight — began to weigh upon his 
 lids — might well be that far-off murmurs of the water, the 
 penetrating scent of the wild flowers and the caresses of the 
 wind affected his senses with the soft drowsiness in which 
 all nature seemed to be steeped — ^the enamoured boy, who 
 until now had been occupied in revolving in his mind the 
 
THE WHITE DOE n^ 
 
 most alluring fancies, began to find that his ideas took shape 
 more slowly and his thoughts drifted into vague and inde- 
 cisive forms. 
 
 After lingering a little in this dim border-land between 
 waking and sleeping, at last he closed his eyes, let his 
 crossbow slip from his hands, and sank into a profound 
 slumber. 
 
 It must have been for two or three hours now that the 
 young hunter had been snoring at his ease, enjoying to the 
 full one of the serenest dreams of his life, when suddenly he 
 opened his eyes, with a stare, and half raised himself to a 
 sitting posture, full yet of that stupor with which one wakes 
 suddenly from profound sleep. 
 
 In the breathings of the wind and blended with the light 
 noises of the night, he thought he detected a strange hum of 
 delicate voices, sweet and mysterious, which were talking 
 with one another, laughing or singing, each in its own in- 
 dividual strain, making a twitter as clamorous and confused 
 as that of the birds awakening at the first ray of the sun amid 
 the leaves of a poplar grove. 
 
 This extraordinary sound was heard for an instant only, 
 and then all was still again. 
 
 " Without doubt, I was dreaming of the absurdities of which 
 the shepherd told us," exclaimed Garces, rubbing his eyes in 
 all tranquillity, and firmly persuaded that what he had thought 
 he heard was no more than that vague impression of slumber 
 which, on awaking, lingers in the imagination, as the closing 
 cadence of a melody dwells in the ear after the last trem- 
 bling note has ceased. And overcome by the unconquerable 
 languor weighing down his limbs, he was about to lay his 
 head again upon the turf, when he heard anew the distant 
 echo of those mysti c voices, which to the accompaniment of 
 
1 20 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the soft stir of the air, the water and the leaves were 
 singing thus : 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 " The archer who watched on the top of the tower has laid his heavy 
 
 head down on the wall. 
 The stealthy hunter who was expecting to surprise the deer has been 
 
 surprised by sleep. 
 The shepherd who awaited the day, consulting the stars, sleeps now, 
 
 and will sleep till dawn. 
 Queen of the water-sprites, follow our steps. 
 Come to swing in the branches of the willows over the surface of the 
 
 water. 
 •• Come to intoxicate thyself with the perfume of the violets which open 
 
 at dusk. 
 "Come to enjoy the night, which is the day of the spirits." 
 
 While the sweet notes of that delicious music floated on 
 the air, Garces remained motionless. After it had melted 
 away, with much caution he slightly parted the branches and, 
 not without experiencing a certain shock, saw come into 
 sight the deer, which, moving in a confused group and some- 
 times bounding over the bushes with incredible lightness, 
 stopping as though listening for others, frolicking together, 
 now hiding in the thicket, now sallying out again into the 
 path, were descending the mountain in the ^direction of the 
 river-pool. 
 
 In advance of her companions, more agile, more graceful, 
 more sportive, more joyous than all of them, leaping, running, 
 pausing and running again so lightly that she seemed not 
 to touch the ground with her feet, went the white doe, whose 
 wonderful color stood out like a fantastic light against the 
 dark background of the trees. 
 
 Although the young man was inclined to see in his sur- 
 roundings something of the supernatural and miraculous, the 
 fact of the case was that, apart from the momentary hallu- 
 cination which disturbed his senses for an instant, suggesting 
 
THE WHITE DOE 121 
 
 to him music, murmurs and words, there was nothing either 
 in the form of the deer, nor in their movements, nor in their 
 short cries with which they seemed to call one to another, 
 that ought not to be entirely familiar to a huntsman ex- 
 perienced in this sort of night expeditions. 
 
 In proportion as he put away the first impression, Garces 
 began to take the practical view of the situation and, smiling 
 inwardly at his credulity and fright, from that instant was 
 intent only on determining, in view of the route they were 
 following, the point where the deer would take the water. 
 
 Having made his calculation, he gripped his crossbow be- 
 tween his teeth and, twisting along like a snake behind the 
 mastic shrubs, located himself about forty paces from his 
 former situation. Once ensconced in his new ambush, he 
 waited long enough for the deer to be within the river, that 
 his aim might be the surer. Scarcely had he begun to hear 
 that peculiar sound which is produced by the violent disturb- 
 ance of water, when Garces commenced to lift himself little 
 by little, with the greatest precaution, resting first on the 
 tips of his fingers, and afterwards on one knee. 
 
 Erect at last, and assuring himself by touch that his weapon 
 was ready, he took a step forward, craned his neck above 
 the shrubs to command a view of the pool and aimed the 
 shaft, but at the very moment when he strained his eyes, 
 together with the cord, in search of the victim whom he must 
 wound, there escaped from his lips a faint, involuntary cry 
 of amazement. 
 
 The moon, which had been slowly climbing up the broad 
 horizon, was motionless, and hung as if suspended in the 
 height of heaven. Her clear radiance flooded the forest, 
 shimmered on the unquiet surface of the river, and caused 
 objects to be seen as through an azure gauze. 
 
 The deer had disappeared. 
 
 In their place, Garces, filled with consternation and almost 
 
1 2 2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 with terror, saw a throng of most beautiful women, some of 
 whom were sportively entering the water, while others were 
 just freeing themselves from the light garments which as yet 
 concealed from the covetous view the treasure of their forms. 
 
 In those thin, brief dreams of dawn, rich in joyous and 
 luxurious images, — dreams as diaphanous and celestial as 
 the light which then begins to shine through the white bed- 
 curtains, never had the imagination of twenty years sketched 
 with fanciful coloring a scene equal to that which now pre- 
 sented itself to the eyes of the astonished Garces. 
 
 Having now cast off their robes and their veils of a thou- 
 sand colors which, suspended from the trees or thrown care- 
 lessly down on the carpet of turf, stood out against the dim 
 background, the maidens ran hither and thither through the 
 grove, forming picturesque groups, going in and out of the 
 water and splashing it in glistening sparks over the flowers 
 of the margin, like a little shower of dewdrops. 
 
 Here, one of them, white as the fleece of a lamb, lifted her 
 fair head among the green floating leaves of an aquatic plant 
 of which she seemed the half-opened blossom whose flexible 
 stem, one might imagine, could be seen to tremble be- 
 neath the endless gleaming circles of the waves. 
 
 Another, with her hair loose on her shoulders, swung from 
 the branch of a willow over the river, and her little rose-colored 
 feet made a ray of silvery light as they grazed the smooth 
 surface. While some remained couched on the bank, with 
 their blue eyes drowsy, breathing voluptuously the perfume 
 of the flowers and shivering slightly at the touch of the fresh 
 breeze, others were dancing in a giddy round, interlacing 
 their hands capriciously, letting their heads droop back with 
 delicious abandon, and striking the ground with their feet in 
 harmonious cadence. 
 
 It was impossible to follow them in their agile movements, 
 impossible to take in with a glance the infinite details of the 
 
THE WHITE DOE 123 
 
 picture they formed, some running, some gambolling and 
 chasing one another with merry laughter in and out the laby- 
 rinth of trees ; others skimming the water swanlike and cut- 
 ting the current with uplifted breast ; others, diving into the 
 depths where they remained long before rising to the surface, 
 bringing one of those wonderful flowers that spring unseen 
 in the bed of the deep waters. 
 
 The gaze of the astonished hunter wandered spellbound 
 from one side to another, without knowing where to fix itself, 
 until he believed he saw, seated under swaying boughs which 
 seemed to serve her as a canopy and surrounded by a group 
 of women, each more beautiful than the rest, who were aid- 
 ing her in freeing herself from her delicate vestments, the 
 object of his secret worship, the daughter of the noble Don 
 Dionis, the incomparable Constanza. 
 
 Passing from one surprise to another, the enamoured youth 
 dared not credit the testimony of his senses, and thought he 
 was under the influence of a fascinating, delusive dream. 
 
 Still, he struggled in vain to convince himself that all he 
 had seen was the effect of disordered imagination, for the 
 longer and more attentively he looked, the more convinced 
 he became that this woman was Constanza. 
 
 He could not doubt ; hers were those dusky eyes shaded 
 by the long lashes that scarcely sufficed to soften the bril- 
 liancy of their glance ; hers that wealth of shining hair, 
 which, after crowning her brow, fell over her white bosom 
 and soft shoulders like a cascade of gold ; hers, too, that 
 graceful neck which supported her languid head, lightly 
 drooping like a flower weary with its weight of dewdrops ; 
 and that fair figure of which, perchance, he had dreamed, 
 and those hands like clusters of jasmine, and those tiny 
 feet, comparable only to two morsels of snow which the 
 sun has not been able to melt and which in the morning lie 
 white on the greensward. 
 
124 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 At the moment when Con stanza emerged from the little 
 thicket, all her beauty unveiled to her lover's eyes, her com- 
 panions, beginning anew to sing, carolled these words to the 
 sweetest of melodies. 
 
 CHORUS. 
 
 " Genii of the air, dwelling in the luminous ether, enveloped in raiment of 
 silver mist— come ! 
 
 "Invisible sylphs, leave the cups of the half-opened lilies and come in 
 your mother-of-pearl chariots drawn through the air by harnessed 
 butterflies. 
 
 " Nymphs of the fountains, forsake your mossy beds and fall upon us in 
 little, diamond showers. 
 
 " Emerald beetles, fiery glow-worms, sable butterflies, come ! 
 
 "And come, all ye spirits of night, come humming like a swarm of lus- 
 trous, golden insects. 
 
 *' Come, for now the moon, protector of mysteries, sparkles in the ful- 
 ness of splendor. 
 
 •' Come, for the moment of marvellous transformation is at hand. 
 
 "Come, for those who love you, await you with impatience." 
 
 Garces, who remained motionless, felt on hearing those 
 mysterious songs the asp of jealousy stinging his heart, and 
 yielding to an impulse stronger than his will, bent on break- 
 ing once for all the spell that was fascinating his senses, 
 thrust apart with a tremulous, convulsive hand the boughs 
 which concealed him, and with a single bound gained the 
 river-bank. The charm was broken, everything vanished 
 like a vapor and, looking about him, he neither saw nor 
 heard more than the noisy confusion with which the timid 
 deer, surprised at the height of their nocturnal gambols, 
 were fleeing in fright from his presence, hither and thither, 
 one clearing the thickets with a bound, another gaining at 
 full speed the mountain path. 
 
 " Oh, well did I say that all these things were only de- 
 lusions of the Devil," exclaimed the hunter, "but this time, 
 by good luck, he blundered, leaving the chief prize in my 
 hands." 
 
THE WHITE DOE 
 
 T2S 
 
 And so, in fact, it was. The white doe, trying to escape 
 through the grove, had rushed into the labyrinth of its trees 
 and, entangled in a network of honeysuckles, was striving in 
 vain to free herself. Carets aimed his shaft, but at the very 
 instant in which he was going to wound her, the doe turned 
 toward the hunter and arrested his action with a cry, saying 
 in a voice clear and sharp : " Garces, what wouldst thou do ? " 
 The young man hesitated and, after a moment's doubt, let 
 his bow fall to the ground, aghast at the mere idea of having 
 been in danger of harming his beloved. A loud, mocking 
 laugh roused him finally from his stupor. The white doe 
 had taken advantage of those brief instants to extricate her- 
 self and to flee swift as a flash of lightning, laughing at the 
 trick played on the hunter. 
 
 " Ah, damned offspring of Satan ! " he shouted in a terrible 
 voice, catching up his bow with unspeakable swiftness, " too 
 soon hast thou sung thy victory ; too soon hast thou thought 
 thyself beyond my reach." And so saying, he sped the arrow, 
 that went hissing on its way and was lost in the darkness 
 of the wood, from whose depths there simultaneously came a 
 shriek followed by choking groans. 
 
 " My God I " exclaimed Garces on hearing those sobs of 
 anguish. "My God! if it should be true!" And beside 
 himself, hardly aware of what he did, he ran like a madman 
 in the direction in which he had shot the arrow, the same 
 direction from which sounded the groans. He reached the 
 place at last, but on arriving there, his hair stood erect with 
 horror, the words throbbed vainly in his throat and he had 
 to clutch the trunk of a tree to save himself from falling to 
 the ground. 
 
 Constanza, wounded by his hand, was dying there before 
 his eyes, writhing in her own blood, among the sharp brambles 
 of the mountain. 
 
THE PASSION ROSE 
 
 One summer afternoon, in a garden of Toledo, this curious 
 tale was related to me by a young girl as good as she was 
 pretty. 
 
 While explaining to me the mystery of its especial struc- 
 ture, she kissed the leaves and pistils which she was pluck- 
 ing one by one from the flower that gives to this legend its 
 name. 
 
 If I could tell it with the gentle charm and the appealing 
 simplicity which it had upon her lips, the history of the un- 
 happy Sara would move you as it moved me. 
 
 But since this cannot be, I here set down what of the 
 tradition I can at this instant recall. 
 
 In one of the most obscure and crooked lanes of the Im- 
 perial City, wedged in and almost hidden between the high 
 Moorish tower of an old Visigothic church and the gloomy 
 walls, sculptured with armorial bearings, of a family mansion, 
 there was many years ago a tumbledown dwelling-house dark 
 and miserable as its owner, a Jew named Daniel Levi. 
 
 This Jew,ilike all his race, was spiteful and vindictive, but 
 for deceit and hypocrisy he had no match. 
 
 The possessor, according to popular report, of an immense 
 fortune, he might nevertheless be seen all day long huddled 
 up in the shadowy doorway of his home, making and repair- 
 ing chains, old belts and broken trappings of all sorts, in 
 which he carried on a thriving business with the riff-raff of 
 
 126 
 
A MOORISH WINDOW 
 
CALlFOgJ 
 
THE PASSION ROSE 127 
 
 the Zocodover, the hucksters of the Postigo and the poor 
 squires. 
 
 Though an implacable hater of Christians and of every- 
 thing pertaining to them, he never passed a cavalier of note 
 or an eminent canon without doffing, not only once, but ten 
 times over, the dingy little cap which covered his bald, 
 yellow head, nor did he receive in his wretched shop one of 
 his regular customers without bending low in the most humble 
 salutations accompanied by flattering smiles. 
 
 The smile of Daniel had come to be proverbial in all 
 Toledo, and his meekness, proof against the most vexatious 
 pranks, mocks and cat-calls of his neighbors, knew no 
 limit. 
 
 In vain the boys, to tease him, stoned his poor old house ; 
 in vain the little pages and even the men-at-arms of the 
 neighboring castle tried to provoke him by insulting nick- 
 names, or the devout old women of the parish crossed them- 
 selves when passing his door as if they saw the very Lucifer 
 in person. Daniel smiled eternally with a strange, indescrib- 
 able smile. His thin, sunken lips twitched under the shadow 
 of his nose, which was enormous and hooked like the beak 
 of an eagle, and although from his eyes, small, green, round 
 and almost hidden by the heavy brows, there gleamed a 
 spark of ill-suppressed anger, he went on imperturbably 
 beating with his little iron hammer upon the anvil where he 
 repaired the thousand rusty and seemingly useless trifles 
 which constituted his stock in trade. 
 
 Over the door of the Jew's humble dwelling and within a 
 casing of bright-colored tiles there opened an Arabic window 
 left over from the original building of the Toledan Moors. 
 Around the fretted frame of the window and climbing over 
 the slender marble colonettes that divided it into two equal 
 apertures there arose from the interior of the house one of 
 those climbing plants which, green and full of sap and of 
 
128 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 exuberant growth, spread themselves over the blackened walls 
 of ruins. 
 
 In the part of the house that received an uncertain light 
 through the narrow spaces of the casement, the only opening 
 in the time-stained, weather-worn wall, lived Sara, the be- 
 loved daughter of Daniel. 
 
 When the neighbors, passing the shop of the Hebrew, 
 chanced to see Sara through the lattice of her Moorish 
 window and Daniel crouched over his anvil, they would ex- 
 claim aloud in admiration of the charms of the beautiful 
 Jewess : " It seems impossible that such an ugly old trunk 
 should have put forth so beautiful a branch ! " 
 
 For, in truth, Sara was a miracle of beauty. In the pupils 
 of her great eyes, shadowed by the cloudy arch of their black 
 lashes, gleamed a point of light like a star in a darkened 
 sky. Her glowing lips seemed to have been cut from a car- 
 mine weft by the invisible hands of a fairy. Her complexion 
 was pale and transparent as the alabaster of a sepulchral 
 statue. She was scarcely sixteen years of age and yet there 
 seemed engraven on her countenance the sweet seriousness of 
 precocious intelligence, and there arose from her bosom and 
 escaped from her mouth those sighs which reveal the vague 
 awakening of passion. 
 
 The most prominent Jews of the city, captivated by her 
 marvellous beauty, had sought her in marriage, but the 
 Hebrew maiden, untouched by the homage of her admirers 
 and the counsels of her father, who urged her to choose a 
 companion before she should be left alone in the world, held 
 herself aloof in a deep reserve, giving no other reason for her 
 strange conduct than the caprice of wishing to retain her 
 freedom. At last, one of her adorers, tired of suffering 
 Sara's repulses and suspecting that her perpetual sadness 
 was a certain sign that her heart hid some important secret, 
 approached Daniel and said to him : 
 
THE PASSION ROSE 
 
 129 
 
 " Do you know, Daniel, that among our brothers there is 
 complaint of your daughter ? " 
 
 The Jew raised his eyes for an instant from his anvil, 
 stopped his eternal hammering and, without showing the 
 least emotion, asked his questioner : 
 
 " And what do they say of her ? " 
 
 " They say," continued his interlocutor, " they say — what 
 do I know ? — many things ; among them, that your daughter 
 is in love with a Christian." At this, the despised suitor 
 waited to see what effect his words had had upon Daniel. 
 
 Daniel raised his eyes once more, looked at him fixedly a 
 moment without speaking and, lowering his gaze again to 
 resume his interrupted work, exclaimed : 
 
 " And who says this is not slander ? " 
 
 " One who has seen them more than once in this very 
 street talking together while you were absent at our Rabbin- 
 ical service," insisted the young Hebrew, wondering that 
 his mere suspicions, much more his positive statements, 
 should have made so little impression on the mind of Daniel. 
 
 The Jew, without giving up his work, his gaze fixed upon 
 the anvil where he was now busying himself, his little hammer 
 laid aside, in brightening the metal clasp of a sword guard 
 with a small file, began to speak in a low, broken voice as if 
 his lips were repeating mechanically the thoughts that strug- 
 gled through his mind : 
 
 " He ! He I He ! " he chuckled, laughing in a strange, 
 diabolical way. " So a Christian dog thinks he can snatch 
 from me my Sara, the pride of our people, the staff on which 
 my old age leans ! And do you believe he will do it ? He I 
 He ! " he continued, always talking to himself and always 
 laughing, while his file, biting the metal with its teeth of 
 steel, grated with an ever-increasing force. " He ! He I 
 • Poor Daniel,' my friends will say, * is in his dotage. What 
 right has this decrepit old fellow, already at death's door, to 
 
130 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 a daughter so young and so beautiful, if he doesn't know how 
 to guard her from the covetous eyes of our enemies ? * He 1 
 He 1 He I Do you think perchance that Daniel sleeps ? Do 
 you think, peradventure, that if my daughter has a lover — 
 and that might well be — and this lover is a Christian and 
 tries to win her heart and wins it — all which is possible 
 — and plans to flee with her — which also is easy — and flees, 
 for instance, to-morrow morning, — which falls within human 
 probability, — do you think that Daniel will suffer his treasure 
 to be thus snatched away ? Do you think he will not know 
 how to avenge himself? " 
 
 " But," exclaimed the youth, interrupting him, " did you 
 then know it before ? " 
 
 " I know," said Daniel, rising and giving him a slap on 
 the shoulder, " I know more than you, who know nothing, 
 and would know nothing had not the hour come for telling all. 
 Adieu 1 Bid our brethren assemble as soon as possible. 
 To-night, in an hour or two, I will be with them. Adieu 1 " 
 
 And saying this, Daniel gently pushed his interlocutor 
 out into the street, gathered up his tools very slowly, and 
 began to fasten with double bolts and bars the door of his 
 little shop. 
 
 The noise made by the door as it closed on its creaking 
 hinges prevented the departing youth from hearing the sound 
 of the window lattice, which at the same time fell suddenly 
 as if the Jewess were just withdrawing from the embrasure. 
 
 II. 
 
 It was the night of Good Friday, and the people of Toledo, 
 after having attended the service of the Tenebrae in their 
 magnificent cathedral, had just retired to rest, or, gathered 
 at their firesides, were relating legends like that of the Christ 
 of the Light, a statue which, stolen by Jews, left a trail of blood 
 causing the discovery of the criminals, or the story of the 
 
THE PASSION ROSE i ^ I 
 
 Child Martyr, upon whom the implacable enemies of our faith 
 repeated the cruel Passion of Jesus. In the city there reigned 
 a profound silence, broken at intervals, now by the distant 
 cries of the night-watchman, at that epoch accustomed to 
 keep guard about the Alcazar, and again by the sighing of 
 the wind which was whirling the weather-cocks of the towers 
 or sighing through the tortuous windings of the streets. At 
 this dead hour the master of a little boat that, moored to a 
 post, lay swaying near the mills which seem like natural in- 
 crustations at the foot of the rocks bathed by the Tagus and 
 above which the city is seated, saw approaching the shore, 
 descending with difficulty one of the narrow paths which lead 
 down from the height of the walls to the river, a person whom 
 he seemed to await with impatience. 
 
 " It is she," the boatman muttered between his teeth. " It 
 would seem that this night all that accursed race of Jews is 
 bent on mischief. Where the devil will they hold their tryst 
 with Satan that they all come to my boat when the bridge is 
 so near ? No, they are bound on no honest errand when 
 they take such pains to avoid a sudden meeting with the 
 soldiers of San Servando, — but, after all, they give me the 
 chance to earn good money and — every man for himself — 
 it is no business of mine." 
 
 Saying this, the worthy ferryman, seating himself in his 
 boat, adjusted the oars, and when Sara, for it was no other 
 than she for whom he had been waiting, had leaped into the 
 little craft, he cast off the rope that held it and began to row 
 toward the opposite shore. 
 
 " How many have crossed to-night ? " asked Sara of the 
 boatman, when they had scarcely pulled away from the mills, 
 as though referring to something of which they had just been 
 speaking. 
 
 " I could not count them," he replied, " a swarm. It looks 
 as though to-night will be the last of their gatherings." 
 
132 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " And do you know what they have in mind and for what 
 purpose they leave the city at this hour ? " 
 
 " I don't know, but it is hkely that they are expecting 
 some one who ought to arrive to-night. I cannot tell why 
 they are lying in wait for him, but I suspect for no good 
 end." 
 
 After this brief dialogue Sara remained for some moments 
 plunged in deep silence as if trying to collect her thoughts. 
 " Beyond a doubt," she reflected, " my father has discovered 
 our love and is preparing some terrible vengeance. I must 
 know where they go, what they do, and what they are plot- 
 ting. A moment of hesitation might be death to him." 
 
 While Sara sprang to her feet and, as if to thrust away the 
 horrible doubts that distracted her, passed her hand over her 
 forehead which anguish had covered with an icy sweat, the 
 boat touched the opposite shore. 
 
 " Friend," exclaimed the beautiful Jewess, tossing some 
 coins to the ferryman and pointing to a narrow, crooked 
 road that wound up among the rocks, " is that the way they 
 take ? " 
 
 ** It is, and when they come to the Moor's Head they turn 
 to the left. Then the Devil and they know where they go 
 next," replied the boatman. 
 
 Sara set out in the direction he had indicated. For 
 some moments he saw her appear and disappear alternately 
 in that dusky labyrinth of dim, steep rocks. When she had 
 reached the summit called the Moor's Head, her dark sil- 
 houette was outlined for an instant against the azure back- 
 ground of the sky and then was lost amid the shades of 
 night. 
 
 III. 
 
 On the path where to-day stands the picturesque hermitage 
 of the Virgin of the Valley, and about two arrow flights from 
 
THE PASSION ROSE i^^ 
 
 the summit known by the Toledan populace as the Moor's 
 Head, there existed at that period the ruins of a B)'zantine 
 church of date anterior to the Arab conquest. 
 
 In the porch, outhned by rough blocks of marble scattered 
 over the ground, were growing brambles and other parasitical 
 plants, among which lay, half concealed — here, the shattered 
 capital of a column, there, a square-hewn stone rudely sculp- 
 tured with interlacing leaves, horrible or grotesque monsters 
 and formless human figures. Of the temple there remained 
 standing only the side walls and some broken ivy-grown 
 arches. 
 
 Sara, who seemed to be guided by a supernatural instinct, 
 on arriving at the point the boatman had indicated, 
 hesitated a little, uncertain which way to take ; but, finally, 
 with a firm and resolute step, directed her course toward the 
 abandoned ruins of the church. 
 
 In truth, her instinct had not been at fault ; Daniel, who 
 was no longer smiling, no longer the feeble and humble old 
 man, but rather, fury flashing from his little round eyes, 
 seemed inspired by the spirit of Vengeance, was in the midst 
 of a throng of Jews eager, like himself, to wreak their thirsty 
 hate on one of the enemies of their religion. He seemed to 
 multiply himself, giving orders to some, urging others for- 
 ward in the work, making, with a hideous solicitude, all the 
 necessary preparations for the accomplishment of the fright- 
 ful deed which he had been meditating, day in, day out, 
 while, impassive, he hammered the anvil in his den at 
 Toledo. 
 
 Sara, who, favored by the darkness, had succeeded in 
 reaching the porch of the church, had to make a supreme 
 effort to suppress a cry of horror as her glance penetrated 
 its interior. In the ruddy glow of a blaze which threw the 
 shadow of that infernal group on the walls of the church, she 
 thought she saw that some were making efforts to raise a 
 
134 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 heavy cross, while others wove a crown of briers, or sharp- 
 ened on a stone the points of enormous nails. A fearful 
 thought crossed her mind. She remembered that her raqe 
 had been accused more than once of mysterious crimes. She 
 recalled vaguely the terrifying story of the Crucified Child 
 which she had hitherto believed a gross calumny invented 
 by the populace for the taunting and reproaching of the 
 Hebrews. 
 
 But now there was no longer room for doubt. There, 
 before her eyes, were those awful instruments of martyrdom, 
 and the ferocious executioners only awaited their victim. 
 
 Sara, filled with holy indignation, overflowing with noble 
 wrath and inspired by that unquenchable faith in the true 
 God whom her lover had revealed to her, could not control 
 herself at sight of that spectacle, and, breaking through the 
 tangled undergrowth that concealed her, suddenly appeared 
 on the threshold of the temple. 
 
 On beholding her the Jews raised a cry of amazement, and 
 Daniel, taking a step toward his daughter with threatening 
 aspect, hoarsely asked her : " What seekest thou here, un- 
 happy one ? " 
 
 " I come to cast in your faces," said Sara, in a clear, un- 
 faltering voice, " all the shame of your infamous work and I 
 come to tell you that in vain you await the victim for the 
 sacrifice, unless you mean to quench in me your thirst for 
 blood, for the Christian you are expecting will not come, 
 because I have warned him of your plot." 
 
 " Sara 1 " exclaimed the Jew, roaring with anger, " Sara, 
 this is not true ; thou canst not have been so treacherous to 
 us as to reveal our mysterious rites. If it is true that thou 
 hast revealed them, thou art no longer my daughter." 
 
 " No, I am not thy daughter. I have found another Father, 
 a father all love for his children, a Father whom you Jews 
 nailed to an ignominious cross and who died upon it to 
 
THE PASSION ROSE 
 
 135 
 
 redeem us, opening to us for an eternity the doors of heaven. 
 No, I am no longer thy daughter, for I am a Christian, and 
 I am ashamed of my origin." 
 
 On hearing these words, pronounced with that strong 
 fortitude which heaven puts only into the mouth of martyrs, 
 Daniel, blind with rage, rushed upon the beautiful Hebrew 
 girl and, throwing her to the ground, dragged her by the 
 hair, as though he were possessed by an infernal spirit, to 
 the foot of the cross which seemed to open its bare arms to 
 receive her. 
 
 ** Here I deliver her up to you," he exclaimed to those 
 who stood around. " Deal justice to this shameless one, 
 who has sold her honor, her religion and her brethren." 
 
 IV. 
 
 On the day following, when the cathedral bells were peal- 
 ing the Gloria and the worthy citizens of Toledo were amus- 
 ing themselves by shooting from crossbows at Judases of 
 straw, just as is done to-day in some of our villages, Daniel 
 opened the door of his shop, according to his custom and, 
 with that everlasting smile on his lips, commenced to salute 
 the passers-by, beating ceaselessly on his anvil with his little 
 iron hammer; but the lattices of Sara's Moorish window 
 were unopened, nor was the beautiful Jewess ever seen again 
 reclining at her casement of colored tiles. 
 
 They say that some years afterward a shepherd brought 
 to the archbishop a flower till then unknown, in which were 
 represented all the instruments of the Saviour's martyrdom 
 — a flower strange and mysterious, which had grown, a 
 climbing vine, over the crumbling walls of the ruined 
 church. 
 
 Penetrating into that precinct and seeking to discover the 
 
136 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 origin of this marvel, there was found, they add, the skeleton 
 of a woman and, buried with her, those instruments of the 
 Passion which characterize the flower. 
 
 The skeleton, although no one could ascertain whose it 
 might be, was preserved many years with special veneration 
 in the hermitage of San Pedro el Verde^ and the flower, now 
 common, is called the Passion Rose. 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 
 
 A Provefi^al Ballad. 
 
 " I was the true Teobaldo de Mo?itagut, Baron of Fort- 
 castell. Lord or serf, noble or commoner, thou, whosoever 
 thou mayst be, who pausest an instant beside my sepulchre^ 
 believe in God, as I have believed, and pray for me^ 
 
 Ye gallant Knights Errant, who, lance in rest, vizor closed, 
 mounted on powerful charger, ride the world over with no 
 more patrimony than your illustrious name and your good 
 sword, seeking honor and glory in the profession of arms, — 
 if on crossing the rugged valley of Montagut yoii have been 
 overtaken by night and storm and have found a refuge in the 
 ruins of the monastery still to be seen in its bosom, hearken 
 to me I 
 
 Ye Shepherds, who follow with slow step your herds that 
 go grazing far and wide over the hills and plains, if on lead- 
 ing them to the border of the transparent rivulet which runs, 
 struggling and leaping, amid the great rocks of the valley of 
 Montagut in the drought of summer, ye have found, on a 
 fiery afternoon, shade and slumber beneath the broken mon- 
 astery arches, whose mossy pillars kiss the waves, hearken 
 to me ! 
 
 ^2>1 
 
138 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Little Daughters of the hamlets roundabout, ye wild lilies 
 who bloom happy in the shelter of your humbleness, if on 
 the morning of the Patron Saint of this locality, coming down 
 into the valley of Montagut to gather clovers and daisies to 
 deck his shrine, conquering the fear which the sombre mon- 
 astery, rising on its rocks, strikes to your childish hearts, ye 
 have ventured into its silent and deserted cloister to wander 
 amid its forsaken tombs, on whose edges grow the fuUest- 
 petaled daisies and the bluest harebells, hearken to me 1 
 
 Thou, Noble Knight, perchance by the gleam of a light- 
 ning flash ; thou. Wandering Shepherd, bronzed by the fierce 
 heat of the sun ; thou. Lovely Child, still besprent with drops 
 of dew like tears, all ye would have seen in that holy place 
 a tomb, a lowly tomb. Formerly it consisted of an unhewn 
 stone and a wooden cross ; the cross has disappeared and 
 only the stone remains. In this tomb, whose inscription is 
 the motto of my song, rests in peace the last baron of Fort- 
 castell, Teobaldo de Montagut, whose strange history I am 
 about to tell. 
 
 L 
 
 While the noble Countess of Montagut was pregnant with 
 her firstborn son, Teobaldo, she had a strange and terrible 
 dream. Perchance a divine warning ; mayhap a vain fantasy 
 which time made real in later years. She dreamed that in her 
 womb she had borne a serpent, a monstrous serpent that, 
 darting out shrill hisses, now gliding through the short grass, 
 now coiling upon itself for a spring, fled from her sight, hiding 
 at last in a clump of briers. 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 1^^ 
 
 " There it is ! there it is ! " shrieked the Countess in her 
 horrible nightmare, pointing out to her servitors the brambles 
 among which the nauseous reptile had sought concealment. 
 
 When the servitors had swiftly reached the spot which the 
 noble lady, motionless and overwhelmed by a profound 
 terror, was still pointing out to them with her finger, a white 
 dove rose from out the prickly thicket and soared to the 
 clouds. 
 
 The serpent had disappeared. 
 
 II. 
 
 Teobaldo was born. His mother died in giving him 
 birth ; his father perished a few years later in an ambus- 
 cade, warring like a good Christian against the Moors, the 
 enemies of God. 
 
 From this time on the youth of the heir of Fortcastell can 
 be likened only to a hurricane. Wherever he went, his way 
 was marked by a trail of tears and blood. He hanged his 
 vassals, he fought his equals, he pursued maidens, he beat 
 the monks, and never ceased from oaths and blasphemies. 
 There was no saint in peace, no hallowed thing, he did not 
 curse. 
 
 III. 
 
 One day when he was out hunting and when, as was his 
 custom, he had had all his devilish retinue of profligate pages, 
 inhuman archers and debased servants, with the dogs, horses 
 and gerfalcons, take shelter from the rain in a village church 
 of his demesne, a venerable priest, daring the young lord's 
 wrath, not quailing at thought of the fury-fits of that wild 
 nature, raised the consecrated Host in his hands and con- 
 jured the invader in the name of Heaven to depart from that 
 place and go on foot, with pilgrim staff, to entreat of the Pope 
 absolution for his crimes. 
 
140 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " Leave me alone, old fool 1 " exclaimed Teobaldo on 
 hearing this, — " leave me alone ! Or, since I have not come 
 on a single quarry all day long, I will let loose my hounds 
 and chase thee like a wild boar for my sport." 
 
 IV. 
 
 With Teobaldo a word was a deed. Yet the priest made 
 no answer save this : 
 
 " Do what thou wilt, but remember that there is a God 
 who chastises and who pardons. If I die at thy hands. He 
 will blot out my sins from the book of His displeasure, to 
 write thy name in their place and to make thee expiate thy 
 crime." 
 
 " A God who chastises and pardons I " interrupted the 
 blasphemous baron with a burst of laughter. " I do not be- 
 lieve in God and, by way of proof, I am going to carry out 
 my threat ; for" though not much given to prayer, I am a man 
 of my word. Raimundo ! Gerardo ! Pedro I Set on the 
 pack 1 give me a javelin ! blow the alali on your horns, since 
 we will hunt down this idiot, though he climb to the tops of 
 his altars." 
 
 V. 
 
 After an instant's hesitation and a fresh command from 
 their lord, the pages began to unleash the greyhounds that 
 filled the church with the din of their eager barking ; the 
 baron had strung his crossbow, laughing a Satanic laugh ; 
 and the venerable priest, murmuring a prayer, was, with his 
 eyes raised to heaven, tranquilly awaiting death, when there 
 rose outside the sacred enclosure a wild halloo, the braying^ 
 of horns proclaiming that the game had been sighted, and 
 shouts of After the boar I Across the brushwood / To the 
 mountain ! Teobaldo, at this announcement of the longed- 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 141 
 
 for quarry, dashed open the doors of the church, transported 
 by deHght ; behind him went his retainers, and with his re- 
 tainers the horses and hounds. 
 
 VI. 
 
 " Which way went the boar ? " asked the baron as he 
 sprang upon his steed without touching the stirrups or un- 
 stringing his bow. " By the glen which runs to the foot of 
 those hills," they answered him. Without hearing the last 
 word, the impetuous hunter buried his golden spur in the 
 flank of the horse, who bounded away at full gallop. Behind 
 him departed all the rest. 
 
 The dwellers in the hamlet, who had been the first to give 
 the alarm and who, at the approach of the terrible beast, had 
 taken refuge in their huts, timidly thrust out their heads from 
 behind their window-shutters, and when they saw that the 
 infernal troop had disappeared among the foliage of the 
 woods, they crossed themselves in silence. 
 
 VII. 
 
 Teobaldo rode in advance of all. His steed, swifter by 
 nature or more severely goaded than those of the retainers, 
 followed so close to the quarry that twice or thrice the baron, 
 dropping his bridle upon the neck of the fiery courser, had 
 stood up in his stirrups and drawn the bow to his shoulder 
 to wound his prey. But the boar, whom he saw only at 
 intervals among the tangled thickets, would again vanish 
 from view to reappear just out of reach of the arrow. 
 
 So he pursued the chase hour after hour, traversing the 
 ravines of the valley and the stony bed of the stream, until, 
 plunging into a deep forest, he lost his way in its shadowy 
 defiles, his eyes ever fixed on the coveted game he constantly 
 
142 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 expected to overtake, only to find himself constantly mocked 
 by its marvellous agility. * 
 
 VIII. 
 
 At last, he had his chance ; he extended his arm and let 
 fly the shaft, which plunged, quivering, into the loin of the 
 terrible beast that gave a leap and a frightful snort. — " Dead ! " 
 exclaims the hunter with a shout of glee, driving his spur 
 for the hundredth time into the bloody flank of his horse. 
 " Dead 1 in vain he flees. The trail of his flowing blood 
 marks his way." And so speaking, Teobaldo commenced 
 to sound upon his bugle the signal of triumph that his 
 retinue might hear. 
 
 At that instant his steed stopped short, its legs gave way, 
 a slight tremor shook its strained muscles, it fell flat to the 
 ground, shooting out from its swollen nostrils, bathed in 
 foam, a rill of blood. 
 
 It had died of exhaustion, died when the pace of the 
 wounded boar was beginning to slacken, when but one more 
 effort was needed to run the quarry down. 
 
 IX. 
 
 To paint the wrath of the fierce-tempered Teobaldo would 
 be impossible. To repeat his oaths and his curses, merely 
 to repeat them, would be scandalous and impious. He 
 shouted at the top of his voice to his retainers, but only echo 
 answered him in those vast solitudes, and he tore his hair 
 and plucked at his beard, a prey to the most furious despair. 
 — " I will run it down, even though I break every blood- 
 vessel in my body," he exclaimed at last, stringing his bow 
 anew and making ready to pursue the game on foot ; but at 
 that very instant he heard a sound behind him ; the thick 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 14- 
 
 branches of the wood opened, and before his eyes appeared 
 a page leading by the halter a charger black as night. 
 
 " Heaven hath sent it to me," exclaimed the hunter, 
 leaping upon its loins lightly as a deer. The page, who was 
 thin, very thin, and yellow as death, smiled a strange smile 
 as he handed him the bridle. 
 
 The horse whinnied with a force which made the forest 
 tremble, gave an incredible bound, a bound that raised him 
 more than thirty feet above the earth, and the air began to 
 hum about the ears of the rider, as a stone hums, hurled 
 from a sling. He had started off at full gallop ; but at a 
 gallop so headlong that, afraid of losing the stirrups and in 
 his dizziness falling to the ground, he had to shut his eyes 
 and with both hands clutch the streaming mane. 
 
 And still without a shake of the reins, without touch of 
 spur or call of voice, the steed ran, ran without ceasing. 
 How long did Teobaldo gallop thus, unwitting where, feeling 
 the branches buffet his face as he rushed by, and the 
 brambles tear at his clothing, and the wind whistle about his 
 head ? No human being knows. 
 
 XL 
 
 When, recovering courage, he opened his eyes an instant 
 to throw a troubled glance about him, he found himself far, 
 very far from Montagut, and in a district that was to him 
 entirely unknown. The steed ran, ran without ceasing, and 
 trees, rocks, castles and villages passed by him like a breath. 
 New and still new horizons opened to his view, — horizons 
 that melted away only to give place to others stranger and 
 yet more strange. Narrow valleys, bristling with colossal 
 fragments of granite which the tempests had torn down from 
 
144 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 mountain-summits ; smiling plains, covered with a carpet of 
 verdure and sprinkled over with white villages ; limitless 
 deserts, where the sands seethed beneath the searching rays 
 of a sun of fire ; immeasurable wildernesses, boundless 
 steppes, regions of eternal snow, where the gigantic icebergs, 
 standing out against a dim grey sky, were like .white phan- 
 toms reaching out their arms to seize him by the hair as he 
 fled past ; all this, and thousands of other sights that I can- 
 not depict, he saw in his wild race, until, enveloped in an 
 obscure cloud, he ceased to hear the tramp of his horse's 
 hoofs beating the ground. 
 
 I. 
 
 Noble Knights, Shepherds, Lovely Little Maids who 
 hearken to my lay, if what I tell be a marvel in your ears, 
 deem it not a fable woven at my whim to steal a march on 
 ycur credulity ; from mouth to mouth this tradition has been 
 passed down to me, and the inscription upon the tomb which 
 still abides in the monastery of Montagut is an unimpeach- 
 able proof of the veracity of my words. 
 
 Believe, then, what I have told, and believe what I have 
 yet to tell, for it is as certain as the foregoing, although more 
 wonderful. Perchance I shall be able to adorn with a few 
 graces of poetry the bare skeleton of this simple and terrible 
 history, but never will I consciously depart one iota from the 
 truth. 
 
 IL 
 
 When Teobaldo ceased to perceive the hoof-beats of his 
 courser and felt himself hurled forth upon the void, he could 
 not repress an involuntary shudder of terror. Up to this 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 14^ 
 
 point he had believed that the objects which flashed before 
 his eyes were the wild visions of his imagination, perturbed 
 as it was by giddiness, and that his steed ran uncontrolled, 
 to be sure, but still ran within the boundaries of his own 
 seigniory. Now there remained na doubt that he was the 
 S-port of a supernatural power, which was hurrying him he 
 knew not whither, through those masses of dark 'clouds, 
 clouds of freakish and fantastic forms, in whose depths, lit 
 up from time to time by flashes of lightning, he thought he 
 could distinguish the burning thunderbolts about to break 
 upon him. 
 
 The steed still ran, or, be it better said, swam now in that 
 .ocean of vague and fiery vapors, and the wonders of the sky 
 began to display themselves one after another before the 
 astounded eyes of his rider. 
 
 III. 
 
 He saw the angels, ministers of the wrath of God, clad in 
 long tunics with fringes of fire, their burning hair loose on the 
 hurricane, their brandished swords, which flashed the light- 
 ning, throwing out sparks of crimson light, — he saw this 
 heavenly cavalry wheeling upon the clouds, sweeping like a 
 mighty army over the wings of the tempest. 
 
 And he mounted higher, and he deemed he descried, from 
 far above, the stormy clouds like a sea of lava, and heard the 
 thunder moan below him as moans the ocean breaking on 
 the cliff from whose summit the pilgrim views it all amazed. 
 
 IV. 
 
 And he saw the archangel, white as snow, who, throned 
 on a great crystal globe, steers it through space in the cloud- 
 less nights like a silver boat over the surface of an azure 
 lake. 
 
146 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 And he saw the sun revolving in splendor on golden axles 
 through an atmosphere of color and of flame, and at its centre 
 the fiery spirits who dwell unharmed in that intensest glow 
 and from its blazing heart entone to their Creator hymns of 
 praise. 
 
 He saw the threads of imperceptible light which bind men 
 to the stars, and he saw the rainbow arch, thrown like a 
 colossal bridge across the abyss which divides the first from 
 the second heaven. 
 
 By a mystic stair he saw souls descend to earth ; he saw 
 many come down, and few go up. Each one of these inno- 
 cent spirits went accompanied by a most radiant archangel 
 who covered it with the shadow of his wings. The arch- 
 angels who returned alone came in silence, weeping; but 
 the others mounted singing like the larks on April mornings. 
 
 Then the rosy and azure mists which floated in the ether, 
 like curtains of transparent gauze, were rent, as Holy Satur- 
 day, the Day of Glory, rends in our churches the veiling of 
 the altars, and the Paradise of the Righteous opened, da^*, 
 zling in its beauty, to his gaze. 
 
 VI. 
 
 There were the holy prophets whom you have seen rudely 
 sculptured on the stone portals of our cathedrals, there the 
 shining virgins jwhom the painter vainly strives, in the stained 
 glass of the ogive windows, to copy from his dreams ; there 
 the cherubim with their long and floating robes and haloes 
 of gold ; as in the altar pictures ; there, at last, crowned with 
 stars, clad in light, surrounded by all the celestial hierarchy, 
 and beautiful beyond all thought. Our Lady of Montserrat, 
 Mother of God, Queen of Archangels, the shelter of sinners 
 and the consolation of the afflicted. 
 
^ Of THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
BELIEVE IN- GOD 147 
 
 VII. 
 
 Beyond the Paradise of the Righteous ; beyond the throne 
 where sits the Virgin Mary. The mind of Teobaldo was 
 stricken by terror ; a fathomless fear possessed his soul. 
 Eternal solitude, ecernal silence live in those spaces that lead 
 to the mysterious sanctuary of the Most High. From time 
 to time a rush of wind, cold as the blade of a poniard, smote 
 his forehead, — a wind that shriveled his hair with horror and 
 penetrated to the marrow of his bones, — a wind like to those 
 which announced to the prophets the approach of the Divine 
 Spirit. At last he reached a point where he thought he per- 
 ceived a dull murmur that might be likened to the far-off 
 hum of a swarm of bees, when, in autumn evenings, they 
 hover around the last of the flowers. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 He crossed that fantastic region whither go all the accents 
 i)f_the earth, the sounds which we say have ceased, the words 
 which we deem are lost in the air, the laments which we be- 
 lieve are heard of none. 
 
 There, in a harmonious circle, float the prayers of little 
 children, the orisons of virgins, the psalms of holy hermits, 
 the petitions of the humble, the chaste words of the pure in 
 heart, the resigned moans of those in pain, the sobs of souls 
 that suffer and the hymns of souls that hope. Teobaldo 
 heard among those voices, that throbbed still in the lumi- 
 nous ether, the voice of his sainted mother who prayed to God 
 for him ; but he heard no prayer of his own. 
 
 IX. 
 
 Further on, thousands on thousands of harsh, rough accents 
 wounded his ears with a discordant roar, — blasphemies, cries 
 for vengeance, drinking songs, indecencies, curses of despair, 
 threats of the helpless, and sacrilegious oaths of the impious. 
 
148 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Teobaldo traversed the second circle with the rapidity of 
 a meteor crossing the sky in a summer evening, that he might 
 not hear his own voice which vibrated there thunderously 
 loud, exceeding all other voices in the stress of that inferhal 
 concert. 
 
 " I do not believe in God ! I do not believe in God I " 
 still spake his tone beating through that ocean of blasphem- 
 ies ; and Teobaldo began to believe. 
 
 X. 
 
 He left those regions behind him and crossed other illim- 
 itable spaces full of terrible visions, which neither could he 
 comprehend nor am I able to conceive, and finally he came 
 to the uppermost circle of the spiral heavens, where the sera- 
 phim adore Jehovah, covering their faces with their triple 
 wings and prostrate at His feet. 
 
 He would see God. 
 
 A waft of fire scorched his face, a sea of light darkened 
 his eyes, unbearable thunder resounded in hrs ears and, 
 caught from his charger and hurled into the void, like an 
 incandescent stone shot out from a volcano, he felt himself 
 falling, and falling without ever alighting, blind, burned and 
 deafened, as the rebellious angel fell when God overthrew 
 with a breath the pedestal of his pride. 
 
 Night had shut in, and the wind moaned as it stirred the 
 leaves of the trees, through whose luxuriant foliage was slip- 
 ping a soft ray of moonlight, when Teobaldo, rising upon his 
 elbow and rubbing his eyes as if awakening from profound 
 slumber, looked about him and found himself in the same 
 wood where he had wounded the boar, where his steed fell 
 
BELIEVE IN GOD 149 
 
 dead, where was given him that phantasmal courser which 
 had rushed him away to unknown, mysterious realms. 
 
 A deathlike silence reigned about him, a silence broken 
 only by the distant calling of the deer, the timid murmur of 
 the leaves, and the echo of a far-off bell borne to his ears 
 from time to time upon the gentle gusts. 
 
 " I must have dreamed," said the baron, and set forth on 
 his way across the wood, coming out at last into the open. 
 
 II. 
 
 At a great distance, and above the rocks of Montagut, he 
 saw the black silhouette of his castle standing out against 
 the blue, transparent background of the night sky — " My 
 castle is far away and I am weary," he muttered. "I will 
 await the day in this village-hut near by," and he bent his 
 steps to the hut. He knocked at the door. " Who are you ? " 
 they demanded from within. " The Baron of Fortcastell," 
 he replied, and they laughed in his face. He knocked at 
 another door. " Who are you and what do you want ? " 
 these, too, asked him. '* Your liege lord," urged the knight, 
 surprised that they did not recognize him. " Teobaldo de 
 Montagut." "-Teobaldo de Montagut!" angrily repeated 
 the person within, a woman not yet old. " Teobaldo de 
 Montagut, the count of the story ! Bah ! Go your way and 
 don't come back to rouse honest folk from their sleep to hear 
 your stupid jests." 
 
 III. 
 
 Teobaldo, full of astonishment, left the village and pursued 
 his way to the castle, at whose gates he arrived when it was 
 scarcely dawn. The moat was filled up with great blocks 
 of stone from the ruined battlements ; the raised drawbridge, 
 now useless, was rotting as it still hung from its strong iron 
 
15© ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 chains, covered with rust though they were by the wasting of 
 the years ; in the homage-tower slowly tolled a bell ; in front 
 of the principal arch of the fortress and upon a granite 
 pedelstal was raised a cross ; upon the walls not a single 
 soldier was to be discerned ; and, indistinct and muffled, there 
 seemed to come from its heart like a distant murmur a sacred 
 hymn, grave, solemn and majestic. 
 
 " But this is my castle, beyond a doubt," said Teobaldo, 
 shifting his troubled gaze from one point to another, unable 
 to comprehend the situation. " That is my escutcheon, still 
 engraved above the keystone of the arch. This is the valley 
 of Montagut. These are the lands it governs, the seigniory 
 of Fortcastell " — 
 
 At this instant the heavy doors swung upon their hinges 
 and a monk appeared beneath the lintel. 
 
 IV. 
 
 " Who are you and what are you doing here ? " demanded 
 Teobaldo of the monk. 
 
 " I am," he answered, " a humble servant of God, a monk 
 of the monastery of Montagut." 
 
 " But " — interrupted the baron. " Montagut ? Is it not a 
 seigniory ? " 
 
 " It was," replied the monk, " a long time ago. Its last 
 lord, the story goes, was carried off by the Devil, and as he 
 left no heir to succeed him in the fief, the Sovereign Counts 
 granted his estate to the monks of our order, who have been 
 here for a matter of from one hundred to one hundred and 
 twenty years. And you — who are you ? " 
 
 " I " — stammered the Baron of Fortcastell, after a long 
 moment of silence, " I am — a miserable sinner, who, repent- 
 ing of his misdeeds, comes to make confession to your abbot 
 and beg him for admittance into the bosom of his faith." 
 
THE PROMISE 
 I. 
 
 Margarita, her face hidden in her hands, was weeping ; 
 she did not sob, but the tears ran silently down her cheeks, 
 slipping between her fingers to fall to the earth toward which 
 her brow was bent. 
 
 Near Margarita was Pedro, who from time to time lifted 
 his eyes to steal a glance at her and, seeing that she still 
 wept, dropped them again, maintaining for his part utter 
 silence. 
 
 All was hushed about them, as if respecting her grief. 
 The murmurs of the field were stilled, the breeze of evening 
 slept, and darkness was beginning to envelop the dense 
 growth of the wood. 
 
 Thus some moments passed, during which the trace of 
 light that the dying sun had left on the horizon faded quite 
 away ; the moon began to be faintly sketched against the 
 violet background of the twilight sky, and one after another 
 shone out the brighter stars. 
 
 Pedro broke at last that distressful silence, exclaiming in 
 a hoarse and gasping voice and as if he were communing 
 with himself : 
 
 " 'Tis impossible — impossible ! " 
 
 Then, coming close to the inconsolable maiden and taking 
 one of her hands, he continued in a softer, more caressing 
 tone: 
 
 " Margarita, for thee love is all, and thou seest naught be- 
 
1 5 2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 yond love. Yet there is one thing as binding as our love, 
 and that is my duty. Our lord the Count of Gomara goes 
 forth to-morrow from his castle to join his force to the army 
 of King Fernando, who is on his way to deliver Seville out 
 of the power of the Infidels, and it is my duty to depart with 
 the Count. 
 
 " An obscure orphan, without name or family, I owe to 
 him all that I am. I have served him in the idle days of 
 peace, I have slept beneath his roof, I have been warmed 
 at his hearth and eaten at his board. If I forsake him now, 
 to-morrow his men-at-arms, as they sally forth in marching 
 array from his castle gates, will ask, wondering at my absence : 
 * Where is the favorite squire of the Count of Gomara ? ' 
 And my lord will be silent for shame, and his pages and his 
 fools will say in mocking tone : * The Count's squire is only 
 a gallant of the jousts, a warrior in the game of courtesy.' " 
 
 When he had spoken thus far, Margarita lifted her eyes 
 full of tears to meet those of her lover and moved her lips 
 as if to answer him ; but her voice was choked in a sob. 
 
 Pedro, with still tenderer and more persuasive tone, went 
 on : 
 
 " Weep not, for God's sake, Margarita ; weep not, for 
 thy tears hurt me. I must go from thee, but I will return 
 as soon as I shall have gained a little glory for my obscure 
 name. 
 
 " Heaven will aid us in our holy enterprise ; we shall con- 
 quer Seville, and to us conquerors the King will give fiefs 
 along the banks of the Guadalquivir. Then I will come back 
 for thee, and we will go together to dwell in tnat paradise of 
 the Arabs, where they say the sky is clearer and more blue 
 than the sky above Castile. 
 
 " I will come back, I swear to thee I will ; I will return to 
 keep the troth solemnly pledged thee that day when I placed 
 on thy finger this ring, symbol of a promise." 
 
THE PROMISE 155 
 
 *' Pedro 1 " here exclaimed Margarita, controlling her emo- 
 tion and speaking in a firm, determined tone : 
 
 " Go, go to uphold thine honor," and on pronouncing these 
 words, she threw herself for the last time into the embrace of 
 her lover. Then she added in a tone lower and more shaken : 
 "Go to uphold thine honor, but come back — come back — to 
 save mine." 
 
 Pedro kissed the brow of Margarita, loosed his horse, that 
 was tied to one of the trees of the grove, and rode off at a 
 gallop through the depths of the poplar-wood. 
 
 Margarita followed Pedro with her eyes until his dim form 
 was swallowed up in the shades of night. When he could no 
 longer be discerned, she went back slowly to the village where 
 her brothers were awaiting her. 
 
 " Put on thy gala dress," one of them said to her as she 
 entered, " for in the morning we go to Gomara with all the 
 neighborhood to see the Count marching to Andalusia." 
 
 " For my part, it saddens rather than gladdens me to see 
 those go forth who perchance shall not return," replied Mar- 
 garita with a sigh. 
 
 " Yet come with us thou must," insisted the other brother, 
 *' and thou must come with mien composed and glad ; so that 
 the gossiping folk shall have no cause to say thou hast a 
 lover in the castle, and thy lover goeth to the war." 
 
 II. 
 
 Hardly was the first light of dawn streaming up the sky 
 when there began to sound throughout all the camp of 
 Gomara the shrill trumpeting of the Count's soldiers ; and 
 the peasants who were arriving in numerous groups from 
 the villages round about saw the seigniorial banner flung to the 
 winds from the highest tower of the fortress. 
 
 The peasants were everywhere, — seated on the edge of the 
 moat, ensconced in the tops of trees, strolling over the plain, 
 
154 JROM ANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 crowning the crests of the hills, forming a line far along the 
 highway, and it must have been already for nearly an hour 
 that their curiosity had awaited the show, not without some 
 signs of impatience, when the ringing bugle-call sounded 
 again, the chains of the drawbridge creaked as it fell slowly 
 across the moat, and the portcullis was raised, while little by 
 little, groaning upon their hinges, the massive doors of the 
 arched passage which led to the Court of Arms swung wide. 
 
 The multitude ran to press for places on the sloping banks 
 beside the road in order to see their fill of the brilliant armor 
 and sumptuous trappings of the following of the Count of 
 Gomara, famed through all the countryside for his splendor 
 and his lavish pomp. 
 
 The march was opened by the heralds who, halting at fixed 
 intervals, proclaimed in loud voice, to the beat of the drum, 
 the commands of the King, summoning his feudatories to the 
 Moorish war and requiring the villages and free towns to give 
 passage and aid to his armies. 
 
 After the heralds followed the kings-at-arms, proud of their 
 silken vestments, their shields bordered with gold and bright 
 colors, and their caps decked with graceful plumes. 
 
 Then came the chief retainer of the castle armed cap-k- 
 pie, a knight mounted on a young black horse, bearing in his 
 hands the pennon of a grandee with his motto and device ; 
 at his left hand rode the executioner of the seigniory, clad in 
 black and red. 
 
 The seneschal was preceded by fully a score of those 
 famous trumpeters of Castile celebrated in the chronicles of 
 our kings for the incredible power of their lungs. 
 
 When the shrill clamor of their mighty trumpeting ceased to 
 wound the wind, a dull sound, steady and monotonous, began 
 to reach the ear, — the tramp of the foot-soldiers, armed with 
 long pikes and provided with a leather shield apiece. Behind 
 these soon came in view the soldiers who managed the en- 
 
THE PROMISE I^^ 
 
 gines of war, with their crude machines and their wooden 
 towers, the bands of wall-sealers and the rabble of stable-boys 
 in charge of the mules. 
 
 Then, enveloped in the cloud of dust raised by the hoofs 
 of their horses, flashing sparks from their iron breastplates, 
 passed the men-at-arms of the castle, formed in thick pla- 
 toons, looking from a distance like a forest of spears. 
 
 Last of all, preceded by the drummers who were mounted 
 on strong mules tricked out in housings and plumes, sur- 
 rounded by pages in rich raiment of silk and gold and fol- 
 lowed by the squires of the castle, appeared the Count. 
 
 As the multitude caught sight of him, a great shout of 
 greeting went up and in the tumult of acclamation was stifled 
 the cry of a woman, who at that moment, as if struck by a 
 thunderbolt, fell fainting into the arms of those who sprang 
 to her aid. It was Margarita, Margarita who had recognized 
 her mysterious lover in that great and dreadful lord, the 
 Count of Gomara, one of the most exalted and powerful 
 feudatories of the Crown of Castile. 
 
 III. 
 
 The host of Don Fernando, after going forth from Cordova, 
 had marched to Seville, not without having to fight its way 
 at ficija, Carmona, and Alcala del Rio del Guadaira, whose 
 famous castle, once taken by storm, put the army in sight of 
 the stronghold of the Infidels. 
 
 The Count of Gomara was in his tent seated on a bench 
 of larchwood, motionless, pale, terrible, his hands crossed 
 upon the hilt of his broadsword, his eyes fixed on space with 
 that vague regard which appears to behold a definite object 
 and yet takes cognizance of naught in the encompassing 
 scene. 
 
 Standing by his side, the squire who had been longest in 
 the castle, the only one who in those moods of black de- 
 
156 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 spondency could have ventured to intrude without drawing- 
 down upon his head an explosion of wrath, was speaking to 
 him. " What is your ail, my lord ? " he was saying. " What 
 trouble wears and wastes you ? Sad you go to battle, and 
 sad return, even though returning victorious. When all the 
 warriors sleep, surrendered to the weariness of the day, I 
 hear your anguished sighs ; and if I run to your bed, I see 
 you struggling there against some invisible torment. You 
 open your eyes, but your terror does not vanish. What is 
 it, my lord ? Tell me. If it be a secret, I will guard it in 
 the depths of my memory as in a grave." 
 
 The Count seemed not to hear his squire, but after a long 
 pause, as if the words had taken all that time to make slow 
 way from his ears to his understanding, he emerged little by 
 little from his trance and, drawing the squire affectionately 
 toward him, said to him with grave and quiet tone : 
 
 " I have suffered much in silence. Believing myself the 
 sport of a vain fantasy, I have until now held my peace for 
 shame, — but nay, what is happening to me is no illusion. 
 
 '* It must be that I am under the power of some awful 
 curse. Heaven or hell must wish something of me, and tell 
 me so by supernatural events. Recallest thou the day of our 
 encounter with the Moors of Nebriza in the Aljarafe de 
 Triana ? We were few, the combat was stern, and I was 
 face to face with death. Thou sawest, in the most critical 
 moment of the fight, my horse, wounded and blind with rage, 
 dash toward the main body of the Moorish host. I strove 
 in vain to check him ; the reins had escaped from my hands, 
 and the fiery animal galloped on, bearing me to certain 
 death. 
 
 " Already the Moors, closing up their ranks, were ground- 
 ing their long pikes to receive me on the points ; a cloud of 
 arrows hissed about my ears ; the horse was but a few bounds 
 from the serried spears on which we were about to fling our- 
 
^ Thp 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 or 
 
THE PROMISE j-- 
 
 selves, when — believe me, it was not an illusion — I saw a 
 hand that, grasping the bridle, stopped him with an unearthly- 
 force and, turning him in the direction of my own troops, 
 saved me by a miracle. 
 
 " In vain I asked of one and another who my deliverer 
 was ; no one knew him, no one had seen him. 
 
 *' * When you were rushing to throw yourself upon the wall 
 of pikes,' they said, 'you went alone, absolutely alone ; this 
 is why we marvelled to see you turn, knowing that the steed 
 no longer obeyed his rider.' 
 
 " That night I entered my tent distraught ; I strove in vain 
 to extirpate from my imagination the memory of the strange 
 adventure ; but on advancing toward my bed, again I saw 
 the same hand, a beautiful hand, white to the point of pallor, 
 which drew the curtains, vanishing after it had drawn them. 
 Ever since, at all hours, in all places, I see that mysterious 
 hand which anticipates my desires and forestalls my actions. 
 I saw it, when we were storming the castle of Triana, catch 
 between its fingers and break in the air an arrow which was 
 about to strike me ; I have seen it at banquets where I was 
 trying to drown my trouble in the tumultuous revelry, pour 
 the wine into my cup ; and always it flickers before my eyes, 
 and wherever I go it follows me ; in the tent, in the battle, 
 by day, by night, — even now, see it, see it here, resting gently 
 on my shoulder 1 " 
 
 On speaking these last words, the Count sprang to his 
 feet, striding back and forth as if beside himself, overwhelmed 
 by utter terror. 
 
 The squire dashed away a tear. Believing his lord mad, 
 he did not try to combat his ideas, but confined himself to 
 saying in a voice of deep emotion : 
 
 " Come ; let us go out from the tent a moment ; perhaps 
 the evening air will cool your temples, calming this incom- 
 prehensible grief, for which I find no words of consolation." 
 
1^8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 IV. 
 
 The camp of the Christians extended over all the plain of 
 Guadaira, even to the left bank of the Guadalquivir. In 
 front of the camp and clearly defined against the bright 
 horizon, rose the walls of Seville flanked by massive, menacing 
 towers. Above the crown of battlements showed in its rich 
 profusion the green leafage of the thousand gardens enclosed 
 in the Moorish stronghold, and amid the dim clusters of 
 foliage gleamed the observation turrets, white as snow, the 
 minarets of the mosques, and the gigantic watch-tower, over 
 whose aerial parapet the four great balls of gold, which from 
 the Christian camp looked like four flames, threw out, when 
 smitten by the sun, sparks of living light. 
 
 The enterprise of Don Fernando, one of the most heroic 
 and intrepid of that epoch, had drawn to his banners the 
 greatest warriors of the various kingdoms in the Peninsula, 
 with others who, called by fame, had come from foreign, far- 
 off lands to add their forces to those of the Royal Saint. 
 Stretching along the plain might be seen, therefore, army- 
 tents of all forms and colors, above whose peaks waved in the 
 wind the various ensigns with their quartered escutcheons, — 
 stars, griffins, lions, chains, bars and caldrons, with hundreds 
 of other heraldic figures or symbols which proclaimed the 
 name and quality of their owners. Through the streets of 
 that improvised city were circulating in all directions a mul- 
 titude of soldiers who, speaking diverse dialects, dressed 
 each in the fashion of his own locality and armed according 
 to his fancy, formed a scene of strange and picturesque 
 contrasts. 
 
 Here a group of nobles were resting from the fatigues 
 of combat, seated on benches of larchwood at the door of 
 their tents and playing at chess, while their pages poured 
 them wine in metal cups ; there some foot-soldiers were taking 
 
THE PROMISE i^^ 
 
 advantage of a moment of leisure to clean and mend their 
 armor, the worse for their last skirmish ; further on, the most 
 expert archers of the army were covering the mark with ar- 
 rows, amidst the applause of the crowd marvelling at their 
 dexterity ; and the beating of the drums, the shrilling of the 
 trumpets, the cries of pedlars hawking their wares, the clang 
 of iron striking on iron, the ballad-singing of the minstrels 
 who entertained their hearers with the relation of prodigious 
 exploits, and the shouts of the heralds who published the 
 orders of the camp-masters, all these, fiUing the air with 
 thousands of discordant noises, contributed to that picture 
 of soldier life a vivacity and animation impossible to portray 
 in words. 
 
 The Count of Gomara, attended by his faithful squire, 
 passed among the lively groups without raising his eyes from 
 the ground, silent, sad, as if not a sight disturbed his gaze 
 nor the least sound reached his hearing. He moved mechan- 
 ically, as a sleepwalker, whose spirit is busy in the world of 
 dreams, steps and takes his course without consciousness 
 of his actions, as if impelled by a will not his own. 
 
 Close by the royal tent and in the middle of a ring of 
 soldiers, little pages and camp-servants, who were listening 
 to him open-mouthed, making haste to buy some of the 
 tawdry knickknacks which he was enumerating in a loud 
 voice, with extravagant praises, was an odd personage, half 
 pilgrim, half minstrel, who, at one moment reciting a kind of 
 litany in barbarous Latin, and the next giving vent to some 
 buffoonery or scurrility, was mingling in his interminable tale 
 devout prayers with jests broad enough to make a common 
 soldier blush, romances of illicit love with legends of saints. 
 In the huge pack that hung from his shoulders were a thou- 
 sand different objects all tossed and tumbled together, — rib- 
 bons touched to the sepulchre of Santiago, scrolls with words 
 which he averred were Hebrew, the very same that King 
 
l6o SOMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Solomon spoke when he founded the temple, and the only 
 words able to keep you free of every contagious disease; 
 marvellous balsams capable of sticking together men who 
 were cut in two ; secret charms to make all women in love 
 with you ; Gospels sewed into little silk bags ; relics of the 
 patron saints of all the towns in Spain ; tinsel jewels, chains, 
 sword-belts, medals and many other gewgaws of brass, glass 
 and lead. 
 
 When the Count approached the group formed by the 
 pilgrim and his admirers, the fellow began to tune a kind of 
 mandolin or Arab guitar with which he accompanied himself 
 in the singsong recital of his romances. When he had thor- 
 oughly tested the strings, one after another, very coolly, while 
 his companion made the round of the circle coaxing out the 
 last coppers from the flaccid pouches of the audience, the pil- 
 grim began to sing in nasal voice, to a monotonous and plain- 
 tive air, a ballad whose stanzas always ended in the same 
 refrain. 
 
 The Count drew near the group and gave attention. By 
 an apparently strange coincidence, the title of this tale was 
 entirely at one with the melancholy thoughts that burdened 
 his mind. As the singer had announced before beginning, 
 the lay was called the Ballad of the Dead Hand. 
 
 The squire, on hearing so strange an announcement, had 
 striven to draw his lord away ; but the Count, with his eyes 
 fixed on the minstrel, remained motionless, listening to this 
 song. 
 
 A maiden had a lover gay 
 Who said he was a squire ; 
 
 The war-drums called him far away ; 
 Not tears could quench his fire. . 
 
 " Thou goest to return no more." 
 " Nay, by all oaths that bind "— 
 
THE PROMISE j5j 
 
 But even while the lover swore, 
 
 A voice was on the wind : 
 III fares the soul that sets its trust 
 On faith of dust. 
 
 II. 
 
 Forth from his castle rode the lord 
 
 With all his glittering train, 
 But never will his battle-sword 
 
 Inflict so keen a pain. 
 " His soldier-honor well he keeps ; 
 
 Mine honor— blind ! oh, blind ! " 
 While the forsaken woman weeps, 
 
 A voice is on the wind : 
 III fares the soul that sets its trust 
 On faith of dust. 
 
 III. 
 
 Her brother's eye her secret reads; 
 
 His fatal angers burn. 
 ** Thou hast us shamed." Her terror pleads,— 
 
 " He swore he would return." 
 *' But not to find thee, if he tries, 
 
 Where he was wont to find." 
 Beneath her brother's blow she dies ; 
 
 A voice is on the wind : 
 III fares the soul that sets its trust 
 On faith of dust. 
 
 IV. 
 
 In the trysting-wood, where love made mirth, 
 
 They have buried her deep, — but lo I 
 However high they heap the earth, 
 
 A hand as white as snow 
 Comes stealing up, a hand whose ring 
 
 A noble's troth doth bind. 
 Above her grave no maidens sing. 
 
 But a voice is on the wind : 
 
 III fares the soul that sets its trust 
 
 On faith of dust. 
 
1 62 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Hardly had the singer finished the last stanza, when, 
 breaking through the wall of eager listeners who respect- 
 fully gave way on recognizing him, the Count fronted the 
 pilgrim and, clutching his arm, demanded in a low, convulsive 
 voice : 
 
 " From what part of Spain art thou ? '* 
 
 " From Soria," was the unmoved response. 
 
 " And where hast thou learned this ballad ? Who is that 
 maiden of whom the story tells ? " again exclaimed the Count, 
 with ever more profound emotion. 
 
 " My lord," said the pilgrim, fixing his eyes upon the Count 
 with imperturbable steadiness, " this ballad is passed from 
 mouth to mouth among the peasants in the fief of Gomara, 
 and it refers to an unhappy village-girl cruelly wronged by a 
 great lord. The high justice of God has permitted that, 
 in her burial, there shall still remain above the earth the 
 hand on which her lover placed a ring in plighting her his 
 troth. Perchance you know whom it behooves to keep that 
 pledge.'* 
 
 V. 
 
 In a wretched village which may be found at one side of 
 the highway leading to Gomara, I saw not long since the spot 
 where the strange ceremony of the Count's marriage is said 
 to have taken place. 
 
 After he, kneeling upon the humble grave, had pressed the 
 hand of Margarita in his own, and a priest, authorized by 
 the Pope, had blessed Jthe mournful union, the story goes that 
 the miracle ceased, and the dead hand buried itself forever. 
 
 At the foot of some great old trees there is a bit of 
 meadow which, every spring, covers itself spontaneously with 
 flowers. 
 
 The country-folk say that this is the burial place of 
 Margarita. 
 
THE KISS 
 
 When a division of the French army, at the beginning of 
 the nineteenth century, took possession of historic Toledo, 
 the officers in command, not unaware of the danger to which 
 French soldiers were exposed in Spanish towns by being 
 quartered in separate lodgings, commenced to fit up as bar- 
 racks the largest and best edifices of the city. 
 
 After occupying the magnificent palace of Carlos V. they 
 appropriated the City Hall, and when this could hold no 
 more, they began to invade the pious shade of monasteries, 
 at last making over into stables even the churches sacred to 
 worship. Such was the state of affairs in the famous old town, 
 scene of the event which I am about to recount, when one 
 night, already late, there entered the city, muffled in their 
 dark army-cloaks and deafening the narrow, lonely streets, 
 from the Gate of the Sun to the Zocodover, with the clang 
 of weapons and the resounding beat of the hoofs that struck 
 sparks from the flinty way, one hundred or so of these tall 
 dragoons, dashing, mettlesome fellows, whom our grand- 
 mothers still tell about with admiration. 
 
 The force was commanded by a youthful officer, riding 
 about thirty paces in advance of his troop and talking in low 
 tones with a man on foot, who, so far as might be inferred 
 from his dress, was also a soldier. Walking in front of his 
 interlocutor, with a small lantern in hand, he seemed to be 
 serving as guide through that labyrinth. of obscure, twisted 
 and intertangled streets. 
 
 163 
 
1 64 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 "In sooth," said the trooper to his companion, " if the 
 lodging prepared for us is even such as you picture it, perhaps 
 it would be better to camp out in the country or in one of the 
 pubUc squares." 
 
 " But what would you, my captain ? " answered the guide, 
 who was, in fact, a sergeant sent on before to make ready for 
 their reception. " In the palace there is not room for another 
 grain of wheat, much less for a man ; of San Juan de los 
 Reyes there is no use in talking, for there it has reached such 
 a point that in one of the friars' cells are sleeping fifteen 
 hussars. The monastery to which I am taking you was 
 not so bad, but some, three or four days ago there fell upon 
 us, as if out of the clouds, one of the flying columns that scour 
 the province, and we are lucky to have prevailed on them to 
 heap themselves up along the cloisters and leave the chur 
 free for us." 
 
 "Ah, well I " exclaimed the officer, after a brief silence, 
 with an air of resigning himself to the strange quarters which 
 chance had apportioned him, " an ill lodging is better than 
 none. At all events, in case of rain, — not unlikely, judging 
 from the massing of the clouds, — we shall be under cover, 
 and that is something." 
 
 With this the conversation was broken off, and the troopers, 
 preceded by the guide, took the onward way in silence until 
 they came to one of the smaller squares, on the further side 
 of which stood out the black silhouette of the monastery with 
 its Moorish minaret, spired bell-tower, ogive cupola and dark, 
 uneven roof. 
 
 " Here is your lodging ! " exclaimed the sergeant at sight 
 of it, addressing the captain, who, after commanding his troop 
 to halt, dismounted, caught the lantern from the hands of the 
 guide, and took his way toward the building designated. • 
 
 Since the church of the monastery was thoroughly dis- 
 mantled, the soldiers who occupied the other parts of the 
 
OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
THE KISS 165 
 
 building had thought that the doors were now a trifle less 
 than useless and, piece by piece, had wrenched off one to-day, 
 another to-morrow, to make bonfires for warming themselves 
 by night. 
 
 Our young officer, therefore, did not have to delay for 
 turning of keys or drawing of bolts before penetrating into 
 the heart of the sanctuary. 
 
 By the light of the lantern, whose doubtful ray, lost in the 
 heavy glooms of nave and aisles, threw in giant proportions 
 upon the wall the fantastic shadow of the sergeant going on 
 before, he traversed the length and breadth of the church and 
 peered into the deserted chapels, one by one, until he had 
 made himself thoroughly acquainted with the place, when he 
 ordered his troop to dismount, and set about the bestowing 
 of that confused crowd of men and horses as best he could. 
 
 As we have said, the church was completely dismantled ; 
 before the High Altar were still hanging from the lofty cor- 
 nices torn shreds of the veil witjj which the jnonks had cov- 
 ered it on abandoning that holy place ; at intervals along the 
 aisles might be seen shrines fastened against the wall, their 
 niches bereft of images ; in the choir a line of light traced 
 the strange contour of the shadowy larchwood stalls ; upon the 
 pavement, destroyed at various points, might still be distin- 
 guished broad burial slabs filled with heraldic devices, shields 
 and long Gothic inscriptions ; and far away, in the depths of 
 the silent chapels and along the transepts, were vaguely visi- 
 ble in the dimness, like motionless white spectres, marble 
 statues which, some extended at full length and others kneel- 
 ing on their stony tombs, appeared to be the only tenants of 
 that ruined structure. 
 
 For anyone less spent than the captain of dragoons, who 
 carried in his body the fatigues of a ride of fourteen leagues, 
 or less accustomed to seeing these sacrileges as the most 
 natural thing in the world, two drams of imagination would 
 
1 66 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 have suflficed to keep eyes from closing the whole night long 
 in that dusky, awesome haunt, where the oaths of the soldiers, 
 who were loudly complaining of their improvised barracks, 
 the metallic clink of their spurs striking rudely against the 
 once sepulchral slabs of the pavement, the clatter of the 
 horses as they pawed impatiently, tossing their heads and 
 rattling the chains which bound them to the pillars, formed 
 a strange and fearful confusion of sounds that reverberated 
 through the reaches of the church and was repeated, ever 
 more weirdly, from echo to echo among the lofty vaults. 
 
 But our hero, young though he was, had already become 
 so familiar with those shiftings of the scene in a soldier's 
 life, that scarcely had he assigned places to his men than he 
 ordered a sack of fodder flung down at the foot of the chan- 
 cel steps, and rolling himself as snugly as possible into his 
 cloak, resting his head upon the lowest stair, in five minutes 
 was snoring with more tranquillity than King Joseph himself 
 in his palace at Madrid. 
 
 The soldiers, making pillows of the saddles, followed his 
 example, and little by little the murmur of their voices died 
 away. 
 
 Half an hour later, nothing was to be heard save the 
 stifled groans of the wind which entered by the broken ogive 
 windows of the church, the skurrying flights of night-birds 
 whose nests were built in the stone canopies above the sculp- 
 tured figures of the walls, and the tramp, now near, now far, 
 of the sentry who was pacing up and down the portico, wound 
 in the wide folds of his military cloak. 
 
 II. 
 
 In the epoch to which the account of this incident, no less 
 true than strange, reverts, the city of Toledo, for those who 
 knew not how to value the treasures of art which its walls 
 
 I 
 
THE KISS i6y 
 
 enclose, was, even as now, no more than a great huddle of 
 houses, old-fashioned, ruinous, insufferable. 
 
 The officers of the French army who, to judge from the 
 acts of vandalism by which they left in Toledo a sad and 
 enduring memory of their occupation, counted few artists 
 and archaeologists in their number, found themselves, as 
 goes without the saying, supremely bored in the ancient city 
 of the Caesars. 
 
 In this frame of mind, the most trifling event which came 
 to break the monotonous calm of those eternal, unvarying 
 days was eagerly caught up among the idlers, so that the 
 promotion of one of their comrades to the next grade, a 
 report of the strategic movement of a flying column, the 
 departure of an official post or the arrival at the city of any 
 military force whatsoever, became a fertile theme of conver- 
 sation and object of every sort of comment, until something 
 else occurred to take its place and serve as foundation for 
 new grumblings, criticisms and conjectures. 
 
 As was to be expected, among those officers who, accord- 
 ing to their custom, gathered on the following day to take 
 the air and chat a little in the Zocodover, the dish of gossip 
 was supplied by nothing else than the arrival of the dragoons, 
 whose leader was left in the former chapter stretched out at 
 his ease, sleeping off the fatigues of the march. For up- 
 wards of an hour the conversation had been beating about 
 this event, and already various explanations had been put 
 forward to account for the non-appearance of the new-comer, 
 whom an officer present, a former schoolmate, had invited to 
 the Zocodover, when at last, in one of the side-streets that 
 radiate from the square, appeared our gallant captain, no 
 longer obscured by his voluminous army-cloak, but sporting 
 a great shining helmet with a plume of white feathers, a tur- 
 quoise-blue coat with scarlet facings, and a magnificent two- 
 handed sword in a steel scabbard which clanked as it struck 
 
1 68 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the ground in time to his martial stride and to the keener, 
 sharper clink of his golden spurs. 
 
 As soon as his former chum caught sight of him, off he 
 went to meet him and bid him welcome, followed by almost 
 all the officers who chanced to be in the group that morning 
 and who had been stirred to curiosity and a desire to know 
 him by what they had already heard of his original, extraor- 
 dinary traits of character. 
 
 After the customary close embraces, and the exclamations, 
 compliments and questions enjoined by etiquette in meetings 
 like this ; after discussing at length and in detail the latest 
 news from Madrid, the changing fortune of the war, and old 
 friends dead or far away, the conversation, flitting from one 
 subject to another, came to roost at last on the inevitable 
 theme, to wit, the hardships of the service, the dearth of 
 amusements in the city, and the inconveniences of their 
 lodgings. 
 
 Now at this juncture one of the company, who, it would 
 seem, had heard of the ill grace with which the young officer 
 had resigned himself to quartering his troop in the abandoned 
 church, said to him with an air of raillery : 
 
 " And speaking of lodgings, what sort of a night did you 
 have in yours ? " 
 
 " We lacked for nothing," answered the captain, " and if it 
 is the truth that I slept but little, the cause of my insomnia 
 is well worth the pains of wakefulness. A vigil in the society 
 of a charming woman is surely not the worst of evils/' 
 
 " A woman I " repeated his interlocutor, as if wondering 
 at the good fortune of the new arrival. " This is what they 
 call ending the pilgrimage and kissing the saint." 
 
 " Perhaps it is some old flame of the Capital who follows 
 him to Madrid to make his exile more endurable," added 
 another of the circle. 
 
 " Oh, no 1 " exclaimed the captain, " nothing of the sort 
 
THE KISS 169 
 
 I swear to you, on the word of a gentleman, I had never 
 seen her before, nor had I dreamed of finding so gracious a 
 hostess in so bad a hostelry. It is altogether what one might 
 call a genuine adventure." 
 
 " Tell it ! tell it 1 " chorused the officers who surrounded 
 the captain, and as he proceeded so to do, all lent the most 
 eager attention, while he began his story thus : 
 
 " I was sleeping last night the sleep of a man who carries 
 in his body the effects of a thirteen-league ride, w^hen, look 
 you, in the best of my slumber I was startled wide-awake, — 
 springing up and leaning on my elbows, — by a horrible up- 
 roar, such an uproar fhat it deafened me for an instant and 
 left my ears, a full minute after, humming as if a horse-fly 
 were singing on my cheek. 
 
 " As you will have guessed, the cause of my alarm was the 
 first stroke which I heard of that diabolical campana gorda, 
 a sort of bronze chorister, which the canons of Toledo have 
 placed in their cathedral for the praiseworthy object of kill- 
 ing the weary with wrath. 
 
 " Cursing between my teeth both bell and bell-ringer, I dis- 
 posed myself, as soon as that strange and frightful noise had 
 ceased, to take up anew the thread of my broken dream, 
 when there befell, to pique my imagination and challenge my 
 senses, a thing of wonder. By the uncertain moonlight 
 which entered the church through the narrow Moorish 
 window of the chancel wall, I saw a woman kneeling at the 
 altar." 
 
 The officers exchknged glances of mingled astonishment 
 and incredulity ; the captain, without heeding the impression 
 his narrative was making, continued as follows : 
 
 " It could not enter into man's heart to conceive that noc- 
 turnal, phantasmal vision, vaguely outlined in the twilight of 
 the chapel, like those virgins painted in colored glass 
 that you have sometimes seen, from afar off, stand out, 
 
170 
 
 KOMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 white and luminous, across the shadowy stretch of the 
 cathedrals. 
 
 " Her oval face, on which one saw stamped the seal, deli- 
 cate and spiritual, of emaciation, her harmonious features 
 full of a gentle, melancholy sweetness, her intense pallor, the 
 perfect lines of her slender figure, her reposeful, noble pos- 
 ture, her robe of flowing white, brought to my memory the 
 women of whom I used to dream when I was still little more 
 than a child. Chaste, celestial images, illusive objects of 
 the wandering love of youth 1 
 
 " I believed myself the sport of an hallucination and not 
 withdrawing my eyes from her for an instant, I scarcely 
 dared breathe, fearing that a breath might dissolve the 
 enchantment. 
 
 " She remained motionless. 
 
 " The fancy crossed my mind, on seeing her so shining, so 
 transparent, that this was no creature of the earth, but a 
 spirit, that, once more assuming for an instant the veil of 
 human form, had descended in the moonbeam, leaving in the 
 air behind it the azure track which slanted from the high 
 window to the foot of the opposite wall, breaking the deep 
 gloom of that dusky, mysterious recess." 
 
 " But — " interrupted his former schoolmate, who, incHned 
 at the outset to make fun of the story, had at last grown 
 closely attentive — " how came that woman there ? Did 
 you not speak to her? Did she not explain to you her 
 presence in that place ? " 
 
 " T decided not to address her, because I was sure that she 
 would not answer me, nor see me, nor hear me." 
 
 " Was she deaf ? " 
 
 " Was she blind ? " 
 
 " Was she dumb ? " exclaimed simultaneously three or 
 four of those who were listening to the story. 
 
THE KISS 171 
 
 " She was all at once," finally declared the captain after a 
 moment's pause, " for she was marble." 
 
 On hearing this remarkable denouement of so strange an 
 adventure, the bystanders burst into a noisy peal of laughter, 
 while one of them said to the narrator of this curious experi- 
 ence, who alone remained quiet and of grave deportment : 
 
 " We will make a complete thing of it. As for this sort 
 of ladies, I have more than a thousand, a regular seraglio, in 
 San Juan de los Reyes ^ a seraglio which from this time on I 
 put quite at your service, since, it would seem, a woman of 
 stone is the same to you as a woman of flesh." 
 
 " Oh, no I " responded the captain, not nettled in the 
 slightest by the laughter of his companions. " I am sure 
 that they cannot be like mine. Mine is a true Castilian dame 
 of high degree, who by a miracle of sculpture appears not to 
 have been buried in a sepulchre, but still, body and soul, 
 to kneel upon the lid of her own tomb, motionless, with 
 hands joined in attitude of prayer, drowned in an ecstasy of 
 mystic love." 
 
 " You are so plausible that you will end by making us 
 believe in the fable of Galatea." 
 
 " For my part, I admit that I had always supposed it non- 
 sense, but since last night I begin to comprehend the passion 
 of the Greek sculptor." 
 
 " Considering the pecuUar circumstances of your new lady, 
 I presume you would have no objection to presenting us. As 
 for me, I vow that already I am dead with longing to behold 
 this paragon. But — what the devil ! — one would say that 
 you do not wish to introduce us. Ha, ha, ha ! It would be 
 a joke indeed if we should find you jealous." 
 
 " Jealous ! " the captain hastened to reply. " Jealous — of 
 men, n.o ; but yet see to what lengths my madness reaches. 
 Close beside the image of this woman is a warrior, also of 
 marble, an august figure, as lifelike as herself, — her husband, 
 
1^2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 without doubt. Well, then I I am going to make a clean 
 breast of it, jeer at my folly as you may, — if I had not feared 
 being taken for a lunatic, I believe I should have broken him 
 to pieces a hundred times over." 
 
 A fresh and yet more riotous outburst of laughter from the 
 officers greeted this original revelation on the part of the 
 eccentric lover of the marble lady. 
 
 " We will take no refusal. We must see her," cried some. 
 
 " Yes, yes, we must know if the object of such devotion is 
 as unique as the passion itself," added others. 
 
 " When shall we come together to take a drink in the 
 church where you lodge ? " demanded the rest. 
 
 " Whenever you please ; this very evening, if you like," 
 replied the young captain, regaining his usual debonair 
 expression, dispelled for an instant by that flash of jealousy. 
 " By the way, along with the baggage I have brought as many 
 as two dozen bottles of champagne, genuine champagne, what 
 was left over from a present given to our brigadier-general, 
 who, as you know, is a distant relative -of mine." 
 
 " Bravo ! Bravo I " shouted the officers with one voice, 
 breaking into gleeful exclamations. 
 
 " We will drink the wine of our native land ! " 
 
 " And we will sing one of Rorjsard's songs ! " 
 
 " And we will talk of women, apropos of the lady of our 
 host." 
 
 " And so — good-bye till evening 1 " 
 
 « Till evening ! " 
 
 III. 
 
 It was now a good hour since the peaceful inhabitants of 
 Toledo had secured with key and bolt the massive doors 
 of their ancient mansions ; the campana gorda of the cathe- 
 dral was ringing curfew, and from the summit of the palace, 
 now converted into barracks, was sounding the last bugle- 
 call for silence, when ten or twelve officers, who had been 
 
THE KISS , 1^3 
 
 gradually assembling in the Zocodover, took the road lead- 
 ing thence to the monastery where the captain was lodged, 
 impelled more by hope of draining the promised bottles than 
 by eagerness to make acquaintance with the marvellous piece 
 of sculpture. 
 
 The night had shut down dark and threatening ; the sky 
 was covered with leaden clouds ; the wind, whistling along 
 the imprisoning channels of the narrow, tortuous streets, was 
 shaking the dying flames of the shielded lamps before the 
 shrines, or making the iron weather-vanes of the towers whirl 
 about with a shrill creaking. 
 
 Scarcely had the officers caught sight of the square where 
 stood the monastery which served as quarters for their new 
 friend, than he, who was impatiently looking out for their 
 arrival, sallied forth to meet them, and after the exchange of 
 a few low-toned sentences, all together entered the church, 
 within whose dim enclosure the faint gleam of a lantern was 
 struggling at hopeless odds with the black and heavy 
 shadows. 
 
 " Ton my honor ! " exclaimed one of the guests, peering 
 about him. " If this isn't the last place in the world for a 
 revel ! " 
 
 " True enough ! " said another. " You bring us here to 
 meet a lady, and scarcely can a man see his hand before his 
 face." 
 
 " And worst of all, it's so icy cold that we might as well be 
 in Siberia," added a third, hugging the folds of his cloak 
 about him." 
 
 " Patience, gentlemen, patience ! " interposed the host. 
 " A little patience will set all to rights. Here, my lad ! " he 
 continued, addressing one of his men. " Hunt us up a bit 
 of fuel and kindle a rousing bonfire in the chancel." 
 
 The orderly, obeying his captain's directions, commenced 
 to rain swinging blows on the carven stalls of the choir, and 
 
174 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 after he had thus collected a goodly supply of wood, which 
 was heaped up at the foot of the chancel steps, he took the 
 lantern and proceeded to make an auto de fe of those frag- 
 ments carved in richest designs. Among them might be 
 seen here a portion of a spiral column, there the effigy of a 
 holy abbot, the torso of a woman, or the misshapen head of 
 a griffin peeping through foliage. 
 
 In a few minutes, a great light which suddenly streamed 
 out through all the compass of the church announced to the 
 officers that the hour for the carousal had arrived. 
 
 The captain, who did the honors of his lodging with the 
 same punctiliousness which he would have observed in his 
 own house, turned to his guests and said : 
 
 " We will, if you please, pass to the refreshment room." 
 
 His comrades, affecting the utmost gravity, responded to 
 the invitation with absurdly profound bows and took their 
 way to the chancel preceded by the lord of the revel, who, 
 on reaching the stone steps, paused an instant, and ex- 
 tending his hand in the direction of the tomb, said to them 
 with the most exquisite courtesy : 
 
 " I have the pleasure of presenting you to the lady of my 
 dreams. I am sure you will grant that I have not exag- 
 gerated her beauty." 
 
 The officers turned their eyes toward the point which 
 their friend designated, and exclamations of astonishment 
 broke involuntarily from the lips of all. 
 
 In the depths of a sepulchral arch lined with black marbles, 
 they saw, in fact, kneeling before a prayer-stool, with folded 
 palms and face turned toward the altar, the image of a 
 woman so beautiful that never did her equal come from 
 sculptor's hands, nor could desire paint her in imagination 
 more supremely lovely. 
 
 " In truth, an angel ! " murmured one. 
 
 " A pity that she is marble I " added another. 
 
THE KISS 
 
 I7S 
 
 " Well might — illusion though it be — the neighborhood of 
 such a woman suffice to keep one from closing eye the 
 whole night through." 
 
 " And you do not know who she is ? " others of the group, 
 contemplating the statue, asked of the captain, who stood 
 smiling, satisfied with his triumph. 
 
 "Recalling a little of the Latin which I learned in my 
 boyhood, I have been able, at no small pains, to decipher 
 the inscription on the stone," he answered, " and by what I 
 have managed to make out, it is the tomb of a Castilian 
 noble, a famous warrior wdio fought under the Great Captain. 
 His name I have forgotten, but his wife, on whom you look, 
 is called Dona Elvira de Castaneda, and by my hopes of sal- 
 vation, if the copy resembles the original, this should be the 
 most notable woman of her time." 
 
 After these brief explanations, the guests, who did not 
 lose sight of the principal object of the gathering, proceeded 
 to uncork some of the bottles and, seating themselves around 
 the bonfire, began to pass the wine from hand to hand. 
 
 In proportion as their libations became more copious and 
 frequent, and the fumes of the foaming champagne com- 
 menced to cloud their brains, the animation, the uproar and 
 the merriment of the young Frenchmen rose to such a pitch 
 that some of them threw the broken necks of the empty bottles 
 at the granite monks carved against the pillars, and others 
 trolled at the tops of their voices scandalous drinking-songs, 
 while the rest burst into roars of laughter, clapped their 
 hands in applause or quarrelled among themselves with 
 angry words and oaths. 
 
 The captain sat drinking in silence, like a man distraught, 
 without moving his eyes from the statue of Doiia Elvira. 
 
 Illumed by the ruddy splendor of the bonfire, and seen 
 across the misty veil which wine had drawn before his vision, 
 the marble image sometimes seemed to him to be changing 
 
1 76 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 into an actual woman ; it seemed to him that her lips parted, 
 as if murmuring a prayer, that her breast heaved as if with 
 stifled sobs, that her palms were pressed together with morp 
 energy, and finally, that rosy color crept into her cheeks, as 
 if she were blushing before that sacrilegious and repugnant 
 scene. 
 
 The officers, noting the gloomy silence of their comrade, 
 roused him from the trance into which he had fallen, and 
 thrusting a cup into his hands, exclaimed in noisy chorus : 
 
 " Come, give us a toast, you, the only man that has failed 
 of it to-night ! " 
 
 The young host took the cup, rose and, lifting it on high, 
 turned to face the statue of the warrior kneeling beside Dona 
 Elvira and said : 
 
 " I drink to the Emperor, and I drink to the success of his 
 arms, thanks to which we have been able to penetrate even 
 to the heart of Castile and to court, at his own tomb, the wife 
 of a conqueror of Ceriiiola." 
 
 The officers drank the toast with a storm of applause, and 
 the captain, keeping his balance with some difficulty, took a 
 few steps toward the sepulchre. 
 
 " No," he continued, always addressing, with the stupid 
 smile of intoxication, the statue of the warrior. " Don't 
 suppose that I have a grudge against you for being my rival. 
 On the contrary, old lad, I admire you for a patient husband, 
 an example of meekness and long suffering, and, for my part, 
 I wish to be generous, too. You should be a tippler, since 
 you are a soldier, and it shall not be said that I left you to 
 die of thirst in the sight of twenty empty bottles. Drink ! " 
 
 And with thesewords he raised the cup to his lips and, 
 after wetting them with the liquor which it contained, flung 
 the rest into the marble face, bursting into a boisterous 
 peal of laughter to see how the wine splashed down over the 
 tomb from the carven beard of the motionless warrior. 
 
TFIE KISS . 177 
 
 " Captain," exclaimed at that point one of his comrades 
 in a tone of raillery, " take heed what you do. Bear in 
 mind that these jests with the stone people are apt to cost 
 dear. Remember what happened to the Fifth Hussars in 
 the monastery of Poblet. The story goes that the warriors of 
 the cloister laid hand to their granite swords one night and 
 gave plenty of occupation to those merry fellows who had 
 amused themselves by adorning them with charcoal mus- 
 taches." 
 
 The young revellers received this report with roars of 
 laughter, but the captain, heedless of their mirth, continued, 
 his mind fixed ever on the same idea. 
 
 " Do you think that I would have given him the wine, had 
 I not known that he would swallow at least as much as fell 
 upon his mouth ? Oh, no ! I do not l^elieve like you that 
 these statues are mere blocks of marble as inert to-day as 
 when hewed from the quarry. Undoubtedly the artist, who 
 is*aTways a god, gives to his work a breath of life which is 
 not powerful enough to make the figure move and walk, but 
 which inspires it with a strange, incomprehensible life, a life 
 which I do not fully explain to myself, but which I feel, 
 especially when I am a little drunk." 
 
 " Magnificent ! " exclaimed his comrades. " Drink and 
 continue I " 
 
 The officer drank and, fixing his eyes upon the image of 
 Dona Elvira, went on with mounting excitement : 
 
 " Look at her ! Look at her 1 Do you not note those 
 changing flushes of her soft, transparent flesh ? Does it 
 not seem that beneath this delicate alabaster skin, azure- 
 veined and tender, circulates a fluid of rose-colored light ? 
 Would you wish more life, more reality ? " 
 
 " Oh, but yes, by all means," said one of those who was 
 listening. *' We would have her of flesh and bone." 
 
 " Flesh and bone 1 Misery and corruption ! " exclaimed 
 
lyS ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the captain. " I have felt in the course of an orgy my lips 
 burn, and my head. I have felt that fire which runs boiling 
 through the veins like the lava of a volcano, that fire whose 
 dim vapors trouble and confuse the brain and conjure up 
 strange visions. Then the kiss of these material women 
 burned me like a red-hot iron, and I thrust them from me 
 with displeasure, with horror and with loathing; for then, 
 as now, I needed for my fevered forehead a breath of the 
 sea-breeze, to drink ice and to kiss snow, snow tinted by 
 mellow light, snow illumined by a golden ray of sunshine, — 
 a woman white, beautiful and cold, like this woman of stone 
 who seems to allure me with her ethereal grace, to sway 
 like a flame — who challenges me with parted lips, offering 
 me a wealth of love. Oh, yes, a kiss I Only a kiss of thine 
 can calm the fire which is consuming me." 
 
 " Captain I " exclaimed some of the officers, on seeing him 
 start toward the statue as if beside himself, his gaze wild 
 and his steps reeling. " What mad foolery would you com- 
 mit ? Enough of jesting 1 Leave the dead in peace." 
 
 The young host did not even hear the warnings of his 
 friends ; staggering, groping his way, he reached the tomb 
 and approached the statue of Dona Elvira, but as he 
 stretched out his arms to clasp it, a cry of horror resounded 
 through the temple. With blood gushing from eyes, mouth 
 and nostrils, he had fallen prone, his face crushed in, at the 
 foot of the sepulchre. 
 
 The officers, hushed and terrified, dared not take one step 
 forward to his aid. 
 
 At the moment when their comrade strove to touch his 
 burning lips to those of Dona Elvira, they had seen the 
 marble warrior lift its hand and, with a frightful blow of the 
 Stone gauntlet, strike him down. 
 
THE SPIRITS* MOUNTAIN 
 
 On All Souls' Night I was awakened, I knew not at what 
 hour, by the tolling of bells ; their monotonous, unceasing 
 sound brought to mind this tradition which I heard a short 
 time ago in Soria. 
 
 I tried to sleep again. Impossible ! The imagination, 
 once roused, is a horse that runs wild and cannot be reined 
 in. To pass the time, I decided to write the story out, and 
 so in fact I did. 
 
 I had heard it in the very place where it originated and, 
 as I wrote, I sometimes glanced behind me with sudden 
 fear, when, smitten by the cold night air, the glass of my 
 balcony crackled. 
 
 Make of it what you will, — here it goes loose, like the 
 mounted horseman in a Spanish pack of cards. 
 
 I. 
 
 " Leash the dogs ! Blow the horns to call the hunters 
 together, and let us return to the city. Night is at hand, — 
 the Night of All Souls, and we are on the Spirits' Mountain." 
 
 " So soon 1 " 
 
 " Were it any day but this, I would not give up till I had 
 made an end of that pack of wolves which the snows of the 
 Moncayo have driven from their dens ; but to-day it is 
 impossible. Very soon the Angelus will sound in the 
 monastery of the Knights Templars, and the souls of the 
 dead will commence to toll their bell in the chajpel on the 
 mountain." 
 
 " In that ruined chapel I Bah ! Would you frighten me ? " 
 179 
 
1 82 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 of the flames. Alonso watched the reflection of the fire 
 sparkling in the blue eyes of Beatriz. 
 
 Both maintained for some time an unbroken silence. 
 
 The duennas were telling gruesome stories, appropriate' 
 to the Night of All Souls, — stories in which ghosts and 
 spectres played the principal roles, and the church bells of 
 Soria were tolling in the distance with a monotonous and 
 mournful sound. 
 
 " Fair cousin," finally exclaimed Alonso, breaking the 
 long silence between them. " Soon we are to separate, per- 
 haps forever. I know you do not like the arid plains of 
 Castile, its rough, soldier customs, its simple, patriarchal 
 ways. At various times I have heard you sigh, perhaps for 
 some lover in your far-away demesne." 
 
 Beatriz made a gesture of cold indifference; the whole 
 character of the woman was revealed in that disdainful con- 
 traction of her delicate lips. 
 
 " Or perhaps for the grandeur and gaiety of the French 
 capital, where you have lived hitherto," the young man 
 hastened to add. " In one way or another, I foresee that 
 I shall lose you before long. When we part, I would like 
 to have you carry hence a remembrance of me. Do you 
 recollect the time when we went to church to give thanks to 
 God for having granted you that restoration to health which 
 was your object in coming to this region ? The jewel 
 that fastened the plume of my cap attracted your attention. 
 How well it would look clasping a veil over your dark hair 1 
 It has already been the adornment of a bride. My father 
 gave it to my mother, and she wore it to the altar. Would 
 you like it ? " 
 
 " I do not know how it may be in your part of the country," 
 replied the beauty, " but in mine to accept a gift is to incur 
 an obligation. Only on a holy day may one receive a present 
 
A MOUNTAIN PASS 
 
OF TH£ 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
TBE SPIRITS' MOUNTAIN 183 
 
 from a kinsman, — though he may go to Rome without return- 
 ing empty-handed." 
 
 The frigid tone in which Beatriz spoke these words 
 troubled the youth for a moment, but, clearing his brow, he 
 replied sadly : 
 
 " I know it, cousin, but to-day is the festival of All Saints, 
 and yours among them, — a holiday on which gifts are fitting. 
 Will you accept mine ? " 
 
 Beatriz slightly bit her lip and put out her hand for the 
 jewel, without a word. 
 
 The two again fell silent and again heard the quavering 
 voices of the old women telling of witches and hobgoblins, 
 the whistling wind which shook the ogive windows, and the 
 mournful, monotonous tolling of the bells. 
 
 After the lapse of some little time, the interrupted dialogue 
 was thus renewed : 
 
 " And before All Saints' Day ends, which is holy to my 
 saint as well as to yours, so that you can, without com- 
 promising yourself, give me a keepsake, will you not do so ? '* 
 pleaded Alonso, fixing his eyes on his cousin's, which flashed 
 like lightning, gleaming with a diabolical thought. 
 
 " Why not? " she exclaimed, raising her hand to her right 
 shoulder as though seeking for something amid the folds of 
 her wide velvet sleeve embroidered with gold. Then, with 
 an innocent air of disappointment, she added : 
 
 " Do you recollect the blue scarf I wore to-day to the 
 hunt, — the scarf which you said, because of something about 
 the meaning of its color, was the emblem of your soul ? " 
 
 " Yes." 
 
 f' Well 1 it is lost ! it is lost, and I was thinking of letting 
 you have it for a souvenir." 
 
 " Lost 1 where ? " asked Alonso, rising from his seat with 
 an indescribable expression of. mingled fear and hope. 
 
 " I do not know, — perhaps on the mountain." v 
 
i84 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 " On the Spirits' Mountain I" he murmured, paHng and 
 sinking back into his seat. " On the Spirits' Mountain ! " 
 
 Then he went on in a voice choked and broken : 
 
 " You know, for you have heard it a thousand times, that 
 I am called in the city, in all Castile, the king of the hunters. 
 Not having yet had a chance to try, like my ancestors, my 
 strength in battle, I have brought to bear on this pastime, 
 the image of war, all the energy of my youth, all the hered- 
 itary ardor of my race. The rugs your feet tread on are 
 the spoils of the chase, the hides of the wild beasts I have 
 killed with my own hand. I know their haunts and their 
 habits ; I have fought them by day and by night, on foot 
 and on horseback, alone and with hunting-parties, and there 
 is not a man will say that he has ever seen me shrink from 
 danger. On any other night I would fly for that scarf, — 
 fly as joyously as to a festival ; but to-night, this one night — 
 why disguise it ? — I am afraid. Do you hear ? The bells 
 are tolling, the Angelus has sounded in San Juan del Duero, 
 the ghosts of the mountain are now beginning to lift their 
 yellowing skulls from amid the brambles that cover their 
 graves — the ghosts ! the mere sight of them is enough to 
 curdle with horror the blood of the bravest, turn his hair 
 white, or sweep him away in the stormy whirl of their fan- 
 tastic chase as a leaf, unwitting whither, is carried by the 
 wind." 
 
 While the young man was speaking, an almost imper- 
 ceptible smile curled the lips of Beatriz, who, when he had 
 ceased, exclaimed in an indifferent tone, while she was 
 stirring the fire on the hearth, where the wood blazed and 
 snapped, throwing off sparks of a thousand colors : 
 
 " Oh, by no means ! What folly 1 To go to the mountain 
 at this hour for such a trifle 1 On so dark a night, too, 
 with ghosts abroad, and the road beset by wolves ! " 
 
 As she spoke this closing phrase, she emphasized it with 
 
THE SPI KITS' MOUNTAIN 185 
 
 SO peculiar an intonation that Alonso could not fail to 
 understand all her bitter irony. As moved by a spring, he 
 leapt to his feet, passed his hand over his brow as if to dis- 
 pel the fear which was in his brain, not in his breast, and 
 with firm voice he said, addressing his beautiful cousin, who 
 was still leaning over the hearth, amusing herself by stirring 
 the fire : 
 
 " Farewell, Beatriz, farewell. If I return, it will be soon." 
 
 " Alonso, Alonso I " she called, turning quickly, but now 
 that she wished — or made show of wishing — to detain him, 
 the youth had gone. 
 
 In a few moments she heard the beat of a horse's hoofs 
 departing at a gallop. The beauty, with a radiant expres- 
 sion of satisfied pride flushing her cheeks, listened attentively 
 to the sound which grew fainter and fainter until it died 
 away. 
 
 The old dames, meanwhile, were continuing their tales of 
 ghostly apparitions ; the wind was shrilling against the 
 balcony glass, and far away the bells of the city tolled on. 
 
 Ill 
 
 An hour had passed, two, three ; midnight would soon be 
 striking, and Beatriz withdrew to her chamber. Alonso 
 had not returned ; he had not returned, though less than an 
 hour would have sufficed for his errand. 
 
 " He must have been afraid ! " exclaimed the girl, closing 
 her prayer-book and turning toward her bed after a vain 
 attempt to murmur some of the prayers that the church 
 offers for the dead on the Day of All Souls. 
 
 After putting out her light and drawing the double silken 
 curtains, she fell asleep ; but her sleep was restless, light, 
 uneasy. 
 
 The Postigo clock struck midnight. Beatriz heard through 
 
1 86 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 her dreams the slow, dull, melancholy strokes, and half 
 opened her eyes. She thought she had heard, at the same 
 time, her name spoken, but far, far away, and in a faint, 
 suffering voice. The wind groaned outside her window. 
 
 " It must have been the wind," she said, and pressing her 
 hand above her heart, she strove to calm herself. But her 
 heart beat ever more wildly. The larchwood doors of the 
 chamber grated on their hinges with a sharp creak, pro- 
 longed and strident. 
 
 First these doors, then the more distant ones, — all the 
 doors which led to her room opened, one after another, some 
 with a heavy, groaning sound, some with a long wail that 
 set the nerves on edge. Then silence, a silence full of 
 strange noises, the silence of midnight, with a monotonous 
 murmur of far-off water, the distant barking of dogs, con- 
 fused voices, unintelligible words, echoes of footsteps going 
 and coming, the rustle of trailing garments, half-suppressed 
 sighs, labored breathing almost felt upon the face, in- 
 voluntary shudders that announce the presence of something 
 not seen, though its approach is felt in the darkness. 
 
 Beatriz, stiffening with fear, yet trembling, thrust her head 
 out from the bed-curtains and listened a moment. She 
 heard a thousand diverse noises; she passed her hand 
 across her brow and listened again ; nothing, silence. 
 
 She saw, with that dilation of the pupils common in nerv- 
 ous crises, dim shapes moving hither and thither all about 
 the room, but when she fixed her gaze on any one point, 
 there was nothing but darkness and impenetrable shadows. 
 
 " Bah 1 " she exclaimed, again resting her beautiful head 
 upon her blue satin pillow, " am I as timid as these poor 
 kinsfolk of mine, whose hearts thump with terror under their 
 armor when they hear a ghost-story ? " 
 
 And closing her eyes she tried to sleep, — but her effort to 
 compose herself was in vain. Soon she started up again, 
 
THE SPIRITS' MOUNTAIN ,87 
 
 paler, more uneasy, more terrified. This time it was no 
 illusion ; the brocade hangings of the door had rustled as 
 they were pushed to either side, and slow footsteps were 
 heard upon the carpet ; the sound of those footsteps was 
 muffled, almost imperceptible, but continuous, and she heard, 
 keeping measure with them, a creaking as of dry wood or 
 bones. And the footfalls came nearer, nearer ; the prayer- 
 stool by the side of her bed moved. Beatriz uttered a sharp 
 cry, and burying herself under the bedclothes, hid her head 
 and held her breath. 
 
 The wind beat against the balcony glass ; the water of 
 the far-off fountain was falling, falling, with a monotonous, 
 unceasing sound ; the barking of the dogs was borne upon 
 the gusts, and the church bells in the city of Soria, some 
 near, some remote, tolled sadly for the souls of the dead. 
 
 So passed an hour, two, the night, a century, for that 
 night seemed to Beatrix eternal. At last the day began to 
 break ; putting fear from her, she half opened her eyes to 
 the first silver rays. How beautiful, after a night of wake- 
 fulness and terrors, is the clear white light of dawn I She 
 parted the silken curtains of her bed and was ready to laugh 
 at her past alarms, when suddenly a cold sweat covered her 
 body, her eyes seemed starting from their sockets, and a 
 deadly pallor overspread her cheeks ; for on her prayer- 
 stool she had seen, torn and blood-stained, the blue scarf 
 she lost on the mountain, the blue scarf Alonso went to seek. 
 
 When her attendants rushed in, aghast, to tell her of the 
 death of the heir of Alcudiel, whose body, partly devoured 
 by wolves, had been found that morning among the bram- 
 bles on the Spirits' Mountain, they discovered her motionless, 
 convulsed, clinging with both hands to one of the ebony bed- 
 posts, her eyes staring, her mouth open, the lips white, her 
 limbs rigid, — dead, dead of fright ! 
 
1 88 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 IV. 
 
 They say that, some time after this event, a hunter who, 
 having lost his way, had been obliged to pass the Night of 
 the Dead on the Spirits' Mountain, and who in the morning, 
 before he died, was able to relate what he had seen, told a 
 tale of horror. Among other awful sights, he avowed he 
 beheld the skeletons of the ancient Knights Templars and 
 of the nobles of Soria, buried in the cloister of the chapel, 
 rise at the hour of the Angelus with a horrible rattle and, 
 mounted on their bony steeds, chase, as a wild beast, a 
 beautiful woman, pallid, with streaming hair, who, uttering 
 cries of terror and anguish, had been wandering, with bare 
 and bloody feet, about the tomb of Alonso. 
 
THE CAVE OF THE MOOR'S 
 DAUGHTER 
 
 I. 
 
 Opposite the Baths of Fitero, on a rocky, precipitous 
 eminence, at whose base flows the river Alhama, there may- 
 be seen to this day the abandoned ruins of a Moorish castle 
 celebrated in the glorious memories of the Reconquest as 
 having been the theatre of great and famous exploits, as 
 well on the part of the defenders as of those who valiantly 
 nailed to its parapets the standard of the Cross. 
 
 Of the walls there remain only some scattered ruins ; the 
 stones of the watch-tower have fallen one above another 
 into the moat, filling it to the top ; in the court-of-arms grow 
 briers and patches of yellow mustard ; in whatever direction 
 you look, you see only broken arches, blackened and crum- 
 bling blocks of stone ; here a section of the barbican in whose 
 fissures springs the ivy, there a round tower, standing yet, 
 as by a miracle ; further on, pillars of cement with the iron 
 rings which supported the drawbridge. 
 
 During my stay at the Baths, partly for exercise, which I 
 was assured would be conducive to my health, and partly 
 from curiosity, I strolled every afternoon along the rough 
 path that leads to the ruins of the Arab fortress. There I 
 passed hours and hours, closely scanning the ground in the 
 hope of discovering some fragments of armor, beating the 
 walls to find out whether they were hollow and might be the 
 hiding place of treasure, and investigating all the nooks and 
 crannies with the idea of hitting upon the entrance to some 
 of those underground cells which are believed to exist in all 
 Moorish castles. 
 
 189 
 
IQO ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 My diligent search was, after all, a fruitless one. 
 
 But yet, one afternoon, when I had quite despaired of 
 discovering anything new and curious on the rocky height 
 crowned by the castle and had given up the climb, Hmiting 
 my walk to the banks of the river which flows by its foot, I 
 saw, as I walked along by the stream, a sort of gaping hole in 
 the living rock, half hidden by thickly-leaved bushes. Not 
 without a little tremor, I parted the branches covering the en- 
 trance to what seemed a natural cave, but what I perceived, 
 after advancing a few steps, was a subterranean vault narrow- 
 ing to the mouth. Not being able to penetrate to the end, 
 which was lost in darkness, I confined myself to observing 
 attentively the peculiarities of the arch and of the pavement 
 that appeared to me to rise in great stairs toward the height 
 on which stood the castle I have mentioned, and in whose 
 ruins I then remembered having seen a closed-up trap door. 
 Doubtless I had discovered one of those secret passages so 
 common in the fortifications of that epoch, serving for covert 
 sallies, or for bringing, in state of siege, water from the river 
 which flows hard by. 
 
 That I might be more sure of the truth of my inferences, 
 after I had come out from the cave by the same way in which 
 I had entered, I fell into conversation with a workman who 
 was pruning some vines in that rough region and whom I 
 accosted under pretence of asking a light for my cigarette. 
 
 We talked of various matters : the medicinal properties 
 of the waters of Fitero ; the last harvest and the next ; the 
 women of Navarre and the cultivation of vines ; indeed, we 
 talked of everything which occurred to the sociable body 
 before we spoke of the cave, the object of my curiosity. 
 
 When, at last, the conversation had reached this point, I 
 asked him if he knew of any one who had gone through it, 
 and seen the other end. 
 
 " Gone through the cave of the Moor's Daughter I " he 
 
A MOUNTAIN GROTTO 
 
THE CAVE OF THE MOOR'S DAUGHTER 191 
 
 repeated, astonished at hearing such a question. " Who 
 would dare ? Do you not know that from this cave there 
 comes out, every night, a ghosi? " 
 
 " A ghost ! " I exclaimed, smiling. " Whose ghost ? " 
 " The ghost of the daughter of a Moorish chief, she who 
 yet wanders mourning about these places and is seen every 
 night coming out of this cave, robed in white, and filling at 
 the river a water-jar." 
 
 Through this good fellow I learned that there was a tradi- 
 tion clinging to this Arab castle and the vault which I believed 
 to communicate with it. And as I am a most willing hearer 
 of all these legends, especially from the lips of the neighbor- 
 folk, I begged him to relate it to me, and so he did, almost 
 in the very words in which I in turn am going to relate it to 
 my readers. 
 
 II. 
 
 When the castle, of which there remain to-day only a few 
 shapeless ruins, was still held by the Moorish kings, and its 
 towers, not one stone now left upon another, commanded from 
 their lofty site all that most fertile valley watered by the river 
 Alhama, there was fought near the town of Fitero a hotly 
 contested battle in which a famous Christian knight, as 
 worthy of renown for his piety as for his valor, fell, wounded, 
 into the hands of the Arabs. 
 
 Taken to the fortress and loaded with irons by his enemies, 
 he was for some days in the depths of a dungeon struggling 
 between life and death, until, healed as if miraculously of his 
 wounds, he was redeemed by his kindred with a ransom of 
 gold. 
 
 The captive returned to his home, — returned to clasp to 
 his breast those who had given him being. His brothers-in- 
 arms and his men-of-war were overjoyed to see him, suppos- 
 ing that he would sound the call to new combat, but the soul 
 
192 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 of the knight had become possessed by a deep melancholy, 
 and neither the endearments of parental love nor the assidu- 
 ities of friendship could dissipate his strange gloom. 
 
 During his imprisonment he had managed to see the 
 daughter of the Moorish chief, rumors of whose beauty had 
 already reached his ears. But when he beheld her, he found 
 her so superior to the idea he had formed of her that he 
 could not resist the fascination of her charms and fell des- 
 perately in love with one who could never be his bride. 
 
 Months and months were spent by the knight in devising 
 the most daring, most absurd plans ; now he would imagine 
 some way of breaking the barriers that separated him from 
 that woman ; again, he would make the utmost efforts to for- 
 get her ; to-day he would decide on one course of action and 
 to-morrow he would resolve on another absolutely different. 
 At last, one morning, he called together his brothers and 
 companions-in-arms, summoned his men-of-war, and after 
 having made, with the greatest secrecy, all necessary prep- 
 arations, fell suddenly upon the fortress which sheltered the 
 beautiful being who was the object of his insensate love. 
 
 On setting out on this expedition, all believed that their 
 commander was moved only by eagerness to avenge himself 
 for the sufferings he had endured loaded with irons in the 
 dungeon depth, but after the fortress was taken, the true 
 cause of that reckless enterprise, in which so many good 
 Christians had perished to contribute to the satisfaction of an 
 unworthy passion, was hid from none. 
 
 The knight, intoxicated with the love which he had at last 
 succeeded in kindling in the breast of the beautiful Moorish 
 girl, gave no heed to the counsels of his friends, and was 
 deaf to the murmurs and complaints of his soldiers. One 
 and all were clamoring to go out as soon as possible from 
 those walls, upon which it was natural that the Arabs, re- 
 covered from the panic of the surprise, would fall anew. 
 
THE CAVE OF THE MOOR'S DAUGHTER 1^3 
 
 And this, in fact, was what took place. The Moorish 
 chief called together the Arabs from all about ; and, one 
 morning, the look-out who was stationed in the watch-tower 
 of the keep went down to announce to the infatuated lovers 
 that over all the mountain range which was discernible from 
 that summit, such a cloud of warriors was descending that 
 he was convinced all Mohammedanism was going to fall upon 
 the castle. 
 
 The Moor's daughter, hearing this, stood still, pale as 
 death ; the knight shouted for his arms, and everything was 
 put in motion in the fortress. The soldiers rushed out tumul- 
 tuously from their quarters ; the captains began to give orders ; 
 the portcullis was lowered ; the drawbridge was raised, and 
 the battlements were manned with archers. 
 
 After some hours, the assault began. 
 
 The castle might well be called impregnable. Only by 
 surprise, as the Christians had taken it, could it be over- 
 co,me. So its defenders resisted one, two, and even ten 
 onsets. 
 
 The Moors, seeing the uselessness of their efforts, con- 
 tented themselves with closely surrounding the castle, that 
 they mig^it bring its defenders to capitulation through 
 famine. 
 
 Hunger began, indeed, to make frightful ravages among 
 the Christians, but, knowing that once the castle was sur- 
 rendered, the price of the life of its defenders would be the 
 head of their leader, no one would betray him, and the very 
 soldiers who had reprobated his conduct swore to perish in 
 his defence. 
 
 The Moors, waxing impatient, resolved to make a fresh 
 assault in the middle of the night. The attack was furious ; 
 the defence, desperate ; the encounter, horrible. During the 
 combat, the Moorish chief, his forehead cleft by an axe, fell 
 into the moat from the top of the wall to which he had sue- 
 
1^4 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 ceeded in climbing by the aid of a scaling ladder. Simul- 
 taneously the knight received a mortal stroke in the breach 
 of the barbican where men were fighting hand to hand in the 
 darkness. 
 
 The Christians began to give way and fell back. At this 
 point, the Moorish girl bent over her lover, who lay in death- 
 like swoon on the ground and, taking him in her arms, 
 with a strength born of desperation and the sense of peril, 
 she dragged him to the castle court. There she touched 
 a spring and through a passage disclosed by a stone, which 
 rose as if supernaturally moved, she disappeared with her 
 precious burden and began to descend until she reached the 
 bottom of the vault. 
 
 in. 
 
 When the knight recovered consciousness, he cast a wan- 
 dering glance about him, crying : " I thirst ! I die 1 I burn 1 " 
 And in his delirium, precursor of death, from his dry lips, 
 through which whistled the difficult breath, came only these 
 words of agony : " I thirst ! I burn I Water I Water ! " 
 
 The Moorish girl knew that there was an opening from 
 that vault to the valley through which the river flows. The 
 valley and all the heights which overlook it were full of 
 Moslem soldiers, who, the fortress now surrendered, were 
 vainly seeking everywhere the knight and his beloved to sati- 
 ate on them their thirst for destruction ; yet she did not hesi- 
 tate an instant, but taking the helmet of the dying man, she 
 slipped like a shadow through the thicket which covered the 
 mouth of the cave and went down to the river bank. 
 
 Already she had dipped up the water and was rising to 
 return to the side of her lover, when an arrow hissed and a 
 cry resounded. 
 
 Two Arab archers who were on watch near the fortress 
 
THE CAVE OE THE MOOR'S DAUGHTER ig^ 
 
 had drawn their bows in the direction in which they heard 
 the foliage rustle. 
 
 The Moor's daughter, mortally wounded, yet succeeded in 
 dragging herself to the entrance of the vault and down into 
 its depths where she joined the knight. He, on seeing her 
 bathed with blood and at the point of death, recovered his 
 reason and, realizing the enormity of the sin which demanded 
 so fearful an expiation, raised his eyes to heaven, took the 
 water which his beloved offered him and, without lifting it to 
 his lips, asked the Moorish girl : " Would you be a Christian ? 
 Would you die in my faith and, if I am saved, be saved with 
 me ? " The Moor's daughter, who had fallen to the ground, 
 faint with loss of blood, made a slight movement of her head, 
 and upon it the knight poured the baptismal water, invoking 
 the name of the Almighty. 
 
 The next day the soldier who had shot the arrow saw a 
 trace of blood on the river bank and, following it, went into 
 the cave where he found the dead bodies of the cavalier and 
 his beloved, who, ever since, come out at night to wander 
 through these parts. 
 
THE GNOME 
 
 The young girls of the village were returning from the 
 fountain with their water-jars on their heads; they were 
 returning with song and laughter, a merry confusion of sound 
 comparable only to the gleeful twitter of a flock of swallows 
 when, thick as hail, they circle around the weather-vane of 
 a belfry. 
 
 Just in front of the church porch, seated at the foot of a 
 juniper tree, was Uncle Gregorio. Uncle Gregorio was the 
 patriarch of the village ; he was nearly ninety years old, with 
 white hair, smiling lips, roguish eyes and trembling hands. 
 In childhood he had been a shepherd ; in his young man- 
 hood, a soldier ; then he tilled a little piece of fruitful land 
 inherited from his parents, until at last his strength was 
 spent and he sat tranquilly awaiting death which he neither 
 dreaded nor longed for. Nobody retailed a bit of gossip 
 more spicily than he, nor knew more marvellous tales, nor 
 could bring so neatly to bear an old refrain, proverb or adage. 
 
 The girls, on seeing him, quickened their steps, eager for 
 his talk, and when they were in the porch they all began to 
 tease him for a story to pass away the time still left them 
 before nightfall — not much, for the setting sun was slanting 
 his rays across the earth, and the shadows of the mountains 
 grew larger moment by moment all along the plain. 
 
 Uncle Gregorio smiled as he listened to the pleading of 
 the lasses, who, having once coaxed from him a promise to 
 tell them something, let down their water-jars upon the 
 ground, and sitting all about him, made a circle with the 
 
 196 
 
THE GNOME loy 
 
 patriarch in the centre ; then he began to talk to them after 
 this fashion : 
 
 " I will not tell you a story, for though several come into 
 my mind this minute, they have to do with such weighty 
 matters that the attention of a group of giddypates, like you, 
 would never hold out to the end ; besides, with the afternoon 
 so nearly gone, I would not have time to tell them through. 
 So I will give you instead a piece of good counsel." 
 
 " Good counsel ! " exclaimed the girls with undisguised 
 vexation. " Bah ! it isn't to hear good counsel that we are 
 stopping here ; when we have need of that, his Reverence 
 the priest will give it to us." 
 
 " But perhaps," went on the old man with his habitual 
 smile, speaking in his broken, tremulous voice, " his Rev- 
 erence the priest will not know how to give you, this once, 
 such timely advice as Uncle Gregorio ; for the priest, busy 
 with his liturgies and litanies, will not have noticed, as I 
 have noticed, that every day you go earlier to the fountain 
 and come back later." 
 
 The girls looked at one another with hardly perceptible 
 smiles of derision, while some of those who were placed 
 behind Uncle Gregorio touched finger to forehead, ac- 
 companying the action with a significant gesture. 
 
 "And what harm do you find in our lingering at the- 
 fountain to chat a minute with our friends and neighbors ? " 
 asked one of them. " Do slanders, perhaps, go about the 
 village because the lads step out on to the road for a pleasant 
 word or two, or come offering to carry our water-jars till we 
 are in sight of the houses ? " 
 
 " Ay, people talk," replied the old man to the girl who 
 had asked him the question for them all. " The old dames 
 of the village murmur that to-day the girls resort for fun and 
 frolic to a spot whither they used to go swiftly and in fear 
 to draw the water, since only there can water be had ; and 
 
198 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 I find it much amiss that you are losing little by little the 
 ^ dread which the vicinity of the fountain inspires in all your 
 elders, — for so it might come to pass that some time the 
 night should overtake you there." 
 
 Uncle Gregorio spoke these last words in a tone so full 
 of mystery that the lasses opened wide their frightened eyes 
 to look at him, and with blended curiosity and mischief, 
 again pressed their questions : 
 
 " The night 1 But what goes on in that place by night 
 that you should scare us so and throw out such dark and 
 dreadful hints of what might befall ? Do you think the 
 wolves will eat us ? " 
 
 " When the Moncayo is covered with snow, the wolves, 
 driven from their dens, come down in packs and range over 
 its slope ; more than once we have heard them howling in 
 horrible concert, not only in the neighborhood of the fountain, 
 but in the very streets of the village ; yet the wolves are 
 not the most terrible tenants of the Moncayo ; in its deep 
 and dark caverns, on its wild and lonely summits, in its 
 hollow heart there live certain diabolical spirits that, during 
 the night, pour down its cascades in swarms and people the 
 empty spaces, thronging like ants upon the plain, leaping 
 from rock to rock, sporting in the waters and swinging on 
 the bare boughs of the trees. It is these spirits that cry 
 from the clefts of the crags, that roll up and push along 
 those immense snowballs which come rolling down from the 
 lofty peaks and sweep away and crush whatever they find 
 in their path, — theirs are the voices calling in the hail at 
 our windows on stormy nights, — theirs the forms that flit 
 like thin, blue flames over the marshes. Among these 
 spirits — who, driven from the lowlands by the sacred services 
 and exorcisms of the Church, have taken refuge on the in- 
 accessible crests of the mountains, — are those of diverse 
 natures, that on appearing to our eyes clothe themselves in 
 
iO \ 
 
 3HJ. iO ^ 
 
THE GNOME l^^ 
 
 varied forms. Yet the most dangerous, those who with 
 sweet words win their way into the hearts of maidens and 
 dazzle them with magnificent promises, are the gnomes. 
 The gnomes Hve in the inner recesses of the mountains ; 
 they know their subterranean roads aad, eternal guardians 
 of the treasures hidden in the heart of the hills, they keep 
 watch day and night over the veins of metal and the precious 
 stones. Do you see — " continued the old man, pointing 
 with the stick which served him for a prop to the summit 
 of the Moncayo, that rose at his right, looming dark and 
 gigantic against the misted, violet sky of twilight — " do you 
 see that mighty mass still crowned with snow ? In its deep 
 cavities these diabolical spirits have their dwellings. The 
 palace they inhabit is terrible and glorious to see. Many 
 years ago a shepherd, following some stray of his flock, 
 penetrated into the mouth of one of those caves whose 
 entrances are covered by thick growths of bushes and whose 
 outlets no man has ever seen. When he came back to the 
 village, he was pale as death ; he had surprised the secret 
 of the gnomes ; he had breathed their poisonous atmosphere, 
 and he paid for his rashness with his life ; but before he died 
 he related marvellous things. Going on along that cavern, 
 he had come at last to vast subterranean galleries lighted by 
 a fitful, fantastic splendor shed from the phosphorescence 
 in the rocks, which there were like great boulders of quartz 
 crystallized into a thousand strange, fantastic forms. The 
 floor, the vaulted ceiling and the walls of those immense 
 halls, the work of nature, seemed variegated like the richest 
 marbles ; but the veins w^hich crossed them were of gold 
 and silver, and among those shining veins, as if incrusted in 
 the rock, were seen jewels, a multitude of precious stones of 
 all colors and sizes. There were jacinths and emeralds in 
 heaps, and diamonds and rubies, and sapphires and — how 
 should I know ? — many other gems unrecognized — more 
 
200 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 than he could name but all so great and beautiful that his 
 eyes dazzled at the sight. No noise of the outer world 
 reached the depths of that weird cavern ; the only per- 
 ceptible sounds were, at intervals, the prolonged and pitiful 
 groans of the air which blew through that enchanted laby- 
 rinth, a vague roar of subterranean fire furious in its prison, 
 and murmurs of running water which flowed on not knowing 
 whither they went. The shepherd, alone and lost in that 
 immensity, wandered I know not how many hours without 
 finding any outlet, until at last he chanced upon the source 
 of a spring whose murmur he had heard. This broke from 
 the ground like a miraculous fountain, a leap of foam-crowned 
 water that fell in an exquisite cascade, singing a silver song 
 as it slipped away through the crannies of the rocks. About 
 him grew plants that he had never seen, some with wide, 
 thick leaves, and others delicate and long like floating rib- 
 bons. Half hidden in that humid foliage were running 
 about a number of extraordinary creatures, some of them 
 manlike, some reptilian, or both at once, changing shape 
 continually, at one moment appearing like human beings, 
 deformed and tiny, the next like gleaming salamanders or 
 fugitive flames that danced in circles above the tip of the 
 fountain-jet. There, darting in all directions, running across 
 the floor in form of repugnant, hunchbacked dwarfs, scram- 
 bling up the walls, wriggling along, reptile-shaped, in their 
 slime, dancing like Will-o-the-wisps on the pool of water, 
 went the gnomes, the lords of those recesses, counting over 
 and shifting from place to place their fabulous riches. 
 They know where misers store those treasures which, after- 
 wards, the heirs seek in vain ; they know the spot where 
 the Moors, before their flight, hid their jewels; and the 
 ornaments which are lost, the money that is missing, every- 
 thing that has value and disappears, they search for, find 
 and steal, to hide in their caves, for they know how to go 
 
THE GNOME 201 
 
 to and fro through all the world by secret, unimagined paths 
 beneath the earth. So there they were keeping stored up in 
 heaps all manner of rare and precious things. There were 
 jewels of inestimable worth ; chains and necklaces of pearls 
 and exquisite gems ; golden jars of classic form, full of rubies ; 
 chiseled cups, armor richly wrought, coins with images and 
 superscriptions that it is no longer possible to recognize or 
 decipher ; treasures, in short, so fabulous and limitless that 
 scarcely may imagination picture them. And all glittered 
 together, flashing out such vivid sparks of light and color 
 that it seemed as if the whole hoard were on fire, quivering 
 and wavering. At least, the shepherd said that so it had 
 seemed to him." At this point the old patriarch paused a 
 moment. The girls, who in the beginning had hearkened 
 to Uncle Gregorio's story with a mocking smile, now main- 
 tained unbroken silence, hoping that he would go on, — wait- 
 ing with frightened eyes, with lips slightly parted, and with 
 curiosity and interest depicted on their faces. One of them 
 finally broke the hush, and unable to control herself, ex- 
 claimed, fascinated with the account of the fabulous riches 
 which had met the shepherd's view : 
 
 " And what then ? Did he take away nothing out of all 
 that ? " 
 
 " Nothing," replied Uncle Gregorio. 
 
 " What a silly ! " the girls exclaimed in concert. 
 
 " Heaven helped him in that moment of peril," continued 
 the old man, " for at the very instant when avarice, the 
 ruling passion, began to dispel his fear and, bewitched by the 
 sight of those jewels, one alone of which would have made 
 him wealthy, the shepherd was about to possess himself of 
 some small share of that treasure, he says he heard — listen 
 and marvel — clear and distinct in those profound abodes, — 
 despite the shouts of laughter and harsh voices of the gnomes, 
 the roar of the subterranean fire, the murmur of running 
 
202 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 water and the laments of the imprisoned air, he heard, I say, 
 as if he had been at the foot of the hill where it stands, the 
 pealing of the bell in the hermitage of Our Lady of the 
 Moncayo. 
 
 " On hearing the bell, which was ringing the Ave Maria^ 
 the shepherd fell to his knees, calling on the Mother of Our 
 Lord Jesus Christ ; and instantly, without knowing the 
 means nor the way, he found himself on the outside of the 
 mountain, near the road which leads to the village, thrown 
 out on a footpath and overwhelmed by a great bewilder- 
 ment as if he had just been startled out of a dream. 
 
 " Since then everybody has understood why our village 
 fountain sometimes has in its waters a glint as of very fine 
 gold-dust ; and when night falls, vague words are heard 
 in its murmur, flattering words with which the gnomes, 
 that defile it from its source, try to entice the foolhardy who 
 lend them ear, promising them riches and treasures that are 
 bound to be the destruction of their souls." 
 
 When Uncle Gregorio had reached this point in his re- 
 lation, night had fallen and the church bell commenced to 
 call to prayer. The girls crossed themselves devoutly, 
 repeating in low voices an Ave Maria, and after bidding 
 good-night to Uncle Gregorio, who again counselled them 
 not to tarry at the fountain, each picked up her water-jar 
 and all went forth, silent and musing, from the churchyard. 
 They were already far from the spot where they had found 
 the old man, and had, indeed, reached the central square of 
 the village whence they were to go their several ways, before 
 the more resolute and decided of them all broke out with 
 the question : 
 
 " Do you girls believe any of that nonsense Uncle Gregorio 
 has been telling us ? " 
 
 " Not I," said one. 
 
 " Nor I," exclaimed another. 
 
THE GNOME 203 
 
 " Nor I ! nor 1 1 " chimed in the rest, laughing at their 
 momentary credulity. 
 
 The group of lasses melted away, each taking her course 
 toward one or another side of the square. Last of all, when 
 the others had disappeared down the better streets that led 
 out from this market-place, two girls, the only ones who had 
 not opened their lips to make fun of Uncle Gregorio's 
 veracity, but who, still musing on the marvellous tale, seemed 
 absorbed in their own meditations, went away together, with 
 the slow step natural to people deep in thought, by a dismal, 
 narrow, crooked alley. 
 
 Of those two girls, the elder, who seemed to be some 
 twenty years old, was called Marta ; and the younger, who 
 had not yet finished her sixteenth year, Magdalena. 
 
 As long as the walk lasted, both kept complete silence ; 
 but when they reached the threshold of their home and had 
 set down their water-jars on the stone bench by the door, 
 Marta said to Magdalena : *• And do you believe in the 
 marvels of the Moncayo and the spirits of the fountain ? " 
 " Yes," answered Magdalena simply, " I believe it all. But 
 you, perhaps, have doubts ? " " Oh, no ! " Marta hastily 
 interrupted. " I, too, believe everything, everything — that 
 I wish to believe." 
 
 II. 
 
 Marta and Magdalena were sisters. Orphans from 
 early childhood, they were living wretchedly under the pro- 
 tection of a kinswoman of their mother, — a kinswoman who 
 had taken them in for charity and who at every step made 
 them feel, by her taunting and humiliating words, the weight 
 of their obligation. Everything would seem to tend toward 
 tightening the knot of love between those two sister souls, — 
 not merely the bond of blood, but those of poverty and 
 suffering, and yet there existed between Marta and Magda- 
 
204 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 lena a mute rivalry, a secret antipathy explicable only by a 
 study of their characters, as utterly contrasted as were their 
 physical types. 
 
 Marta was overbearing, strong in her passions and of 
 a rough directness in the expression of her feelings ; she did 
 not understand either laughter or tears, and so had never 
 wept nor laughed. Magdalena, on the other hand, was 
 gentle, affectionate, kind, and more than once had been 
 seen to laugh and weep together, as children do. 
 
 Marta's eyes were blacker than night and from under her 
 dark lashes there sometimes seemed to leap fiery sparks as 
 from a burning coal. 
 
 The blue eyes of Magdalena appeared to swim in liquid 
 light behind the golden curve of her blond lashes. And 
 everything in them was in keeping with the different ex- 
 pression of their eyes. Marta, thin, pale, tall, stiff of move- 
 ment, her dark, crisp hair shading her brow and falling upon 
 her shoulders like a velvet mantle, formed a singular con- 
 trast to Magdalena, white and pink, petite, with the rounded 
 face and figure of babyhood, and with golden tresses encir- 
 cling her temples like the gilded halo about the head of an 
 angel. 
 
 Despite the inexplicable repulsion which each felt for the 
 other, the two sisters had lived up to this time on terms of 
 indifference that might have been mistaken for peace and 
 affection ; there had been no caresses to quarrel over, nor 
 partialities to envy ; equal in misfortune and affliction, Marta, 
 withdrawn into herself, had borne her troubles in a proud, 
 self-centered silence ; and Magdalena, finding no response 
 in her sister's heart, would weep alone when the tears in- 
 voluntarily rushed into her eyes. 
 
 They had not a sentiment in common ; they never con- 
 fided to one another their joys and griefs, and yet the only 
 secret which each had striven to hide in the depths of her 
 
THE GNOME 205 
 
 soul had been divined by the other with the marvelous in- 
 stinct of love and jealousy. Marta and Magdalena had in 
 fact set their hearts on one and the same man. 
 
 The passion of the one was a stubborn desire, born of a 
 wilful and indomitable character; in the other, love was 
 manifest in that vague, spontaneous tenderness of youth, 
 which, needing an object on which to spend itself, takes the 
 first that comes. Both guarded the secret of their love, for 
 the man who had inspired it would perchance have made 
 mock of a devotion which could be interpreted as an absurd 
 ambition in penniless girls of lowly birth. Both, despite the 
 distance which separated them from their idol, cherished a 
 faint hope of winning him. 
 
 Hard by the village, and above a height which dominated 
 the country round about, there was an ancient castle aban- 
 doned by its owners. The old women, in their evening 
 gossips, would relate a marvellous story about its founders. 
 They told how the King of Aragon, finding himself at war 
 with his enemies, his resources exhausted, forsaken by his 
 allies and on the point of losing the throne, was sought out 
 one day by a shepherdess of those parts, who, after reveal- 
 ing to him the existence of certain subterranean passages by 
 means of which he could go through the Moncayo without 
 being perceived by his enemies, gave him a treasure in fine 
 pearls, precious stones of the richest, and bars of gold and 
 silver ; with these the king paid his troops, raised a mighty 
 army and, marching beneath the earth one whole night long, 
 fell the next day upon his adversaries and routed them, 
 establishing the crown securely on his head. 
 
 After he had won so distinguished a victory, the story goes 
 that the king said to the shepherdess : " Ask of me what 
 thou wilt, and even though it be the half of my kingdom, I 
 swear I will give it thee on the instant." 
 
 " I wish no more than to go back to the keeping of my 
 
2o6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 flock," replied the shepherdess. " Thou shalt keep only 
 my frontiers," rejoined the king, and he gave her lordship 
 over all the boundary, and bade her build a stronghold in 
 the town nearest the borders of Castile ; here dwelt the 
 shepherdess, married to one of the king's favorites, a hus- 
 band noble, gallant, valiant and, as well, lord over many for- 
 tresses and many fiefs. 
 
 The astonishing account given by Uncle Gregorio of the 
 Moncayo gnomes, whose secret haunt was in the village 
 fountain, set soaring anew the wild dreams of the two 
 enamored sisters, for it formed a sequel, so to speak, to the 
 hitherto unexplained tradition of the treasure found by the 
 fabled shepherdess — treasure whose remembered gleam 
 had troubled more than once their wakeful, embittered 
 nights, flashing before their imaginations like a fragile ray 
 of hope. 
 
 The evening following their afternoon meeting with Uncle 
 Gregorio, all the other girls of the village chatted in their 
 homes about the wonderful story he had told them. Marta 
 and Magdalena preserved an unbroken silence, and neither 
 that evening, nor throughout the following day, did they 
 exchange a single word on this matter, the theme of all the 
 talk throughout the hamlet and text of all the neighbors' 
 commentaries. 
 
 At the usual hour, Magdalena took "her water-jar and said 
 to her sister : " Shall we go to the fountain ? " Marta did 
 not answer, and Magdalena said again : " Shall we go to the 
 fountain ? If we do not hurry, the sun will have set before* 
 we are back." Marta finally replied shortly and roughly: 
 " I don't care about going to-day." " Neither do I," re- 
 joined Magdalena after an instant of silence during which 
 she kept her eyes fastened on those of her sister, as if she 
 would read in them the cause of her resolution. 
 
THE GNOME 207 
 
 III. 
 
 For nearly an hour the village girls had been back in 
 their homes. The last glow of sunset had faded on the 
 horizon, and the night was beginning to close in more and 
 more darkly, when Marta and Magdalena, each avoiding 
 the other, left the hamlet by different paths in the direction 
 of the mysterious fountain. The fountain welled up in a 
 hidden nook among some steep, mossy rocks at the further 
 end of a deep grove. Now that the sounds of the day had 
 ceased little by little, and no longer was heard the distant 
 echo of voices from the laborers who return home in 
 knightly fashion, mounted on their yoked oxen and trolling 
 out songs to the accompaniment of the beam of the plough 
 they ^o dragging over the ground, — now that the mon- 
 otonous clang of the sheep-bells had gone beyond hearing, 
 together with the shouts of the shepherds and the barking 
 of their dogs gathering the flocks together, — now that there 
 had sounded in the village-tower the last peal of the call to 
 prayers, there reigned august that double silence of night 
 and solitude, a silence full of strange, soft murmurs making 
 it yet more perceptible. 
 
 Marta and Magdalena slipped through the labyrinth of 
 the trees and, sheltered by the darkness, arrived without 
 seeing each other at the far end of the grove. Marta knew 
 no fear ; her steps were firm and unfaltering. Magdalena 
 trembled at the mere rustle made by her feet as they trod 
 upon the dry leaves carpeting the ground. When the two 
 sisters were close to the fountain, the night wind began to 
 stir the branches of the poplars, and to their uneven, sighing 
 whispers the springing water seemed to make answer with 
 a steady, regular murmur. 
 
 Marta and Magdalena lent attention to those soft noises 
 of the night, — those that flowed beneath their feet like a con- 
 
2o8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 tinuous ripple of laughter, and those that floated above their 
 heads like a lament rising and falling only to rise again and 
 spread through the foliage of the grove. As the hours went 
 on, that unceasing sound of the air and of the water began 
 to produce in them a strange exaltation, a kind of dizziness 
 that, clouding the eyes and humming in the ears, seemed to 
 confuse them utterly. Then as one hears in dreams the far, 
 vague echo of speech, they seemed to perceive, amid those 
 nameless noises, inarticulate sounds as of a child who would 
 call his mother and cannot ; then words repeated over and 
 over, always the same ; then disconnected, inconsequent 
 phrases, without order or meaning, and at last — at last the 
 wind wandering among the trees, and the water leaping from 
 rock to rock, commenced to speak. 
 And they spoke thus : 
 
 The Water. 
 
 Woman 1 — woman ! — hear me ! — hear me and draw near 
 that thou mayst hear me, and I will kiss thy feet while I 
 tremble to copy thine image in the shadowy depth of my 
 waves. Woman ! — hear how my murmurs are words. 
 
 The Wind. 
 
 Maiden ! — Gentle maiden, lift thine head, let me give thy 
 brow the kiss of peace, while I stir thy tresses. Gentle 
 maiden, listen to me, for I, too, know how to speak and I 
 will murmur in thine ear phrases of tenderness. 
 
 Marta. 
 
 Oh, speak 1 Speak, and I will understand, for my mind 
 floats in a dizzy maze, as float those dim words of thine. 
 Speak, mysterious stream. 
 
THE GNOME 209 
 
 Magdalena. 
 
 I am afraid. Air of night, air of perfumes, refresh my 
 burning brow ! Tell me what may inspire me with courage, 
 for my spirit wavers. 
 
 The Water. 
 
 I have crossed the dark hollow of the earth, I have sur- 
 prised the secret of its marvellous fecundity, and I know the 
 phenomena of its inner parts, whence springs the life to be. 
 
 My murmur lulls to sleep and awakens. Awaken thou 
 that thou mayst comprehend it. . 
 
 The Wind. 
 
 I am the air which the angels, as they traverse space, set 
 in motion with their mighty wings. 1 mass up in the west 
 the clouds that offer to the sun a bed of purple, and I shed 
 at dawn, from the mists that vanish into drops, a pearly dew 
 over the flowers. My sighs are a balm : open thine heart 
 and I will flood it with bliss. 
 
 Marta. 
 
 When for the first time I heard the murmur of a subter- 
 ranean stream, not in vain did I bow myself to the earth, 
 lending it ear. With it there went a mystery which at last 
 it should be mine to understand. 
 
 Magdalena. 
 
 Sighs of the wind, I know you well : you used to caress me, 
 a dreaming child, when, spent with weeping, I gave myself 
 up to slumber, and your soft breathings would seem to me 
 the words of a mother who sings her child to sleep. 
 
 The water ceased from speech for a few moments and 
 
2IO ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 made no other noise than that of water breaking on rocks. 
 The wind was voiceless, too, and its sound was no other 
 than the sound of blowing leaves. So passed some time, 
 and then they spoke again, and thus they spoke : 
 
 The Water. 
 
 Since I came filtering, drop by drop, through the vein of 
 gold in an inexhaustible mine ; since I came running along 
 a bed of silver and leaping, as over pebbles, amid innumer- 
 able sapphires and amethysts, bearing on with me, in lieu of 
 sands, diamonds and rubies, I have joined myself in mystic 
 union to a spirit of the earth. Enriched by his power and 
 by the occult virtues of the precious stones and metals, 
 saturated with whose atoms I come, I can offer thee the 
 utmost reach of thine ambitions. I have the force of an in- 
 cantation, the power of a talisman, and the virtue of the seven 
 stones and the seven colors. 
 
 The Wind. 
 
 I come from wandering over the plain, and as the bee that 
 returns to the hive with its booty of sweet honey, I bring 
 with me woman's sighs, children's prayers, words of chaste 
 love, and aromas of nard and wild lihes. I have gathered 
 in my journey no more than fragrances and echoes of har- 
 monies ; my treasures are not material, but they give peace 
 of soul and the vague happiness of pleasant dreams. 
 
 While her sister, drawn on and on as by a spell, was lean- 
 ing over the margin of the fountain to hear better, Mag- 
 dalena was instinctively moving away, withdrawing from the 
 steep rocks in whose midst bubbled the spring. 
 
 Both had their eyes fixed, the one on the depth of the 
 waters, the other on the depth of the sky. 
 
THE GNOME 211 
 
 And Magdalena exclaimed, seeing the astral splendors 
 overhead : " These are the halos of the invisible angels who 
 have us in their keeping." 
 
 At the same instant Marta was saying, seeing the reflection 
 of the stars tremble in the clear waters of the fountain : 
 " These are the particles of gold which the stream gathers 
 in its mysterious course." 
 
 The fountain and the wind, after a second brief period of 
 silence, spoke again and said : 
 
 The Water. 
 
 Trust thyself to my current, cast from thee fear as a coarse 
 garment, and dare to cross the threshold of the unknown. 
 I have divined that thy soul is of the essence of the higher 
 spirits. 
 
 Envy perchance hath thrust thee out of heaven to plunge 
 thee into the mire of mortal misery. Yet I see in thy 
 darkened brow a seal of pride that renders thee worthy of us, 
 spirits strong and free. — Come ; I am going to teach thee 
 magic words of such virtue that as thou speakest them the 
 rocks will open and allure thee with the diamonds that are 
 in their hearts, as pearls are in the shells which fishermen 
 bring up from the bottom of the sea. Come ! I will give 
 thee treasures that thou mayst live in joy, and later, when 
 the cell that imprisons thee is shattered, thy spirit shall be "^ 
 
 made like unto our own, which are human spirits, and all in 
 one we shall be the motive force, the vital ray of the universe, \ 
 
 circulating like a fluid through its subterranean arteries. 
 
 The Wind. 
 
 Water licks the earth and lives in the mud ; I roam the 
 ether and fly in limitless space. Follow the impulses of 
 thy heart ; let thy soul rise like flame and the azure spirals 
 
2 1 2 ROMANTIC LE GENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 of smoke. Wretched is he who, having wings, descends to 
 the depths to seek for gold, while he might mount to the 
 heights for love and sympathy. 
 
 Live hidden as the violet, and I will give thee in a fruit- 
 ful kiss the living seed of another, sister flower, and I will 
 rend the clouds that there may not be lacking a sunbeam to 
 illume thy joy. Live obscure, live unheeded, and when 
 thy spirit is set free, I will lift it on a rosy cloud up to the 
 world of light. 
 
 Wind and wave were hushed, and there appeared the 
 gnome. 
 
 The gnome was like a transparent pigmy, a sort of dwarf 
 all made of light, as a Will-o-the-wisp ; it laughed hugely, 
 but without noise, and leapt from rock to rock, making one 
 dizzy with its giddy antics. Sometimes it plunged into the 
 water and kept on shining in the depths like a precious stone 
 of myriad colors ; again it leapt to the surface, and tossed 
 its feet and its hands, and swung its head from one side to 
 the other with a rapidity that was little short of prodigious. 
 
 Marta had seen the gnome and was following him with a 
 bewildered gaze in all his extravagant evolutions ; and when 
 the diabolical spirit darted away at last into the craggy wilds 
 of the Moncayo, like a running flame, shaking out sparks 
 from its hair, she felt an irresistible attraction and rushed 
 after it in frantic chase. 
 
 Magdalena / at the same instant called the breeze, slowly 
 withdrawing ; and Magdalena, moving step by step like a 
 sleep-walker guided in slumber by a friendly voice, followed 
 the zephyr, which was softly blowing over the plain. 
 
 When all was done, again there was silence in the dusky 
 grove, and the wind and the water kept on, as ever, with 
 sounds as of murmuring and sighing. 
 
THE GNOME 213 
 
 IV. 
 
 Magdalena returned to the hamlet pale and full of amaze- 
 ment. They waited in vain for Marta all that night. 
 
 On the afternoon of the following day, the village girls 
 found a broken water-jar at the margin of the fountain in 
 the grove. It was Marta's water-jar ; nothing more was ever 
 known of her. Since then the girls go for water so early 
 that they rise with the sun. A few have assured me that by 
 night there has been heard, more than once, the weeping of 
 Marta, whose spirit lives imprisoned in the fountain. I do 
 not know what credit to give to this last part of the story, 
 for the truth is that since that night nobody has dared pene- 
 trate into the grove to hear it after the ringing of the Ave 
 Maria, 
 
THE MISERERE 
 
 Some months since, while visiting the celebrated abbey 
 of Fitero and entertaining myself by turning over a few 
 volumes in its neglected library, I discovered, stowed away 
 in a dark corner, two or three old books of manuscript music, 
 covered with dust and gnawed at the edges by rats. 
 
 It was a Miserere. 
 
 I do not read music, but it attracts me so that, even though 
 I do not understand it, I sometimes take up the score of an 
 opera and pore over its pages for hours, looking at the groups 
 of notes more or less crowded together, the dashes, the semi- 
 circles, the triangles and that sort of et cetera Q.2i^^A keys, and 
 all this without comprehending an iota or deriving the 
 slightest profit. 
 
 After this foolish habit of mine, I turned over the leaves 
 of the music-books, and the first thing which attracted my 
 attention was the fact that, although on the last page stood 
 that Latin word so common in all compositions, yf«/j-, the 
 Miserere was not concluded, for the music did not go be- 
 yond the tenth verse of the psalm. 
 
 This it was, undoubtedly, that arrested my attention first ; 
 but as soon as I scanned the pages closely, I was still more 
 surprised to observe that instead of the Italian words com- 
 monly used, such as maestoso^ allegro^ rifardando, piu vivo, d 
 piaeere, there were lines of very small German script written 
 in, some of which called for things as difficult to do as this : 
 " They crack — crack the bones ^ and from their marrow must the 
 cries seem to come forth ; " or this other : ** The chord shrieketh^ 
 yet in unison; the tone thundereth^ yet without deafening ; for 
 
 214 
 
THE MISERERE 215 
 
 all that hath sound soundeth^ arid there is no confusion^ 
 a7id all is htimanity that sobbeth and groatieth ; " or what was 
 certainly the most original of all, enjoined just under the 
 last verse : " The notes are bones covered with flesh ; light in- 
 extinguishable, the heavens afid their harmony— force I— force 
 and sweetness.^^ 
 
 " Do you know what this is ? " I asked of the old friar 
 who accompanied me, after I had half translated these lines, 
 which seemed like phrases scribbled by a lunatic. 
 
 My aged guide then told me the legend which I now pass 
 on to you. 
 
 Many years ago, on a dark and rainy night, a pilgrim 
 arrived at the cloister door of this abbey and begged for a 
 little fire to dry his clothes, a morsel of bread to appease his 
 hunger, and a shelter, however humble, till the morning, 
 when he would resume his journey at dawn. 
 
 The lay-brother of whom this request was made placed 
 his own meagre repast, his own poor bed and his glowing 
 hearth at the service of the traveller, to whom, after he had 
 recovered from his exhaustion, were put the usual questions 
 as to the purpose of his pilgrimage and the goal to which 
 his steps were bent. 
 
 " I am a musician," replied the stranger. " I was born 
 far from here, and in my own country I enjoyed a day of 
 great renown. In my youth I made of my art a powerful 
 weapon of seduction and I enkindled with it passions which 
 drew me on to crime. In my old age I would use for good 
 the talents which I have employed for evil, redeeming my 
 soul by the very means that have brought it into danger of 
 the judgment." 
 
 As the enigmatic words of the unknown guest did not seem 
 
2i6 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 at all clear to the lay-brother, whose curiosity was now 
 becoming aroused, he was moved to press his questions 
 further, obtaining the following response : 
 
 " I was ever weeping in the depths of my soul for the sin 
 that I had committed ; but when I tried to pray to God for 
 mercy, I could find no adequate words to utter my repentance, 
 until one day my eyes chanced to fall upon a holy book. I 
 opened that book and on one of its pages I met with a giant 
 cry of true contrition, a psalm of David, commencing : 
 Miserere mei^ Do7nine ! From the instant in which I read 
 those verses my one thought has been to find a musical ex- 
 pression so magnificent, so sublime, that it would suffice as 
 a setting for the Royal Psalmist's mighty hymn of anguish. 
 As yet I have not found it ; but if I ever attain to the point 
 of expressing what I feel in my heart, what I hear confusedly 
 in my brain, I am sure of writing a Miserere so marvellous 
 in beauty that the sons of men will have heard no other like 
 unto it, so desperate in grief that, as its first strains rise to 
 heaven, the archangels, their eyes flooded with tears, will 
 with me cry out unto the Lord, beseeching Mercy ; and the 
 Lord will be merciful to his unhappy creature." 
 
 The pilgrim, on reaching this point in his narrative, paused 
 for an instant, and then, heaving a sigh, took up again the 
 thread of his story. The lay-brother, a few dependents of 
 the abbey, and two or three shepherds from the friars' farm — 
 these who formed the circle about the hearth — listened to 
 him in the deepest silence. 
 
 " After travelling over all Germany," he continued, " all 
 Italy and the greater part of this country whose sacred music 
 is classic, I have not yet heard a Miserere that can give me 
 my inspiration, not one, — not one, and I have heard so many 
 that I may say I have heard them all." 
 
 " All ? " broke in one of the upper shepherds. " But you 
 have npt heard, have you, the Miserere of the Mountain ? " 
 
I 
 
 OF THE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF 
 
THE MISERERE 217 
 
 " The Miserere of the Mountain ! " exclaimed the musician 
 with an air of amazement. " What Miserere is that ? " 
 
 " Didn't I say so ? " muttered the peasant under his 
 breath, and then went on in a mysterious tone : " This 
 Mise?'erej which is only heard, as chance may fall, by those 
 who, like myself, wander day and night following the sheep 
 through the thickets and over the rocky hills, is, in fact, a 
 tradition, a very old tradition ; yet incredible as it seems, it 
 is no less true. 
 
 "The case is that, in the most rugged part of yonder 
 mountain chains which bound the horizon of this valley in 
 whose bosom the abbey stands, there used to be, many years 
 ago — why do I say many years ! — many centuries, rather, a 
 famous monastery. This monastery, it seems, was built at 
 his own cost by a lord with the wealth that he would 
 naturally have left to his son, whom on his death-bed he 
 disinherited, as a punishment for the young profligate's evil 
 deeds. 
 
 " So far, all had gone well ; but the trouble is that this son, 
 who, from what will be seen further on, must have been the 
 skin of the Devil, if not the Devil himself, learning that his 
 goods were in the possession of the monks, and that his 
 castle had been transformed into a church, gathered together 
 a crew of banditti, comrades of his in the ruffian life he had 
 taken up on forsaking his father's house, and one Holy 
 Thursday night, when the monks would be in the choir, and 
 at the very hour and minute when they would be just be- 
 ginning or would have just begun the Afiserere, these outlaws 
 set fire to the monastery, sacked the church, and willy-nilly, 
 left not a single monk alive. 
 
 " After this atrocity, the banditti and their leader went 
 away, whither no one knows, perhaps to hell. 
 
 " The flames reduced the monastery to ashes ; of the 
 church there still remain standing the ruins upon the hollow 
 
2i8 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 crag whence springs the cascade that after leaping down 
 from rock to rock, forms the rill which comes to bathe the 
 walls of this abbey." 
 
 « But," — interrupted the musician impatiently, " the Mis- 
 erere ? " 
 
 " Wait a while," said the shepherd with great deliberation, 
 "and all will be told in proper order." Vouchsafing no 
 further reply, he continued his story : 
 
 " The people of all the country round about were shocked 
 at the crime ; it was related with horror in the long winter 
 evenings, handed down from father to son, and from son to 
 grandson ; but what tends most of all to keep it fresh in 
 memory is that every year, on the anniversary of that night 
 when the church was burned, lights are seen shining out 
 through its shattered windows, and there is heard a sort of 
 strange music, with mournful, terrible chants that are borne 
 at intervals upon the gusts of wind. 
 
 " The singers are the monks, who, slain perchance before 
 they were ready to present themselves pure of all sin at the 
 Judgment Seat of God, still come from Purgatory to implore 
 Ills mercy, chanting the Miserere.^' 
 
 The group about the fire exchanged glances of incredulity ; 
 but the pilgrim, who had seemed to be vitally interested in 
 the recital of the tradition, inquired eagerly of the narrator : 
 
 " And do you say that this marvel still takes place ? " 
 
 <' It will begin without fail in less than three hours, for 
 the precise reason that this is Holy Thursday night, and 
 the abbey clock has just struck eight." 
 
 " How far is the monastery from here ? " 
 
 " Barely a league and a half, — but what are you doing ? " 
 " Whither would you go on a night like this ? " " Have 
 you fallen from the shelter of God's hand .? " exclaimed one 
 and another as they saw the pilgrim, rising from his bench 
 
THE MISERERE 
 
 219 
 
 and taking his staff, leave the fireplace and move toward 
 the door. 
 
 " Whither am I going ? To hear this miraculous music, 
 to hear the great, the true Miserere^ the Miserere of those 
 who return to the world after death, those who know what 
 it is to die in sin." 
 
 And so saying, he disappeared from the sight of the 
 amazed lay-brother and the no less astonished shepherds. 
 
 The wind shrilled without and shook the doors as if a 
 powerful hand were striving to tear them from their hinges ; 
 the rain fell in torrents, beating against the window-panes, 
 and from time to time a lightning-fiash lit up for an instant 
 all the horizon that could be seen from there. 
 
 After the first moment of bewilderment had passed the 
 lay-brother exclaimed : 
 
 " He is mad." 
 
 " He is mad," repeated the shepherds and, replenishing 
 the fire, they gathered closely around the hearth. 
 
 II. 
 
 After walking for an hour or two, the mysterious person-" 
 age, to whom they had given the degree of madman in the 
 abbey, by following upstream the course of the rill which the 
 story-telling shepherd had pointed out to him, reached the 
 spot where rose the blackened, impressive ruins of the 
 monastery. 
 
 The rain had ceased ; the clouds were drifting in long, 
 dark masses, from between whose shifting shapes there 
 glided from time to time a furtive ray of doubtful, pallid 
 light ; and one would say that the wind, as it lashed the 
 strong buttresses and swept with widening wings through the 
 deserted cloisters, was groaning in its flight. Yet nothing 
 supernatural, nothing extraordinary occurred to strike the 
 imagination. To him who had slept more nights than one 
 
220 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 without Other shelter than the ruins of an abandoned tower 
 or a lonely castle, — to him who in his far pilgrimage had 
 encountered hundreds on hundreds of storms, all those 
 noises were famihar. 
 
 The drops of water which filtered through the cracks of 
 the broken arches and fell upon the stones below with a 
 measured sound like the ticking of a great clock ; the hoots 
 of the owl, screeching from his refuge beneath the stone 
 nimbus of an image still standing in a niche of the wall ; 
 the stir of the reptiles that, wakened from their lethargy by 
 the tempest, thrust out their misshapen heads from the 
 holes where they sleep, or crawled among the wild mustard 
 and the briers that grow at the foot of the altar, rooted in the 
 crevices between the sepulchral slabs that form the pave- 
 ment of the church, — all those strange and niysterious mur- 
 murs of the open country, of solitude and of night, came per- 
 ceptibly to the ear of the pilgrim who, seated on the muti- 
 lated statue of a tomb, was anxiously awaiting the hour when 
 the marvellous event should take place. 
 
 But still the time went by and nothing more was heard ; 
 those myriad confused noises kept on sounding and com- 
 bining with one another in a thousand different ways, but 
 themselves always the same. 
 
 " Ah, they have played a joke on me ! " thought the musi- 
 cian; but at that moment he heard a new sound, a sound 
 inexplicable in such a place, like that made by a clock a few 
 seconds before striking the hour, a sound of whirring wheels, 
 of stretching cords, of machinery secretly setting to work 
 and making ready to use its mysterious mechanic vitality, 
 and a bell rang out the hour — one, two, three, up to eleven. 
 
 In the ruined church there was no bell nor clock, not 
 even a bell-tower. 
 
 The last peal, lessening from echo to echo, had not yet died 
 away ; the vibration was still perceptible, trembling in the air, 
 
THE MISERERE 2 2 1 
 
 when the granite canopies which overhung the sculptures, 
 the marble steps of the altars, the hewn stones of the ogee 
 arches, the fretted screens of the choir, the festoons of tre- 
 foil on the cornices, the black buttresses of the walls, the 
 pavements, the vaulted ceiling, the entire church, began to 
 be lighted by no visible agency, nor was there in sight torch 
 or lamp or candle to shed abroad that unwonted radiance. 
 
 It suggested a skeleton over whose yellow bones spreads 
 that phosphoric gas which burns and puts forth fumes in the 
 darkness like a blue light, restless and terrible. 
 
 Everything seemed to be in motion, but with that galvanic 
 movement which lends to death contractions that parody 
 life, instantaneous movement more horrible even than the 
 inertia of the corpse which stirs with that unknown force. 
 Stones reunited themselves to stones ; the altar, whose 
 broken fragments had before been scattered about in dis- 
 order, rose intact, as if the artificer had just given it the last 
 blow of the chisel, and simultaneously with the altar rose 
 the ruined chapels, the shattered capitals and the great, 
 crumbled series of arches which, crossing and interlacing at 
 caprice, formed with their columns a labyrinth of porphyry. 
 
 As soon as the church was rebuilt there grew upon the 
 hearing a distant harmony which might have been taken for 
 the wailing of the wind, but which was a chorus of far-off, 
 solemn voices, that seemed to come from the depths of the 
 earth and rise to the surface little by little, continually 
 growing more distinct. 
 
 The daring pilgrim began to fear, but with his fear still 
 battled his passion for the bygone and the marvellous, and 
 made valiant by the strength of his desire, he left the tomb 
 on which he was resting, leaned over the brink of the abyss, 
 amid whose rocks leapt the torrent, rushing over the preci- 
 pice with an incessant and terrifying thunder, and his hair 
 rose with horror. 
 
22 2 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 111 wrapped in the tatters of their habits, their cowls, be- 
 neath whose folds the dark eye-cavities of the skulls con- 
 trasted with the fleshless jaws and the white teeth, drawn 
 forward over their heads, he saw the skeletons of ' the 
 monks who had been thrown from the battlements of the 
 church down that headlong steep, emerging from the depth 
 of the waters and, clutching with the long fingers of their 
 bony hands at the fissures in the rocks, clamber over them 
 up to the brink, chanting in low, sepulchral voice, but with 
 a heartrending intonation of anguish, the first verse of 
 David's Psalm : 
 
 Miserere meiy Domine, secundum magnam misericordiam 
 tuami 
 
 When the monks reached the peristyle of the church they 
 arranged themselves in two rows and, entering, went in pro- 
 cession to the choir where they knelt in their places, while 
 with voices louder and yet more solemn they continued to 
 intone the verses of the psalm. The music sounded in 
 accompaniment to their voices ; that music was the distant 
 roll of the thunder which sank into murmurs as the tempest 
 subsided ; it was the blowing of the wind which groaned in 
 the hollow of the mountain ; it was the monotonous splash 
 of the cascade falling down the crag ; and the drip of the 
 filtered waterdrops, and the hoot of the hidden owl, and the 
 gliding sound of the uneasy reptiles. All this was in the 
 music, and something more that cannot be expressed nor 
 scarcely conceived, — something more that seemed like the 
 echo of an organ accompanying the verses of the Royal 
 Psalmist's giant hymn of contrition, with notes and chords 
 as tremendous as the awful words. 
 
 The service proceeded ; the musician who witnessed it, 
 absorbed and terrified as he was, believed himself to be out- 
 side the actual world, living in that fantastic region of dreams 
 
THE MISERERE 223 
 
 where all things reclothe themselves in phenomenal and 
 alien forms. 
 
 A terrible shock came to rouse him from that stupor which 
 was clogging all the faculties of his mind. His nerves 
 sprang to the thrill of a mighty emotion, his teeth chattered, 
 shaking with a tremor he could in no wise repress, and the 
 chill penetrated to the marrow of his bones. 
 
 At that instant the monks were intoning those dread words 
 of the Miserere ; 
 
 In iniquitaiibus conceptiis sum ; et in peccatis concepit me 
 mater mea. 
 
 As the thunder of this verse went rolling in sonorous echo 
 from vault to vault, there arose a terrible outcry which seemed 
 a wail of agony breaking from all humanity for its sense of 
 sin, a horrible wail made up of all the laments of the 
 unfortunate, all the shrieks of despair, all the blasphemies of 
 the impious, a monstrous consonance, fit interpreter of those 
 who live in sin and were conceived in iniquity. 
 
 The chant went on, now sad and deep, now like a sunbeam 
 which breaks through the dark storm cloud, succeeding the 
 lightning-flash of terror by another flash of joy, until by 
 grace of a sudden transformation the church stood re- 
 splendent, bathed in celestial light ; the skeletons of the 
 monks were again clothed in their flesh, about their brows 
 shone lustrous aureoles, the roof vanished and above was 
 seen heaven like a sea of light open to the gaze of the 
 righteous. 
 
 Seraphim, archangels, angels and all the heavenly hierarchy 
 accompanied with a hymn of glory this verse, which then 
 rose sublime to the throne of the Lord like the rhythmical 
 notes of a trumpet, like a colossal spiral of sonorous incense : 
 
 Auditui meo dabis gaudium et laetitiam, et exultabunt ossa 
 humiliata. 
 
 At this point the dazzling brightness blinded the pilgrim's 
 
224 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 eyes, his temples throbbed violently, there was a roaring in 
 his ears, he fell senseless to the ground and heard no more. 
 
 III. 
 
 On the following day, the peaceful monks of the Abbey 
 of Fitero, to whom the lay-brother had given an account of 
 the strange visit of the night before, saw the unknown pil- 
 grim, pallid and like a man beside himself, entering their 
 doors. 
 
 " Did you hear the Miserere at last ? " the lay-brother 
 asked him with a certain tinge of irony, slyly casting a glance 
 of intelligence at his superiors. 
 
 " Yes," replied the musician. 
 
 " And how did you like it ? " 
 
 " I am going to write it. Give me a refuge in your house," 
 he continued, addressing the abbot, ** a refuge and bread for 
 a few months, and I will leave you an immortal work of art, 
 a Miserere which shall blot out my sins from the sight of 
 God, eternize my memory, and with it the memory of this 
 abbey." 
 
 The monks, out of curiosity, counselled the abbot to grant 
 his request ; the abbot, for charity, though he believed the 
 man a lunatic, finally consented ; and the musician, thus in- 
 stalled in the monastery, began his work. 
 
 Night and day he labored with unremitting zeal. In the 
 midst of his task he would pause and appear to be listening 
 to something which sounded in his imagination ; his pupils 
 would dilate and he would spring from his seat exclaiming : 
 " That is it ; so ; so ; no doubt about it — so I " And he would 
 go on writing notes with a feverish haste which more than 
 once made those who kept him under secret observation 
 wonder. 
 
 He wrote the first verses, and those following to about the 
 
THE MISERERE 225 
 
 middle of the Psalm ; but when he had written the last verse 
 that he had heard upon the mountain, it was impossible for 
 him to proceed. 
 
 He made one, two, one hundred, two hundred rough 
 drafts ; all in vain. His music was not like the music 
 already written. Sleep fled from his eyelids, he lost his 
 appetite, fever seized upon his brain, he went mad, and 
 died, at last, without being able to finish the Miserere, which, 
 as a curiosity, the monks treasured till his death, and even 
 yet preserve in the archives of the abbey. 
 
 When the old man had made an end of telling me this 
 story, I could not refrain from turning my eyes again to the 
 dusty, ancient manuscript of the Miserere, which still lay 
 upon one of the tables. 
 
 In peccatis concepit me mater mea. 
 
 These were the words on the page before me, seeming to 
 mock me with their notes, their keys and their scrawls unin- 
 telligible to lay-brothers in music. 
 
 I would have given a world to be able to read them. 
 
 Who knows if they may not be mere nonsense ? 
 
\^' 
 
 STRANGE 
 I. 
 
 We were taking tea in the house of a lady who is a friend 
 of mine, and the talk turned upon the social dranias which 
 develop from act to act, unheeded of the world, — dramas 
 with whose leading characters we have been acquainted, if 
 indeed we have not ourselves played a part in one or another 
 of their scenes. 
 
 Among numerous other persons whom I do not remember, 
 there was a girl of the blonde type, fair and slender, who, if 
 she had had a lapful of flowers in place of the blear-eyed 
 little dog that growled half hidden in the wide folds of her 
 skirt, might have been compared without exaggeration to 
 Shakespeare's Ophelia. 
 
 So pure was the white of her forehead, the azure of her 
 eyes. 
 
 Conversing with the fair girl was a young man, who stood 
 with one hand resting on the causeuse of blue velvet where 
 she sat and the other caressing the precious trinkets of his 
 gold chain. In his affected pronunciation a slight foreign 
 accent was noticeable, despite the fact that his look and 
 bearing were as Spanish as those of the Cid or Bernardo 
 del Carpio. 
 
 A gentleman of mature years, tall, thin, of distinguished 
 and courteous manners, who seemed seriously preoccupied 
 with the operation of sweetening to the exact point his cup 
 of tea, completed the group nearest the fireplace, in whose 
 warmth I sat down to tell this human history. It seems 
 
 226 
 
STRANGE 227 
 
 like a fable, but it is not ; one could make a book of it ; I 
 have done so several times in imagination. Nevertheless, I 
 will tell it in few words, since for him to whom it is given to 
 comprehend it, these few will be more than enough. 
 
 Andres, for so the hero of my tale was called, was one of 
 those men whose hearts abound with feeling for which they 
 have found no outlet, and with love that has no object on 
 which to spend itself. 
 
 An orphan almost from his birth, he was left in the care 
 of relatives. I do not know the details of his childhood ; 
 I can only say that whenever it was mentioned, his face 
 would cloud and he would exclaim, with a sigh : " That is 
 over now." 
 
 We all say the same, sadly recalling bygone joys. But 
 was this the explanation of his words ? I repeat that I do 
 not know ; but I suspect not. 
 
 As soon as he was grown, he launched out into the world. 
 Though I would not calumniate it, the fact remains that the 
 world for the poor, and especially for a certain class of the 
 poor, is not a Paradise nor anything like it. Andres was, 
 as the saying goes, one of those people who rise, most days, 
 with nothing to look forward to but twenty-four hours more. 
 Judge then, my readers, what would be the state of a spirit 
 all idealism, all love, put to the no less difficult than prosaic 
 task of seeking our daily bread. 
 
 Yet sometimes, sitting on the edge of his lonely bed, his 
 elbows on his knees and his head between his hands, he 
 would exclaim : 
 
 "If I only had something to love with all my heart ! A 
 wife, a horse, even a dog ! " 
 
 As he had not a copper to spare, it was not possible for 
 him to get anything, — not any object on which to satisfy his 
 hunger to love. This waxed to such a point that in its acute 
 attacks he came to feel an affection for the wretched closet 
 
228 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 where he slept, the scanty furniture that met his needs, his 
 very landlady, that patron saint who was his evil genius. 
 
 This is not at all surprising ; Josephus relates that during 
 the siege of Jerusalem hunger reached such a point that 
 mothers devoured their children. 
 
 There came a day when he was able to secure a very small 
 living wage. The evening of that day, when he was return- 
 ing to his boarding-house, on crossing a narrow street he 
 heard a sort of wail, like the crying of a new-born child. 
 He had taken but a few steps further after hearing those 
 doleful sounds, when he exclaimed, stopping short : 
 
 " What the deuce is that ? " 
 
 And he touched with the toe of his shoe a soft object that 
 moved, and fell again to mewling and whining. It was one 
 of those new-born puppies that people cast out to the mercy 
 of the rubbish heap. 
 
 " Providence has placed it in my path," said Andres to 
 himself, picking it up and wrapping it in the skirt of his 
 coat ; and he carried it to his miserable lodging. 
 
 " What now ! " grumbled the landlady on seeing him 
 enter with the puppy; "all we needed was this fresh nui- 
 sance in the house. Take it back this minute to where you 
 found it, or else look up new quarters for the two of you to- 
 morrow.*' 
 
 The next day Andres was turned out of the house, and in 
 the course of two or three months he left some two hundred 
 more, for the same reason. But for all these inconveniences, 
 and a thousand others which it is impossible to detail, he 
 was richly compensated by the intelligence and affection of 
 the dog, with whom he diverted himself as with a person in 
 his long hours of solitude and ennui. They ate together, 
 they enjoyed their siestas together, and together they would 
 take a turn in the Ronda, or go to walk along the Cara- 
 banchel road. 
 
STRANGE 229 
 
 Evening gatherings, fashionable promenades, theatres, 
 cafes, places where dogs are not allowed or would be in the 
 way, were forbidden to our hero, who sometimes exclaimed 
 from the fulness of his heart, as he responded to the 
 caresses of his very own : 
 
 *• Doggy mine 1 you can do everything but talk." 
 
 II. 
 
 It would be wearisome to explain how, but it came to pass 
 that Andres somewhat bettered his position, and seeing that 
 he had money in hand, he said : 
 
 " If I only had a wife 1 But having a wife is very ex- 
 pensive. Men like me, before choosing a bride, should have 
 a paradise to offer her, and a paradise in Madrid is worth 
 as much as a man's eye. — If I could buy a horse 1 A horse 1 
 There is no animal more noble or more beautiful. How he 
 would love my dog 1 what merry times they would have with 
 each other, and I with both ! " 
 
 One afternoon he went to the bullfight, and before the 
 entertainment began, he unpremeditatedly strolled out into 
 the court-yard, where the horses who had to take part in the 
 contest were waiting, already saddled. 
 
 I do not know whether my readers have ever had the 
 curiosity to go and see them. For myself, without claiming 
 to be as tender-hearted as the protagonist of this tale, I can 
 assure you that I have often had a mind to buy them all. 
 So great was the pity that I felt for them. 
 
 Andres could not fail to experience a most grievous sen- 
 sation on finding himself in this place. Some of the horses, 
 with drooping heads, creatures all skin and bone, their 
 manes rough and dirty, were standing motionless, awaiting 
 their turn, as if they had a foreboding of the dreadful 
 death which would put an end, within a few hours, to that 
 
230 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 miserable life of theirs ; others, half blind, were sniffing 
 about for the rack and eating, or, tearing the ground with 
 the hoof and snorting wildly, were struggling to pull them- 
 selves loose and flee from the peril which they scented with 
 horror. And all those animals had been young and beautiful. 
 What aristocratic hands had patted their necks I What 
 affectionate voices had urged on their speed ! And now all 
 was blows from one side, oaths from the other, and death at 
 last, death in terrible agony accompanied by jests and hisses ! 
 
 "If they think at all," said Andres, "what will these 
 animals think at the core of their dim intelligence, when in 
 the middle of the ring they bite their tongues and expire 
 with a frightful spasm? Truly the ingratitude of man is 
 sometimes inconceivable." 
 
 He was startled out of those reflections by the rough voice 
 of one of \\\Q picadores^ who was swearing and cursing while 
 he tested the legs of one of the horses, striking the butt-end of 
 his lance against the wall. The horse did not seem entirely 
 contemptible ; apparently it was crazy or had some mortal 
 disease. 
 
 Andre's thought of buying it. As for the cost, it ought 
 not to cost much ; but how about its keep ? The picador 
 plunged the spur into its flank and started to ride toward the 
 gate of the ring; our. youth wavered for an instant and then 
 stopped him. How he did it, I do not know ; but in less 
 than a quarter of an hour he had induced the horseman to 
 leave the beast behind, had hunted up the contractor, made 
 his .bargain for the horse and taken it away. 
 
 I suppose it is superfluous to say that on that afternoon 
 he did not see the bullfight. 
 
 He led off the horse in triumph ; but the horse, in fact, 
 was or appeared to be crazy. 
 
 " Use plenty of stick on him," said one authority. 
 
 "Don't give him much to eat," advised a blacksmith. 
 
STRANGE 23 T 
 
 The horse was still unruly. " Bah 1 " at last exclaimed 
 his owner. " Let him eat what he likes and do as he chooses." 
 The horse was not old, and now began to fatten and grow 
 more docile. It is true that he still had his whims, and that 
 nobody but Andres could mount him ; but his master said : 
 " So I shall not be teased to lend him ; and as for his oddi- 
 ties, each of us will get accustomed to those of the other." 
 And they came to such a good understanding that Andres 
 knew when the horse felt like doing a thing and when not, 
 and as for the horse, the voice of his master was enough to 
 make him take a leap, stand still, or set off at a gallop, sw'ift 
 as a hurricane. 
 
 Of the dog w^e need say nothing ; he came to be so friendly 
 with his new comrade that neither could go out, even to drink, 
 without the other. From this time on, when Andres set off 
 at a gallop in a cloud of dust on the Carabanchel road, with 
 his dog frisking along beside him, dashing ahead to turn 
 back and hunt for him, or letting him pass to scamper 
 up and overtake him, he believed himself the happiest 
 of men. 
 
 Time went by ; our young man was rich, or almost rich. 
 
 One day, after a long gallop, he alighted, tired out, near 
 a tree and stretched himself in its shade. 
 
 It was a spring day, bright and blue, — one of those days 
 in which men breathe voluptuously the warm air impreg- 
 nated with passion, in which the blowing of the wind comes 
 to the ear like distant harmonies, in which the clear horizons 
 are outlined in gold, and there float before our eyes shining 
 motes of I know not what, motes like transparent forms that 
 follow us, encompass us and intoxicate us with sadness and 
 with happiness at once. 
 
 " I dearly love these two beings," exclaimed Andres as 
 he reclined there stroking his dog with one hand and with 
 the other giving to his horse a handful of grass, " dearly ; 
 
232 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 but yet there is a vacancy in my heart which has never been 
 filled ; I still have it in me to lavish a love greater, holier, 
 purer. Decidedly I need a wife." 
 
 At that moment there passed along the road a yoimg girl 
 with a water- jar upon her head. 
 
 Andres was not thirsty, but yet he begged a drink of 
 water. The girl stopped to offer it to him, and did so with 
 such gentle grace that our youth comprehended perfectly 
 one of the most patriarchal episodes of the Bible. 
 
 " What is your name ? " he asked when he had drunk. 
 
 " Placida." 
 
 *' And what do you do with yourself ? " 
 
 " I am the daughter of a merchant who died ruined and 
 persecuted for his political opinions. After his death, my 
 mother and I retired to a hamlet, where we get on very 
 badly with a pension of three reales [fifteen cents a day] for 
 all our living. My mother is ill, and everything comes on 
 me." 
 
 " And why haven't you married ? " 
 
 " I don't know ; in the village they say that I am good for 
 nothing about work, that I am very delicate, very much the 
 senorita.^^ 
 
 The girl, with a courteous good-bye, moved away. 
 
 While she was still in sight, Andres watched her retreating 
 form in silence ; when she was lost to view, he said with the 
 satisfaction of one who solves a problem : 
 
 " This is the woman for me." 
 
 He mounted his horse and, followed by his dog, took his 
 way to the village. He promptly made the acquaintance of 
 the mother and, almost as soon, utterly lost his heart to the 
 daughter. When at the end of a few months she was left 
 an orphan, he married her, a man in love with his wife, 
 which is one of the greatest blessings life affords. 
 
 To marry, and to set up housekeeping in a country man- 
 
STRANGE 233 
 
 sion situated in one of the most picturesque spots of his 
 native land, was the work of a few days. 
 
 When he saw himself in this residence, rich, with his wife, 
 his dog and his horse, he had to rub his eyes ; he thought 
 he must be dreaming. So happy, so perfectly happy was 
 poor Andres. 
 
 IV. 
 
 So he lived for a period of several years, in divine bliss, 
 when one afternoon he thought he noticed that some one 
 was prowling about his house, and later he surprised a man 
 fitting his eye to the key-hole of one of the garden- 
 doors. 
 
 " There are robbers about," he said. And he determined 
 to inform the nearest town, where there was a brace of civil 
 guards. 
 
 " Where are you going? " asked his wife. 
 
 " To the town." 
 
 " What for ? " 
 
 " To inform the civil guards that I suspect some one is 
 prowling about our house." 
 
 When his wife heard that, she paled slightly. He, giving 
 her a kiss, continued : 
 
 " I am going on foot, for it is not far. Good-bye till I 
 come again." 
 
 On passing through the court-yard to reach the gate, he 
 stepped into the stable a moment, looked his horse over and, 
 patting him, said : 
 
 " Good-bye, old fellow, good-bye ; to-day you shall rest, 
 for yesterday I put you to your paces." 
 
 The horse, who was accustomed to go out every day with 
 his master, whinnied sadly on hearing him depart. 
 
 When Andres was about to leave the premises, the dog 
 began to frolic for joy. 
 
234 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 ** No, you are not coming with me," he exclaimed, speak- 
 ing as if the dog would understand. " When you go to the 
 town, you bark at the boys and chase the hens, and some 
 fine day somebody will give you such a blow that you will 
 have no spirit left to go back for. another. Don't let him 
 out until I am gone," he continued, addressing a servant, 
 and he shut the gate that the dog might not follow him. 
 
 He had taken the turn in the road before he ceased hear- 
 ing the prolonged howls. 
 
 He went to the town, despatched his business, had a 
 pleasant half-hour with the alcalde^ chatting of this and that, 
 and returned home. On reaching the neighborhood of his 
 estate, he was greatly surprised that the dog did not come 
 out to welcome him, the dog that on other occasions, as if 
 aware of his movements, would meet him half way down the 
 road. — He whistles — no response! He enters the outer 
 gates. Not a servant ! " What the deuce is the mean- 
 ing of this ? " he exclaims disquieted, and proceeds to the 
 house. 
 
 Arrived, he enters the court. The first sight that meets 
 his eyes is the dog stretched in a pool of blood at the stable 
 door. A few pieces of cloth scattered over the ground, 
 some threads still hanging from his jaws, covered with crim- 
 son foam, witness that he made a good defence and that in 
 the defence he had received the wounds so thick upon him. 
 
 Andres calls him by his name ; the dying dog half opens 
 his eyes, tries in vain to get upon his feet, feebly wags his 
 tail, licks the hand that caresses him, and dies. 
 
 " My horse 1 where is my horse ? " then exclaimed Andres 
 with a voice hoarse and stifled by emotion, as he saw the 
 stall empty and the halter broken. 
 
 He dashes thence like a madman ; he calls his wife, — no 
 answer ; his servants, — nothing. Beside himself, he rushes 
 over the whole house, — vacant, abandoned. Again he goes 
 
STRANGE 235 
 
 out to the street, sees the hoof-marks of his horse, his own, 
 — no doubt of it, — for he knows, or thinks he knows, even the 
 tracks of his cherished animal. 
 
 " I understand it all," he says, as if illumined by a sudden 
 idea. " The robbers have taken advantage of my absence 
 to accomplish their design, and they are carrying off my 
 wife to exact of me for her ransom a great sum of money. 
 Money ! my blood, my soul's salvation, would I give for her. 
 — My poor dog 1 " he exclaims, returning to look at him, and 
 then he starts forth running like a man out of his wits, 
 following the direction of the hoof-prints. 
 
 And he ran, he ran without resting for an instant after 
 those tracks ; one hour, two, three. 
 
 " Have you seen," he asked of everybody, " a man on 
 horseback with a woman on the crupper ? " 
 
 " Yes," they answered. 
 
 " Which way did they go ? " 
 
 " That way." 
 
 And Andres would gather fresh force and keep on running. 
 
 The night commenced to fall. To the same question he 
 had ever the same reply ; and he ran, and he ran, until at 
 last he discerned a village, and near the entrance, at the foot 
 of a cross which marked the point where the road divided 
 into two, he saw a group of people, laborers, old men, boys, 
 who were regarding with curiosity something that he could 
 not distinguish. 
 
 He arrives, puts the same question as ever, and one of 
 the group says : 
 
 " Yes, we have had sight of that pair ; look ! for a clearer 
 trace see the horse that carried them, who fell here ruptured 
 with running." 
 
 Andres turns his eyes in the direction they indicated, and 
 indeed sees his horse, his beloved horse, which some men 
 of the place were preparing to flay for the sake of its hide. 
 
236 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 He could scarcely resist his grief, but recovering himself, he 
 turned again to the thought of his wife. 
 
 *' And tell me," he exclaimed impetuously ; " how you 
 failed to render aid to that woman in distress." 
 
 " And didn't we aid her ! " said another of the circle. 
 " Didn't I sell them another saddle-horse so that they might 
 press on their way with all the speed that seemed so im- 
 portant to them 1 " 
 
 " But," interrupted Andres, " that woman was stolen away 
 by force ; that man is a bandit, who, regardless of her tears 
 and her laments, drags her I know not whither," 
 
 The sly rustics exchanged glances and compassionate 
 smiles. 
 
 " Not so, senorito ! what tales are you telling us ? " slowly 
 continued the man with whom he was talking. " Stolen 
 away by force 1 But how if it were she herself who said 
 with the greatest earnestness : ' Quick, quick, let us flee from 
 this district ! I shall not be at rest until it is out of my 
 sight forever.' " 
 
 Andres comprehended all ; a cloud of blood passed before 
 his eyes — eyes which shed no tear, and he fell to the earth 
 prone as the dead. 
 
 He went mad ; in a few days, he died. 
 
 There was an autopsy ; no organic trouble was found. 
 Ah I if it were possible to dissect the soul, how many deaths 
 similar to this would be explained 1 
 
 *• And did he actually die of that ? " exclaimed the youth, 
 who was still playing with the charms that hung from his 
 watch chain, as I finished my story. 
 
 I glanced at him as if to say : " Does it seem to you so 
 little ? " He continued with a certain air of profundity : 
 "Strange! I know what it is to suffer; when in the last 
 races my Herminia stumbled, killed the jockey and broke a 
 
STRANGE 237 
 
 leg, the misfortune of that animal vexed me horribly ; but, 
 frankly, not so much as that — not so much as that." 
 
 I was still regarding him with astonishment, when I heard 
 a melodious and slightly veiled voice, the voice of the girl 
 with the azure eyes. 
 
 " Strange, indeed ! I love my Medoro dearly," she said, 
 dropping a kiss on the snout of the sluggish and blear-eyed 
 lap-dog, who gave a little grunt, " but if he should die, or 
 somebody should kill him, I do not believe that I would go 
 mad nor anything like it." 
 
 My astonishment was passing into stupefaction ; these 
 people had not understood me, nor wished to understand me. 
 
 Finally I turned to the gentleman who was taking tea, for 
 at his years he might be expected to be somewhat more 
 reasonable. 
 
 " And you ? how does it seem to you ? " I asked. 
 
 " I will tell you," he replied. " I am married ; I loved 
 my wife ; I have, it seems to me, a regard for her still ; there 
 came up between us a domestic unpleasantness, that by its 
 publicity forced me to demand satisfaction ; a duel followed ; 
 I had the good luck to wound my adversary, an excellent 
 fellow, as full of jest and wit as any man alive, with whom I 
 am still in the habit of taking coffee occasionally in the 
 Iberia. Since then I have ceased to live with my wife, and 
 have devoted myself to travel. — When I am in Madrid, I 
 stay with her as a friend visiting a friend; and all this has 
 taken place without any violent passions, without any great 
 emotions, without any extraordinary sufferings. After this 
 slight sketch of my character and of my life, what shall I say 
 to you about these phenomenal explosions of feeling except 
 that all this seems to me strange, very strange ? " 
 
 When he had finished speaking, the blonde girl and the 
 young man who was making love to her looked over together 
 an album of Gabarni's caricatures. In those few moments 
 
238 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the elder gentleman treated himself with exquisite enjoyment 
 to his third cup of tea. 
 
 When I called to mind that on hearing the outcome of 
 my story they all had said — Strange ! — I for my part ex- 
 claimed to myself — Natural! 
 
WITHERED LEAVES 
 
 The sun had set. The wheeling masses of cloud were 
 hastening to heap themselves one above another in the dis- 
 tant horizon. The cold wind of autumn evenings was whirl- 
 ing the withered leaves about my feet. 
 
 I was sitting by the side of a road [the road to the ceme- 
 tery] where ever there return fewer than those who go. 
 
 I do not know of what I was thinking, if, indeed, I was 
 just then thinking of anything at all. My soul was trem- 
 bling on the point of soaring into space, as the bird trembles 
 and flutters its wings before taking flight. 
 
 There are moments in which, thanks to a series of 
 abstractions, the spirit withdraws from its environment and, 
 self-absorbed, analyzes and comprehends the mysterious 
 phenomena of the inner life of man. 
 
 There are other moments in which the soul slips free from 
 the flesh, loses its personality, mingles with the elements of 
 nature, relates itself to their mode of being and translates 
 their incomprehensible language. 
 
 In one of these latter moments was I, when, alone and in 
 the midst of a clear tract of level ground, I heard talking 
 near me. 
 
 The speakers were two withered leaves, and this, a little 
 more or less exact, was their strange dialogue : 
 
 " Whence comest thou, sister ? " 
 
 " I come from riding on the whirlwind, enveloped in the 
 cloud of dust and of withered leaves, our companions, all the 
 length of the interminable plain. And thou ? " 
 
 " I drifted for a time with the current of the river, until 
 239 
 
240 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 the strong south wind snatched me up from the mud and 
 reeds of the bank." 
 
 " And whither bound ? " 
 
 " I know not. Doth perchance the wind that driveth 
 me know ? " 
 
 " Woe is me ! Who would have said that we should end 
 like this, faded and withered, dragging ourselves along the 
 ground — we who lived clothed in color and light, dancing in 
 the air ? " 
 
 " Rememberest thou the beautiful days of our budding — 
 that peaceful morning when, at the breaking of the swollen 
 sheath which had served us for a cradle, we unfolded to the 
 gentle kiss of the sun, like a fan of emeralds? " 
 
 " Oh, how sweet it was to be swayed at that height by the 
 breeze, drinking in through every pore the air and the light ! " 
 
 " Oh, how beautiful it was to watch the flowing water of 
 the river that lapped the twisted roots of the ancient tree 
 which sustained us, that limpid, transparent water, reflecting 
 like a mirror the azure of the sky, so that we seemed to live 
 suspended between two blue abysses ! " 
 
 " With what delight we used to peep over the green foliage 
 to see ourselves pictured in the tremulous stream I " 
 
 " How we would sing together, imitating the murmur of 
 the breeze and following the rhythm of the waves ! " 
 
 " Brilliant insects would flit about us, spreading their gauzy 
 wings." 
 
 ♦' And the white butterflies and blue dragon-flies, gyrating 
 in strange circles through the air, would alight for a moment 
 on our dentate edges to tell each other the secrets of that 
 mysterious love lasting but an instant and burning up their 
 lives." 
 
 " Each of us was a note in the concert of the groves." 
 
 " Each of us was a tone in their harmony of color." 
 
 " In the silver nights when the moonbeams glided over 
 
 i 
 
WITHERED LEA VES 241 
 
 the mountain tops, dost remember how we would chat in 
 low voices amid the translucent shadows ? " 
 
 "And we would relate in soft whispers stories of the 
 sylphs who swing in the golden threads that the spiders 
 hang from tree to tree." 
 
 " Until we hushed our murmurous speech to listen enrap- 
 tured to the plaints of the nightingale, who had chosen our 
 tree for her throne of song." 
 
 " And so sad and so tender were her lamenting strains 
 that, though filled with joy to hear her, the dawn found us 
 weeping." 
 
 "Oh, how sweet were those tears which the dew of night 
 would shed upon us, and which would sparkle with all the 
 colors of the rainbow in the first gleam of dawn ! " 
 
 " Then came the jocund flock of linnets to pour into the 
 grove life and sound with the gleeful, gay confusion of their 
 songs." 
 
 " And one enamoured pair hung close to us their round 
 nest of straws and feathers." 
 
 " We served to shelter the little ones from the trouble- 
 some rain-drops in the summer tempests." 
 
 •' We served as a canopy to shield them from the fierce 
 rays of the sun." 
 
 " Our life passed like a golden dream from which we had 
 no thought there could be an awakening," 
 
 '' One beautiful afternoon, when everything around us 
 seemed to smile, when the setting sun was kindling the west 
 and crimsoning the clouds, and from the earth, touched by 
 the evening damp, were rising exhalations of life and the 
 perfumes of flowers, two lovers stayed their steps on the 
 river bank at the foot of our parent tree." 
 
 " Never will that memor)^ fade ! She was young, scarcely 
 more than a child, beautiful and pallid. He asked her 
 tenderly, * Why weepest thou ? ' ' Forgive this involuntary 
 
242 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 selfishness,' she replied, brushing away a tear; 'I weep for 
 myself ; I weep for the life which is slipping from me. When 
 the sky is crowned with sunshine and the earth is clothed 
 with verdure and flowers, and the wind is laden with per- 
 fumes, with the songs of birds and with far-off harmonies, 
 and when one loves and feels herself beloved, life is good.' 
 * And why wilt thou not live ? ' he insisted, deeply moved, 
 clasping her hands close in his. * Because I cannot. When 
 these leaves, which whisper in unison above our heads, fall 
 withered, I, too, shall die, and the wind will some day bear 
 away their dust, and mine — whither, who knoweth ? ' " 
 
 "I heard, and thou did'st hear, and we shuddered and 
 were silent. We must wither ! We must die, and be whirled 
 about by the rushing wind! Mute and full of terror we 
 remained even till nightfall. O, how terrible was that night ! " 
 
 " For the first time the love-lorn nightingale failed at the 
 tryst which she had enchanted with her mournful lays." 
 
 " Soon the birds flew away, and with them their little ones 
 now clothed with plumage, and only the nest remained, 
 rocking slowly and sadly, like the empty cradle of a dead 
 child." 
 
 *j And the white butterflies and the blue dragonflies fled, 
 leaving their place to obscure insects which came to eat 
 away our fibre and to deposit in our bosoms their nauseous 
 larvae." 
 
 " Oh, and how we shivered, shrinking from the icy touch 
 of the night frosts ! " 
 
 " We lost our color and freshness." 
 
 " We lost our pliancy and grace, and what before had 
 been to us like the soft sound of kisses, like the murmur of 
 love words, now became a harsh, dry call, unwelcome, 
 dismal." 
 
 "And at last, dislodged, we flew away." 
 
 " Trodden under foot by the careless passers-by, whirled 
 
WITHERED LEA VES 
 
 243 
 
 incessantly from one point to another in the dust and the 
 mire, I accounted myself happy when I could rest for an 
 instant in the deep rut of a road." 
 
 " I have revolved unceasingly in the grip of the turbid 
 stream ; and in the course of my long travels I saw, alone, 
 in mourning garb and with clouded brow, gazing absently 
 upon the running waters and the withered leaves which 
 shared and marked their movement, one of those two lovers 
 whose words gave us our first presentment of death." 
 
 " She, too, has lost her hold on life, and perchance will 
 sleep in an open, new-made grave over which I paused a 
 moment." 
 
 " Ah, she sleeps and rests at last ; but we, when shall we 
 come to the end of our long journey ? " 
 
 " Never 1 — Even now the wind, which has given us a 
 brief repose, blows once more, and I feel myself constrained 
 to rise from the ground and follow. Adieu, sister ! " 
 
 " Adieu ! " 
 
 The wind, quiet for a moment, whistled again, and the 
 leaves rose in a whirling confusion, to be lost afar in the 
 darkness of the night. 
 
 And then there came to me a thought that I cannot re- 
 member and that, even though I were to remember it, I 
 could find no words to utter. 
 
THE SET OF EMERALDS 
 
 We were pausing on the Street of San Jer6nimo, in front 
 of Durin's and were reading the title of a book by Mery. 
 
 As my attention was called to that extraordinary title, and 
 as I spoke of it to the friend who accompanied me, he, lean- 
 ing lightly on my arm, exclaimed : " The day could not be 
 more beautiful. Let us take a turn by the Fuente Castellana. 
 While we are walking, I will tell you a story in which I am 
 the principal hero. You will see how, after hearing it, you 
 will not only understand this title, but will find its explanation 
 the easiest thing in the world." 
 
 I had plenty to do ; but as I am always glad of an excuse 
 for doing nothing, I accepted the proposition, and my friend 
 began his story as follows : 
 
 " Some time ago, one night when I had set out to stroll 
 the streets, without any more definite object, — after having 
 examined all the collections of prints and photographs in the 
 shop-windows, after having chosen in imagination in front 
 of the Savoyard store the bronzes with which I would adorn 
 my house, if I had one, after having made a minute survey, 
 in fine, of all the objects of art and luxury exposed to public 
 view upon the shelves behind the lighted plate-glass, I stopped 
 a moment before Samper's. 
 
 " I do not know how long it was that I remained there, 
 adorning, in fancy, all the pretty women I know, one with a 
 collar of pearls, another with a cross of diamonds, another 
 with ear-rings of amethyst and gold. I was deliberating at 
 that point to whom to offer — who would be worthy of it — a 
 magnificent set of emeralds as rich as it was elegant, which 
 
 244 
 
THE SET OF EMERALDS 245 
 
 among all the other jewelled ornaments claimed attention for 
 the beauty and clearness of its stones, when I heard at my 
 side the softest, sweetest voice exclaim with an accent which 
 could not fail to put my fancies to flight : * What beautiful 
 emeralds I ' 
 
 " I turned my head in the direction of that voice, a woman's 
 voice, for only so could it have left such an echo, and I con- 
 fronted, in fact, a woman supremely beautiful. I could look 
 at her only a moment, and yet her loveliness made on me a 
 profound impression. 
 
 " At the door of the jeweller's shop from which she had 
 come out, there was a carriage. She was accompanied by 
 a lady of mature age, too young to be her mother, too old to 
 be her friend. When both had entered the coupk, the horses 
 started, and I stood like a fool staring after her until she 
 was lost to sight. 
 
 " ' What beautiful emeralds ! ' she had said. The emeralds 
 were indeed superb. That collar, around her snowy neck, 
 would look like a garland of young almond leaves besprent 
 with dew ; that brooch upon her bosorrt, a lotus-flower when 
 it sways on its pulsing wave, crowned with foam. * What 
 beautiful emeralds 1 ' Would she like them, perhaps ? And 
 if she would like them, why not have them ? She must be 
 rich, a lady of high rank. She has an elegant carriage, and 
 on the door of that carriage I thought I saw a crest. Doubt- 
 less in the life of this woman there is some mystery. 
 
 " These were the thoughts that agitated my mind after I 
 lost sight of her, — when not even the sound of her carriage 
 wheels came to my ears. And truly there was in her life, 
 apparently so peaceful and enviable, a horrible mystery. I 
 found it out — I will not tell you how. 
 
 " Married when a mere child to a profligate who, after 
 squandering his own fortune, had sought a profitable alliance, 
 as the best means of squandering another's, that woman, a 
 
246 
 
 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 model of wives and mothers, had refused to gratify the least 
 of her caprices that she might save some part of her inherit- 
 ance for her daughter and that she might maintain in outer 
 appearance the dignity of her house at the height which it 
 had always held in Spanish society. 
 
 ** People tell of some women's great sacrifices. I believe 
 that, considering their peculiar organization, there is none 
 comparable with the sacrifice of an ardent desire in which 
 vanity and coquetry are concerned. 
 
 '* From the time when I penetrated the mystery of her 
 life, all my aspirations, through one of these freakish 
 enthusiasms of my character, were reduced to this only, — to 
 get possession of that marvellous set of jewels and to give 
 it to her in such a way that she could not refuse it, nor even 
 know from whose hand it might have come. 
 
 " Among other difficulties which I at once encountered 
 in the realization of my idea, assuredly not the least was 
 that I had not money, neither much nor little, to buy the 
 gems. 
 
 " Yet I did not despair. 
 
 ** * Where shall I look for money ? * I said to myself, and 
 I remembered the marvels of The Thousand and One Nights; 
 those cabalistic words at whose echo the earth opened and 
 revealed hidden treasures ; those rods of such rare virtue 
 that, when rocks were smitten by them, there bubbled from 
 the clefts not a spring of water, which was a small miracle, 
 but rubies, topazes, pearls and diamonds. 
 
 " Being ignorant of the words and not knowing where to 
 find a rod, I decided at last to write a book and sell it. To 
 get money out of the rock of a publisher is nothing short of 
 miraculous ; but I did it. 
 
 '* I wrote a book of original quality, which few people 
 liked, as only one person could understand it ; for the rest 
 it was merely a collection of phrases. 
 
A SENORITA 
 From the painting by F. Goya 
 
55^»t3^ 
 
 THE 
 
 _ OF 
 
THE SET OF EMERALDS 247 
 
 " The book was entitled The Set of Emeralds^ and I signed 
 it with my initials only. 
 
 " Since I am not Victor Hugo, nor anybody of the sort, 
 I need not tell you that I did not get for my novel what the 
 author of Notre Dame de Paris had for his latest ; but what 
 with one thing and another I gathered together a sufiBcient 
 sum to begin my plan of campaign. 
 
 " The emeralds in question would be worth from fourteen 
 to fifteen thousand dollars, and toward the purchase I now 
 counted up the respectable sum of one hundred and fifty. 
 It was necessary, then, to game. 
 
 " I gamed ; and I gamed with such good sense and good 
 fortune that in a single night I won what I needed. 
 
 " Apropos of gambling, I have made an observation in 
 which every day has confirmed me more and more. If one 
 puts down his money with the full expectation of winning, 
 he wins. One must not approach the green table with the 
 hesitancy of a man who is going to try his luck, but with 
 the coolness of him who comes to take his own. For myself, 
 I can assure you that I should have been as much surprised 
 to lose that night as if a substantial bank had refused me 
 money on a check with Rothschild's signature. 
 
 " The next day I went to Samper's. Will you believe 
 that in throwing down upon the jeweller's counter that hand- 
 ful of many-colored notes, those notes which represented for 
 me at least a year of pleasure, many beautiful women, 
 a journey to Italy, and champagne and cigars at discretion, 
 that I wavered a moment ? Then don't believe it. I threw 
 them down with the same nonchalance — do I say non- 
 chalance ? — with the same satisfaction with which Buck- 
 ingham, breaking the thread on which they were strung, 
 strewed with pearls the carpet of his beloved's palace. 
 
 " I bought the jewels and carried them to my lodgings. 
 You can picture nothing more glorious than that set of 
 
 1/ 
 
248 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 emeralds. No wonder the women sigh now and then as 
 they pass in front of those shops which present to their eyes 
 such ghttering temptations ; no wonder that Mephistopheles 
 selected a collar of precious stones as the object most likely 
 to seduce Marguerite. I, man that I am, could have wished 
 for an instant to live in the Orient and be one of those 
 fabulous monarchs who wreathe their brows with a coil of 
 gold and gems, that I might adorn myself with those mag- 
 nificent emerald leaves and diamond flowers. 
 
 " A gnome, to buy a kiss from a sylph, would not have 
 been able to find among the immense treasures hoarded in 
 the avaricious heart of the earth and known to those elves 
 alone, an emerald larger, clearer, more beautiful than that 
 which sparkled, fastening a knot of rubies, in the centre of 
 the diadem. 
 
 " Now that I had the gems, I began to think out a way of 
 placing them in possession of the woman for whom they 
 were intended. 
 
 " At the end of several days, I prevailed upon one of her 
 maids — thanks to the money that I still had left — to promise 
 me that she, when unobserved, would place the set in the 
 jewel-box ; and to assure myself that she should not, by 
 her conduct, betray the source of the gift, I gave her what 
 money was left over, several hundred dollars, on condition 
 that she, as soon as she had put the emeralds in the place 
 agreed upon, should leave the capital and remove to Bar- 
 celona. This, in fact, she did. 
 
 "Judge for yourself what must have been the surprise of 
 her mistress when, after noticing her sudden disappearance 
 and suspecting that perhaps she had fled from the house with 
 something stolen, she found in the jewel-box the magnificent 
 set of emeralds. Who had divined her thought ? Who had 
 been able to surmise that she still, from time to time, re- 
 membered those gems with a sigh ? 
 
THE SET OF EMERALDS 249 
 
 " The weeks and the months passed on. I knew that she 
 kept my gift ; I knew that great efforts had been made to 
 discover whence it came ; and yet I had never seen her 
 adorned with it. — Did she scorn the offering ? * Ah 1 ' I 
 said, ' if she knew all the merit of that gift I if she knew 
 that its desert is scarcely surpassed by the gift of that lover 
 who pawned his cloak in winter to buy a nosegay ! Does 
 she perhaps think that it comes from the hands of some 
 great personage who will one day present himself, if 
 admitted, to claim its price ? What a mistake she makes 1 " 
 
 " One night when there was to be a royal ball I stationed 
 myself at the door of the palace and, lost in the crowd, waited 
 for her carriage that I might see her. When it arrived and, 
 the footman opening the door, she appeared in radiant beauty, 
 a murmur of admiration went up from among the pressing 
 multitude. The women beheld her with envy; the men 
 with longing ; from me there broke a low, involuntary cry. 
 She was wearing the set of emeralds. 
 
 " That night I went to bed without my supper ; I do not 
 remember whether it was because emotion had taken away 
 my appetite or because I had no money. In either case, I 
 was happy. In my dreams I thought I heard the music of 
 the ball and saw her crossing before my eyes, flashing sparks 
 of a thousand colors, until I dreamed even that I was danc- 
 ing with her. 
 
 " The romance of the emeralds had been conjectured, since 
 they had been talked about when they first appeared in the 
 cabinet, by some ladies of rank. 
 
 " Now that the set had been seen, there was no longer 
 room for doubt, and idle tongues began to comment on the 
 affair. She enjoyed a spotless reputation. Notwithstand- 
 ing the dissipation of her husband and his neglect of her, 
 calumny could never reach to the height on which her virtue 
 had placed her ; but yet, on this occasion, there began to 
 
250 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 Stir that little breath of gossip from which, according to Don 
 Basilio, scandal begins. 
 
 " On a day when I chanced to be in a circle of young 
 men, the conversation fell on the famous emeralds, and 
 finally a coxcomb said, as if settling the matter : 
 
 " There is no need of discussion. These jewels have as 
 vulgar an origin as all such presents in this world of ours. 
 The time has gone by when invisible spirits placed marvel- 
 lous gifts under the pillows of lovely ladies, and the man 
 who makes a present of this value makes it with the hope 
 of a recompense — and this recompense, who knows that it 
 was not given in advance ? " 
 
 *' The words of that idiot roused my wrath, and all the 
 more because they found response in those who heard them. 
 Yet I controlled myself. What right had I to go to the 
 defence of that woman ? 
 
 " Not a quarter of an hour had passed when I had oppor- 
 tunity to contradict this man who had insulted her. I do 
 not know exactly what the point was on which I contra- 
 dicted him ; what I can assure you of is that I did it with 
 so much sharpness, not to say rudeness, that out of our dis- 
 pute grew a quarrel. That is what I was seeking. 
 
 " My friends, knowing my disposition, wondered, not only 
 that I should have sought a duel for so trifling a cause, but 
 at my firm refusal to give or receive explanations of any 
 kind. 
 
 " I fought, I do not know whether to say with good fortune 
 or not, for although on firing I saw my adversary sway an 
 instant and fall to the ground, a second after I felt my ears 
 buzzing and my eyes clouding over. I was wounded, too, 
 and seriously, in the breast. 
 
 " They carried me, already in a burning fever, to my mean 
 lodging. There I know not how many days went by, 
 while I called aloud I know not on whom ; undoubtedly on 
 
THE SE T OF EMERA LDS 251 
 
 her. I would have had courage to suffer in silence all my 
 life for one look of gratitude on the brink of the grave ; but 
 to die without leaving her even a memory of me 1 
 
 " These ideas were tormenting my imagination one wake- 
 ful, fevered night, when I saw the curtains of my alcove part 
 and in the opening appeared a woman. I thought that I 
 was dreaming ; but no. That woman approached my bed, 
 that poor, hot bed on which I was tossing in pain, and lifting 
 the veil which covered her face, disclosed a tear trembling 
 on her long, dark lashes. It was she I 
 
 *' I started up with frightened eyes, I started up and — at 
 that moment I arrived in front of Duran's bookstore — " 
 
 " What 1" I exclaimed, interrupting my friend on hearing 
 that change of tone. " Then you were not wounded and in 
 bed ? " 
 
 "In bed ! — ah ! what the deuce 1 I had forgotten to tell 
 you that all this is what I was thinking as I came from the 
 jewelry shop of Samper, — where in sober truth I saw the 
 set of emeralds and heard, on the lips of a beautiful woman, 
 the exclamation which I have mentioned to you, — to the 
 Carrcra de San Jerd?iimOy where a thrust from the elbow of 
 a porter roused me from my revery in front of Duran's, in 
 whose window I observed a book by Mery with this title, 
 Histoire de ce qui n' est pas arrive ^ ' The Story of that which 
 did not happen.' Do you understand it now ? " 
 
 On hearing this denouement^ I could not repress a shout of 
 laughter. Really I do not know of what Mery's book may 
 treat, but I now see how, with that title, a million incompar- 
 able stories might be written. 
 
y 
 
 THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 
 
 In Seville, at the half-way point of the road that runs 
 from the Macarena gate to the convent of San Jeronimo, 
 there is, among other famous taverns, one which, because of 
 its location and the special features that attach to it, may be 
 said to have been, if it is not now, the real thing, the most 
 characteristic of all the Andalusian roadside inns. 
 
 Picture to yourself a little house, white as the driven snow, 
 under its roof of tiles, some reddish, some deep green, with 
 an endless growth of yellow mustard and sprigs of mignonette 
 springing up among them. A wooden overhang shadows 
 the door, which has on either side a bench of cemented brick. 
 Mortised into the wall, which is broken by various little 
 casements, opened at caprice to give light to the interior, 
 some lower, some higher, one square, another imitating a 
 Moorish arched window with its dividing colonnettes, or a 
 dormer, are seen at regular distances iron spikes and rings 
 for hitching the horses. A vine, full of years, which twists 
 its blackening stems in and out of the sustaining wooden 
 lattice, clothing it with clusters of grapes and broad green 
 leaves, covers like a canopy the guest-hall, that consists of 
 three pine benches, half a dozen rickety rush chairs, and as 
 many as six or seven crippled tables made of ill-joined boards. 
 On one side of the house climbs a honeysuckle, clinging to 
 the cracks in the wall, up to the roof, from whose eaves 
 droop sprays that sway with the wind, like floating curtains 
 of verdure. On the other side runs a fence of wattled twigs, 
 defining the bounds of a little garden that looks like a basket 
 of rushes overflowing with flowers. The tops of two great 
 
 253 
 
THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 253 
 
 trees, towering up behind the tavern, form the dark back- 
 ground against which stand out its white chimneys ; the - 
 decoration is completed by the orchard-plots full of century, 
 plants and blackberries, the broom that grows on the borders 
 of the river, and the Guadalquivir, which flows-^into the dis- 
 tance, slowly winding its tortuous way between those rural 
 banks to the foot of the ancient convent of San Jeronimo, 
 that peers above the thick olive groves surrounding it and 
 traces the black silhouette of its towers against a transparent, 
 azure sky. 
 
 Imagine this landscape animated by a multitude of figures 
 — men, women, children and animals, forming groups that 
 vie with one another in the characteristic and the pictur- 
 esque ; here the innkeeper, round and ruddy, seated in the 
 sun on a low chair, rolling between his hands the tobacco to 
 make a cigarette, with the paper in his mouth ; there a huck- 
 ster of Macarena who sings, rolling up his eyes, to the 
 accompaniment of his guitar, while others beat time by clap- 
 ping their hands or striking their glasses on the tables ; over 
 yonder a group of peasant girls with their gauzy kerchiefs 
 of a million colors, and a whole flower-pot of pinks in their 
 hair, who play the tambourine, and scream, and laugh, and 
 talk at the top of their voices as they push like mad the 
 swing hung between two trees ; and the serving-boys of the 
 tavern who come and go with trays of wine-glasses full of 
 manzanilla and with plates of olives ; and the group of village 
 people who swarm in the road ; two drunken fellows quarrel- 
 ling with a dandy who is making^love, in passing, to a pretty 
 girl ; a cock that, proudly spreading out its wings, crows 
 from the thatch of the poultry-yard ; a dog that barks at the 
 boys who tease him with sticks and stones ; olive-oil boiling 
 and bubbling in the pan where fish is frying ; the cracking 
 of the whips of the cab-drivers who arrive in a cloud of dust; 
 a din of songs, castanets, peals of laughter, voices, whistles 
 and guitars, and blows on the tables, and clappings, and 
 
254 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 crash of breaking pitchers, and thousands of strange, dis- 
 cordant sounds forming a jocund hullabaloo impossible to 
 describe. Fancy all this on a pleasant calm afternoon, the 
 afternoon of one of the most beautiful days in Andalusia 
 where all the days are so beautiful, and you will have an 
 idea of the spectacle that presented itself for the first time 
 to my eyes, when, led by its fame, I came to visit that 
 celebrated tavern. 
 
 This was many years ago ; ten or twelve, at least. I was 
 there as a stranger, away from my natural environment, and 
 everything about me, from the cut of my clothes to the 
 astonished expression of my face, was out of keeping with 
 that picture of frank and boisterous jollity. It seemed to me 
 that the passers-by turned their heads to stare at me with 
 the dislike with which one regards an intruder. 
 
 Not wishing to attract attention nor choosing that my 
 appearance should be made the butt of mockeries more or 
 less dissembled, I took a seat at one side of the tavern door, 
 called for something to drink, which I did not drink, and 
 when all had forgotten my alien presence, I drew out a sheet 
 of sketching paper from the portfolio which I carried with 
 me, sharpened a pencil, and began to look about for a char- 
 acteristic figure to copy and preserve as a souvenir of that 
 day. 
 
 Soon my eyes fastened on one of the girls forming the 
 merry group around the swing. She was tall, slender, bru- 
 nette, with sleepy eyes, big and black, and hair blacker than 
 her eyes. While I was making the sketch a group of men, 
 among them one who played lively flourishes on the guitar 
 with much skill, chorused songs that alluded to personal 
 qualities, the secrets of love, the likings of the girls who 
 were sporting about the swing or stories of their jealousy 
 and their disdain, — songs to which these in their turn re- 
 sponded with others no less saucy, piquant and gay. 
 
THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 255 
 
 The slender brunette, quick of wit, whom I had chosen 
 for model, led the singing of the women, composing the 
 quatrains and reciting them to her companions who greeted 
 them with clapping and laughter, while the guitar-player 
 seemed to be the leader of the lads and the one eminent 
 among them all for his cleverness and ready retorts. 
 
 For my part, it did not take me long to understand that 
 between these two there was a feeling of affection which 
 betrayed itself in their songs, full of transparent allusions 
 and enamoured phrases. 
 
 When I finished my drawing, night was beginning to fall. 
 Already there had been lighted in the tower of the cathedral 
 the two lanterns of the shrine of the bells, and their lustres 
 seemed like fiery eyes from that giant of brick and mortar 
 which dominates all the city. The groups were going, melt- 
 ing away little by little and disappearing up the road in the 
 dim twilight silvered by the moon, that now began to show 
 against the violet dusk of the sky. The girls went singing 
 away together, and their clear, bright voices gradually less- 
 ened until they became but a part of the other indistinct 
 and distant sounds that trembled in the air. All was over 
 at once, — the day, the jollity, the animation and the im- 
 promptu festival ; and of all there remained only an echo 
 in the ear and in the soul, like the softest of vibrations, like 
 a sweet drowsiness such as one experiences on waking from 
 a pleasant dream. 
 
 When the last loiterers were gone, I folded my drawing, 
 placed it safely in the portfolio, called the waiter with a 
 hand-clap, paid my trifling account, and was just on the 
 point of departing when I felt myself caught gently by the 
 arm. It was the young guitar-player -whom I had noticed 
 before and who while I was drawing had often stared at me 
 with unusual curiosity. I had not observed that, after the 
 fun was over, he approached under some pretext the place 
 
256 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 where I was sitting in order to see what I was doing that 
 I should be looking so steadily at the woman in whom he 
 seemed to have a special interest. 
 
 " Sehorito^^^ he said to me in a tone which he strove to 
 soften as much as possible, " I am going to ask you to do me 
 a favor.'* 
 
 " A favor 1 " I exclaimed, without comprehending what he 
 could want of me. " Name it, and if it is in my power, 
 count on it as done." 
 
 " Would you give me the picture you have made ? " On 
 hearing this, I could not help pausing a moment in per- 
 plexity, surprised both by the request, rare enough in itself, 
 and by the tone, which baffled me to determine whether it 
 was one of threat or of entreaty. He must have understood 
 my hesitation, and he immediately hastened to add : 
 
 " I beg it of you for the sake of your mother, for the sake 
 of the woman whom you hold dearest in the world, if you 
 hold any dear; ask of me in return all that my poverty 
 affords." 
 
 I did not know how to make my way out of this difficulty, 
 I would almost have preferred that it had come in guise of 
 a quarrel, if so I might have kept the sketch of that woman 
 who had so deeply impressed me ; but whether it was the 
 surprise of the moment, or my inability to say no to anything, 
 the fact is that I opened my portfolio, took out the drawing 
 and handed it to him without a word. 
 
 To repeat the lad's expressions of gratitude, his exclama- 
 tions as he gazed at it anew by the light of the tavern's metal 
 lamp, the care with which he folded it to put it away securely 
 in his sash, the offers of devotion he made me, and the ex- 
 travagant praises with which he cried up his good fortune in 
 that he had met one whom he called, in his clipped Anda- 
 lusian speech, a " reg'lar senorito,^'' would be a task most 
 difficult, not to say impossible. I will only say that, as the 
 
THE TA VERN OF THE CA TS 
 
 257 
 
 night, what with one delay and another, was now fully upon 
 us, he insisted, willy-nilly, on going with me to the Macarena 
 gate ; and he laid so much stress on it, that finally I decided 
 that it would be better to take the road together. The way 
 is very short, but while it lasted he managed to tell me from 
 beginning to end all the story of his love. 
 
 The tavern where the merry-making had taken place be- 
 longed to his father, who had promised him, when he should 
 marry, an orchard which adjoined the house and was part 
 of its holding. As to the girl, the object of his love, whom 
 he described to me with the most vivid colors and most 
 picturesque phrases, he told me that her name was Amparo, 
 that she had been brought up in his father's house from her 
 babyhood, and that it was not known who her parents were. 
 All this and a hundred other details of less interest he re- 
 lated to me on the way. When he had come to the gates 
 of the city he gave me a strong pressure of the hands, again 
 put himself at my service, and made off trolling a song whose 
 echoes spread far and wide through the silence of the night. 
 I stood a moment watching him depart. His happiness 
 seemed contagious, and I felt joyous with a strange and 
 nameless joy — a reflected joy, if I may say so. 
 
 He sang till he could sing no longer. One of his refrains 
 ran thus : 
 
 " Too long our separation ; 
 Soul of my soul thou art, 
 The Virgin of Consolation 
 On the altar of my heart." 
 
 When his voice began to die away, I heard borne on the 
 evening wind another voice, delicate and vibrating, that 
 sounded at a further distance yet. It was she, she who 
 impatiently awaited his coming. 
 
 A few days later I left Seville, and many years went by 
 
258 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 before my return. I forgot many things which happened to 
 me there, but the memory of such happiness, so humble and 
 so content, was never erased from my memory. 
 
 IL ' 
 
 As I have said, many years passed after my leaving Seville 
 without my forgetting in the least that afternoon whose 
 recollection sometimes passed over my imagination like 
 a reviving breeze that cools the heated brow. 
 
 When chance brought me again to the great city which is 
 called with so much reason the Queen of Andalusia, one of 
 the things that most attracted my attention was the remark- 
 able change effected during my absence. Great buildings, 
 blocks of houses and entire suburbs had risen at the magic 
 touch of industry and capital ; on every side were factories, 
 public gardens, parks, shady walks, but unhappily many 
 venerable monuments of antiquity had disappeared. 
 
 I visited again many proud edifices full of historical and 
 artistic memories ; again I wandered and lost my way amid 
 the million turns of the curious suburb of Santa Cruz ; I 
 surprised in the course of my strolls many new buildings 
 which had been erected I know not how ; I missed many 
 old ones which had vanished I know not why ; and finally 
 I took my way to the bank of the river. The river-bank 
 has ever been in Seville the chosen field for my excursions. 
 
 After I had admired the magnificent panorama which 
 offers itself to the view at the point where the iron bridge 
 connects the opposite shores ; after I had noticed, with 
 absorbed gaze, the myriad details, — palaces and rows of 
 small white houses ; after I had passed in review the' in- 
 numerable ships at anchor in the stream, unfurling to the 
 wind their airy pennants of a thousand colors, and when I 
 heard the confused hum of the wharves, where everything 
 breathes activity and movement, I transported myself, follow- 
 
THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 259 
 
 ing in imagination the river, against its current, to San 
 Jeronimo. 
 
 I remembered that tranquil landscape, reposeful, luminous, 
 where the rich vegetation of Andalusia displays without 
 cultivation her natural charms. As if I had been in a boat 
 rowed upstream, again, with memory's aid, I saw file by, on 
 one side, the Cartuja [Carthusian convent] with its groves 
 and its lofty, slender towers ; on the other, the Barrio de 
 los Hiimeros [the old g>'psy quarter], the ancient city walls, 
 half Arab, half Roman, the orchards with their fences 
 covered with brambles, and the water-wheels shaded by 
 great, isolated trees, and finally, San Jeronimo. — On reach- 
 ing this point in my imagination, those memories that I still 
 cherished of the famous inn rose before me more vividly 
 than ever, and I fancied myself present once again at those 
 peasant merry-makings; I heard the girls singing, as they 
 flew through the air in the swing ; and I saw the groups of 
 village folk wandering over the meadows, some picnicking, 
 some quarrelling, some laughing, some dancing, and all in 
 motion, overflowing with youth, vivacity and glee. There 
 was she, surrounded by her children, now holding herself 
 aloof from the group of merry girls who were still laughing 
 and singing, and there was he, tranquil and content with 
 his felicity, looking with tenderness at the persons whom he 
 loved best in the world, all together about him and all happy, 
 — his wife, his children, his father, who was there as ten 
 years ago, seated at the door of his inn, impassively twisting 
 the paper about his cigarette, without more change than that 
 his head, which then was gray, would now be white as snow. 
 
 A friend who accompanied me in the walk, noting the sort 
 of blissful revery in which for several moments I had been 
 rapt with these imaginings, shook me at last by the arm, 
 asking : 
 
 " What are you thinking about ? " 
 
26o ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 ** I was thinking," I replied, " of the Tavern of the Cats, 
 and revolving in my mind all the pleasant recollections I 
 cherish of an afternoon when I was at San Jeronimo. — This 
 very instant I was ending a love story which I left there 
 well begun, and I ended it so much to my liking that I believe 
 there cannot be any other conclusion than that which I have 
 made for it. And speaking of the Tavern of the Cats," I 
 continued, turning to my friend, " when shall we take a day 
 and go there for luncheon or to enjoy an hour of revel ? " 
 
 " An hour of revel 1 " exclaimed my friend, with an ex- 
 pression of astonishment which I did not at that time succeed 
 in explaining to myself, " an hour of revel ! A very ap- 
 propriate place it is for that 1 " 
 
 " And why not ? " I rejoined, wondering in my turn at 
 his surprise. 
 
 " The reason is very simple," he told me at last, " for at 
 one hundred paces from the tavern they have laid out the 
 new cemetery " [of San Fernando]. 
 
 Then it was I who gazed at him with astonished eyes 
 and remained some minutes silent before speaking a single 
 word. 
 
 We returned to the city, and that day went by, and still 
 more days, without my being able entirely to throw off the 
 impression which news so unexpected had made upon me. 
 The more variations I played upon it, still the love story of 
 the brunette had no conclusion, for what I had invented 
 before was not conceivable, since I could not make natural 
 a picture of happiness and mirth with a cemetery for a back- 
 ground. 
 
 One afternoon, determined to resolve my doubts, I pleaded 
 a slight indisposition as an excuse for not accompanying my 
 friend in our accustomed rambles, and I started out alone 
 for the inn. When I had left behind me the Macarena gate 
 and its picturesque suburb and had begun to cross by a 
 
THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 261 
 
 narrow footpath that labyrinth of orchards, already I seemed 
 to perceive something strange in my surroundings. 
 
 Whether it was because the afternoon had become a little 
 clouded, or that the tendency of my mind inclined me to 
 melancholy ideas, the fact is that I felt cold and sad, and 
 noticed a silence about me which reminded me of utter soli- 
 tude, as sleep reminds us of death. 
 
 I walked a little without stopping, crossed the orchards to 
 shorten the distance and came out into the street of San 
 Lazaro, whence already may be seen in the distance the 
 convent of San Jeronimo. 
 
 Perhaps it is an illusion, but it seems to me that along the 
 road where pass the dead even the trees and the vegetation 
 come to take on a different color. I fancied there, at least, 
 that warm and harmonious tones were lacking, — no freshness 
 in the groves, no atmosphere in space, no light upon the 
 earth. The landscape was monotonous ; its figures black 
 and isolated. 
 
 Here was a hearse moving slowly, covered with mourning 
 draperies, raising no dust, cracking no whip, without shout 
 to the horses, almost without movement ; further on a man 
 of ill countenance with a spade on his shoulder, or a priest 
 in long, dark robe, or a group of old men poorly clad and 
 of repugnant aspect, with extinguished candles in their hands, 
 who were returning in silence, with lowered heads, and eyes 
 fixed on the ground. I believed myself transported I know 
 not whither ; for all that I saw reminded me of a landscape 
 whose contours were the same as ever, but whose colors had 
 been, as it were, blotted out, there being left of them merely 
 a vague half-tone. The impression that I experienced can 
 be compared only to that which we feel in those dreams 
 where, by an inexplicable phenomenon, things are and are 
 not at one and the same time, and the places in which we 
 
262 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 believe ourselves to be, partially transform themselves in an 
 eccentric and impossible fashion. 
 
 At last I reached the roadside inn ; I recognized it more 
 by the name, which it still keep^ printed in large letters on 
 one of its walls, than by anything else ; for as to the little 
 house itself, it seemed to me that it had changed even its 
 outlines and its proportions. At once I saw that it was 
 much more ruinous, that it was forsaken and sad. The 
 shadow of the cemetery, which rose just beyond it, appeared 
 to fall over it, enveloping it in a dark covering, like the 
 cloth laid on the face of the dead. The innkeeper was there, 
 utterly alone. I recognized him as the same of ten years 
 back ; I recognized him I know not why, for in this time he 
 had aged even to the point of appearing a decrepit old man 
 on the edge of the grave, whereas when I first saw him he 
 seemed fifty, abounding in health, satisfaction and vitality. 
 
 I sat down at one of the deserted tables ; I asked for some- 
 thing to drink, which the innkeeper brought me, and from 
 one detached remark after another we fell finally into con- 
 tinuous conversation relating to that love story of whose 
 last chapter I was still in ignorance, although I had several 
 times attempted to divine it. 
 
 " Everything," said the poor old man to me, " everything 
 seems to have conspired against us since the period in which 
 you remember me. You know how it was with us. Amparo 
 was the delight of our eyes ; she had been reared here from 
 •her birth ; she was the joy of the house ; never could she 
 miss her own parents, for I loved her like a father ; my son 
 had loved her, too, from his boyhood, first as a brother, 
 afterwards with a devotion greater yet. They were on the 
 eve of marriage ; I was ready to make over to them the better 
 part of my modest property, for with the profits of my 
 business it seemed to me that I should have more than 
 enough to live at ease, when some evil spirit — I know not 
 
THE TAVERN OF THE CATS 263 
 
 what — envied our happiness and destroyed it in a moment. 
 In the first place the whisper went about that they were 
 going to locate a cemetery on this side of San Jeronimo ; 
 some said close by, others further off, and while we were all 
 uneasy and anxious, fearing that they might carry out this 
 project, a greater and more certain trouble fell upon us. 
 
 " One day two gentlemen arrived here in a carriage ; they 
 put to me thousands of questions about Amparo whom I 
 had taken in her babyhood from the foundling hospital ; 
 they asked to see the swaddling-clothes which she wore 
 when she was abandoned and which I had kept, with the 
 final result that Amparo proved to be the daughter of a very 
 rich gentleman, who went to law to recover her from us and 
 persisted until he gained his end. I do not wish even to 
 call to memory the day when they took her away. She 
 wept like a Magdalen, my son would have made a mad re- 
 sistance, I was like one dumfounded, not understanding what 
 was happening to me. She went. Rather, she did not go, 
 for she loved us too much to go of her own accord, but 
 they carried her off, and a curse fell upon the house. My 
 son, after an attack of terrible despair, fell into a sort of 
 lethargy. I do not know how to express my own state of 
 mind. I believed that for me the world had ended. 
 
 " While these things were going on, they began to lay out 
 the cemetery. The village-folk fled from this neighborhood. 
 There were no more festivals, songs and music ; all the 
 merriment of this countryside was over, even as the joy of 
 our souls. 
 
 " And Amparo was no happier than we ; bred here in the 
 open air, in the bustle and animation of the inn, brought up 
 to be joyous in poverty, they plucked her from this life, and 
 she withered, as wither the flowers gathered in a garden to 
 adorn a drawing-room. My son made incredible efforts to 
 see her again, to have a moment's speech with her. All was 
 
264 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 in vain ; her family did not wish it. At last he saw her, but 
 he saw her dead. The funeral train passed by here. I 
 knew nothing about it and I cannot tell why I fell to weeping 
 when I saw her hearse. The heart, loyal to love, clamored 
 to me: 
 
 " ' She is young like Amparo ; she, too, must be beautiful ; 
 who knows if it may not be herself ? ' And it was. My son 
 followed the train, entered the enclosure and, when the coffin 
 was opened, uttered a cry and fell senseless to the ground ; 
 and so they brought him back to me. Afterwards he went 
 mad, and is now a lunatic." 
 
 When the poor old man had reached this point in his nar- 
 rative, there entered the inn two gravediggers of sinister 
 bearing and repellent look. Having finished their task, they 
 had come to take a drink " to the health of the dead^'^ as one 
 of them said, accompanying the jest with a silly leer. The 
 innkeeper brushed off a tear with the back of his hand and 
 went to serve them. 
 
 Night was beginning to fall, a dark night and most gloomy. 
 The sky was black and so was the landscape. From the 
 boughs of the trees still hung, half rotted, the ropes of the 
 swing swaying in the wind ; it reminded me of a gallows-rope 
 quivering yet after the body of the felon had been taken 
 down. Only confused noises reached my ears, — the distant 
 barking of dogs on guard in the orchards ; the creaking of 
 a water-wheel, prolonged, melancholy and shrill like a lament ; 
 disconnected, horrible words of the gravediggers who were 
 plotting in low tones a sacrilegious robbery — I know not 
 what ; my memory has kept of this fantastic scene of desola- 
 tion as of that other scene of merriment only a confused 
 recollection that I cannot reproduce. What I still seem 
 to hear as I heard it then is this refrain intoned in a 
 plaintive voice, suddenly disturbing the silence that reigned 
 about : 
 
THE TA VERN OF THE CA TS 265 
 
 " The coach of the dead was grand 
 As it passed our humble door, 
 But from it beckoned a pallid hand, 
 And I saw my love once more." 
 
 It was the poor boy, who was locked up in one of the 
 rooms of the inn, where he passed his days in motionless 
 contemplation of the picture of his beloved, without speak- 
 ing a word, scarcely eating, never weeping, hardly opening 
 his lips save to sing this simple, tender verse enclosing a 
 poem of sorrow that I then learned to decipher. 
 
ALL SOULS' NIGHT 
 
 The gloaming of a misty, melancholy autumn day is suc- 
 ceeded by a cold, dark night. For several hours now, the 
 continuous stir of the town seems to have ceased. 
 
 Some near, others far, some with grave and measured beat 
 and others with a quick and tremulous vibration, the bells 
 are swinging in their towers, flinging out upon the air their 
 metallic notes which float and mingle, lessen and die away 
 to yield place to a new rain of sounds pouring continually 
 from the deep brazen throats as from a spring of inex- 
 haustible harmonies. 
 
 It is said that joy is contagious, but I believe that sadness 
 is much more so. There are melancholy spirits who succeed 
 in eluding the intoxication of delight that our great popular 
 festivals carry in their atmosphere. It is hard to find one 
 who is able to bear unaffected the icy touch of the atmos- 
 phere of sorrow, if this comes to seek us in the privacy of 
 our own fireside, — comes in the wearisome, slow vibration 
 of the bell that is like a grieving voice, uttering its tale of 
 troubles at one's very ear. 
 
 I cannot hear the bells, even when they ring out merry 
 peals as for a festival, without having my soul possessed by 
 a sentiment of inexplicable and involuntary sadness. In the 
 great capitals, by good or evil hap, the confused murmur of 
 the multitude which beats on every sense, full of the noisy 
 giddiness of action, ordinarily drowns the clamor of the bells 
 to such a degree as to make one believe it does not exist. 
 To me at least it seems that on All Souls' Night, the only 
 night of the year when I hear them, the towers of the Madrid 
 
 266 
 
ALL SOULS' NIGHT 267 
 
 churches, thanks to a miracle, regain their voices, breaking 
 for a few hours only their long silence. Whether it be that 
 my imagination, predisposed to melancholy thoughts, aids 
 in producing this effect, or that the novelty of the sound 
 strikes me the more profoundly; always when I perceive, 
 borne on the wind, the separate notes of this harmony, a 
 strange phenomenon takes place in my senses. I think that 
 I distinguish the different voices of the bells one from 
 another; I think that each of them has its own tone and ex- 
 presses a special feeling ; I think, in fine, that after lending 
 for some time profound attention to the discordant combi- 
 nation of sounds, deep or shrill, dull or silvery, which they 
 breathe forth, I succeed in surprising mysterious words that 
 palpitate upon the air enveloped in its prolonged vibrations. 
 
 These words without connection, without meaning, that 
 float in space accompanied by sighs scarcely perceptible and 
 by long sobs, commence to reunite one with another as the 
 vague ideas of a dream combine on waking, and reunited, 
 they form an immense, dolorous poem, in which each bell 
 chants its strophe, and all together interpret by means of 
 symbolic sounds the dumb thought that seethes in the brain 
 of those who harken, plunged in profound meditation. 
 
 A bell of hollow, deafening tone, swinging heavily in its 
 lofty tower with ceremonial slowness, that seems to have a 
 mathematical rhythm and moves by some perfect mechanism, 
 says in peals punctiliously adjusted to the ritual : 
 
 " I am the empty sound that melts away without having 
 made vibrate a single one of the infinite chords of feeling in 
 the heart of man. I bear in my echoes neither sobs nor 
 sighs. I perform correctly my part in the lugubrious, aerial 
 symphony of grief, my sonorous strokes never falling behind 
 nor going in advance by a single second. I am the bell of 
 the parish church, the official bell of funeral honors. My 
 voice proclaims the mourning of etiquette ; my voice laments 
 
268 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 from the heights of the belfry announcing to the neighbor- 
 hood the fatahty, groan by groan ; my voice, which sorrows 
 at so much a sob, releases the rich heir and the young widow 
 from other cares than those of the formalities attending the 
 reading of the will, and the orders for elegant mourning. 
 
 " At my peal the artisans of death come out of their 
 atrophy : the carpenter hastens to adorn with gold braid the 
 most comfortable of his coffins ; the marble worker strikes 
 in his chisel seeking a new allegory for the ostentatious 
 sepulchre ; even the horses of the grotesque hearse, theatre 
 of the last triumph of vanity, proudly shake their antique 
 tufts of fly wing-colored plumes, while the pillars of the church 
 are wound about with black baize, the traditional catafalque 
 is set up under the dome, and the choir-master rehearses on 
 the violin a new Dies Irae for the last mass of the Requiem. 
 
 " I am the grief of tinsel tears, of paper flowers and of 
 distichs in letters of gold. 
 
 " To-day it is my duty to commemorate my fellow-country- 
 men, the illustrious dead for whom I mourn officially, and on 
 doing this with all the pomp and all the noise befitting their 
 social position, my only regret is that I cannot utter one by 
 one their names, titles and decorations ; perchance this new 
 formula would be a comfort to their families." 
 
 When the measured hammering of the heavy bell ceases 
 an instant and its distant echo, blent with the cloud of tones 
 that the wind carries away, is lost, there begins to be heard 
 the sad, uneven, piercing melody of a little clapper-bell." 
 
 " I am," it says, " the voice that sings the joys and bewails 
 the sorrows of the village which I dominate from my spire ; 
 I am the humble bell of the hamlet, that calls down with 
 ardent petitions water from heaven upon the parched fields, 
 the bell that with its pious conjurations puts the storms to 
 flight, the bell that whirls, quivering with emotion, and in 
 
ALL SOULS' NIGHT 269 
 
 wild outcries pleads for succour when fire is devouring the 
 crops. 
 
 " I am the friendly voice that bids the poor his last fare- 
 well ; I am the groan that grief chokes in the throat of the 
 orphan and that mounts on the winged notes of the bell to 
 the throne of the Father of Mercies. 
 
 " On hearing my melody, a prayer breaks involuntarily 
 from the lip, and my last echo goes to breathe itself away on 
 the brink of hidden graves — an echo borne by the wind that 
 seems to pray in a low voice as it waves the tall grass that 
 covers them. 
 
 " I am the weeping that scalds the cheeks ; I am the woe 
 that dries the fount of tears ; I am the anguish that presses 
 on the heart with an iron hand ; I am the supreme sorrow, 
 the sorrow of the forsaken and forlorn. 
 
 " To-day I toll for that nameless multitude which passes 
 through life unheeded, leaving no more trace behind than 
 the broad stream of sweat and tears that marks its course ; 
 to-day I toll for those who sleep in earth forgotten, without 
 other monument than a rude cross of wood which, perchance, 
 is hidden by the nettles and the spear-plume thistles, but 
 amid their leaves arise these humble, yellow-petaled flowers 
 that the angels sow over the graves of the just." 
 
 The echo of the clapper-bell grows fainter little by little 
 till it is lost amid the whirlwind of tones, above which are 
 distinguished the crashing, broken strokes of one of those 
 gigantic bells which set shuddering, as they sound, even the 
 deep foundations of the ancient Gothic cathedrals in whose 
 towers we see them suspended. 
 
 "I am," says the bell with its terrible, stentorian peal, 
 " the voice of the stupendous mass of stone which your fore- 
 fathers raised for the amazement of the ages. I am the 
 mysterious voice familiar to the long-robed virgins, the angels, 
 the kings and the marble prophets who keep watch by night 
 
270 ROMANTIC LEGENDS OF SPAIN 
 
 and by day at the church doors, enveloped in the shadows 
 of their arches. I am the voice of the misshapen monsters, 
 of the griffins and prodigious reptiles that crawl among the 
 intertwined stone leaves along the spires of the towers. I 
 am the phantasmal bell of tradition and of legend that 
 swings alone on All Souls' Night, rung by an invisible hand. 
 
 " I am the bell of fearsome folk-tales, stories of ghosts 
 and souls in pain, — the bell whose strange and indescribable 
 vibration finds an echo only in ardent imaginations. 
 
 " At my voice, knights armed with all manner of arms 
 rise from their Gothic sepulchres ; monks come forth from 
 the dim vaults in which they are sleeping their last sleep 
 to the foot of their abbey altars ; and the cemeteries open 
 their gates little by little to let pass the troops of yellow 
 skeletons that run nimbly to dance in giddy round about the 
 pointed spire which shelters me. 
 
 " When my tremendous clamor surprises the credulous old 
 woman before the antique shrine whose lights she tends, she 
 believes that she sees for a moment the spirits of the picture 
 dance amid the vermilion and ochre flames by the glimmer of 
 the dying lantern. 
 
 " When my mighty vibrations accompany the monotonous 
 recital of an old-time fable to which the children, grouped 
 about the hearth, listen all absorbed, the tongues of red and 
 blue fire that glide along the glowing logs, and the fiery 
 sparks that leap up against the obscure background of the 
 kitchen, are taken for spirits circling in the air, and the 
 noise of the wind shaking the doors, for the work of souls 
 knocking at the leaded panes of the windows with the flesh- 
 less knuckles of their bony hands. 
 
 " I am the bell that prays to God for the souls condemned 
 to hell ; I am the voice of superstitious terror ; I cause not 
 weeping, but rising of the hair, and I carry the chill of fright 
 to the marrow of his bones who harkens to me." 
 
ALL SOULS' NIGHT 
 
 271 
 
 So one after another, or all at once, the bells go pealing 
 on, now as the musical theme that rises clearly above the 
 full orchestra in a grand symphony, now as a fantasia that 
 lingers and recedes, dilating on the wind. 
 
 Only the daylight and the noises that come up from the 
 heart of the town at the first dawn can put to flight the strange 
 abortions of the mind and the doleful, persistent tolling of 
 the bells, which even in sleep is felt as an exhausting night- 
 mare through the eternal Noche de Difuntos. 
 
 ^-^.f UNIVERSITY 
 
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