As He Did So, Cayley Caught Sight Of The Pistol
Under The Fellow's Sheepskin Jacket, And With Characteristic
Promptitude Seized It, While He Presented A Revolver At The
Thief's Head.
All this he told me with great glee a minute
or two later.
When we got back to Argamasilla the Medico was already
awaiting us. He conducted us to the house of the Quijanas,
where an old woman-servant, lamp in hand, showed the way down
a flight of steps into the dungeon. It was a low vaulted
chamber, eight feet high, ten broad, and twenty-four long,
dimly lighted by a lancet window six feet from the ground.
She confidently informed us that Cervantes was in the habit
of writing at the farthest end, and that he was allowed a
lamp for the purpose. We accepted the information with
implicit faith; silently picturing on our mental retinas the
image of him whose genius had brightened the dark hours of
millions for over three hundred years. One could see the
spare form of the man of action pacing up and down his cell,
unconscious of prison walls, roaming in spirit through the
boundless realms of Fancy, his piercing eyes intent upon the
conjured visions of his brain. One noted his vast expanse of
brow, his short, crisp, curly hair, his high cheek-bones and
singularly high-bridged nose, his refined mouth, small
projecting chin and pointed beard. One noticed, too, as he
turned, the stump of the left wrist clasped by the remaining
hand. Who could stand in such a presence and fail to bow
with veneration before this insulted greatness! Potentates
pass like Ozymandias, but not the men who, through the ages,
help to save us from this tread-mill world, and from
ourselves.
We visited Cuenca, Segovia, and many an out-of-the-way spot.
If it be true, as Don Quixote declares, that 'No hay libro
tan malo que no tenga alguna cosa buena' ('there is no book
so worthless that has not some good in it'), still more true
is this of a country like Spain. And the pleasantest places
are just those which only by-roads lead to. In and near the
towns every other man, if not by profession still by
practice, is a beggar. From the seedy-looking rascal in the
street, of whom you incautiously ask the way, and who
piteously whines 'para zapatos' - for the wear and tear of
shoe leather, to the highest official, one and all hold out
their hands for the copper CUARTO or the eleemosynary
sinecure. As it was then, so is it now; the Government wants
support, and it is always to be had, at a price; deputies
always want 'places.' For every duty the functionary
performs, or ought to perform, he receives his bribe. The
Government is too poor to keep him honest, but his POUR-
BOIRES are not measured by his scruples. All is winked at,
if the Ministry secures a vote.
Away in the pretty rural districts, in the little villages
amid the woods and the mountains, with their score or so of
houses and their little chapel with its tinkling old bell and
its poverty-stricken curate, the hard-working, simple-minded
men are too proud and too honest to ask for more than a pinch
of tobacco for the CIGARILLO.
Enter page number
PreviousNext
Page 146 of 208
Words from 74342 to 74901
of 106633
