We took a sea-bath the following morning; we walked about in San Andrés,
feeling our importance, for our presence was an event in the little
village; we visited the parochial church; we gathered shells on the
beach; and yet were back at Tejo at nine o’clock, ready for our
chocolate. Father Moreno did not accompany us; he preferred to take his
bath in the afternoon, because he did not like to omit his mass. My
uncle had not yet made his appearance, nor would he come until one
o’clock in the afternoon, our dinner hour; so Carmen was free from the
duty of entertaining her lover, and had time to devote to me, even
showing herself affectionate and unreserved.
“You retired early last night because you felt bored. Really we do not
know how to entertain you, and it will be hard for you if you do not try
to find some amusement for yourself in the country.”
“Don’t worry yourself on that account. I like the country very much, and
I never feel bored there. This place is beautiful; this morning I had a
splendid bath.”
“And how is my ungrateful friend Benigna? How sorry I am that she will
not come! Your mother is very agreeable, and I always liked her--now
with all the more reason.”
“You see it is not easy to make my mother stir. She always has so much
to do.”
After these commonplace remarks my prospective aunt and I sat like
ninnies, without knowing what to say. At last she said courteously and
very amiably:
“As you brought me such a beautiful present, would you not like to see
some of the others I have received? I keep them in a room by themselves,
because the girls are so curious and so fond of meddling. Come this
way.”
I followed after her. She carried several keys in her pocket, which
rattled prettily, with a familiar sound, as she walked along. She took
out the bunch of keys, opened the mysterious door, and pulled back the
curtains, displaying the splendors of the wedding gifts. When I say
splendors, it should not be taken too literally, because there were
plenty of articles of provincial make; and others, though they came from
Madrid, were not of the finest taste--at least so far as I am able to
judge of those things. The bride-elect went on telling me about them
all. That black satin dress, trimmed with jet, was a present from the
bridegroom, as were also the pearl ear-rings set with diamonds. Papa had
squandered his money on a rich blue silk brocade; and there, too, were
the little hats to correspond. Another dress seemed very beautiful to my
uninitiated eyes: it was a dull white silk, with a delicate net-work of
imitation pearls in front, a beautiful train, and two clusters of leaves
and flowers, placed with exquisite taste.
This, Carmen said, was a thing without utility, a caprice of Señora
Sotopeña’s, who had been commissioned with the selection of finery in
Madrid, and who had insisted that the bride must have an evening dress.
The jewels given by the father were some old family jewels reset; there
was a splendid brooch, and several other things. The Sotopeña family
had sent her an elegant fan, representing Fortuny’s “Vicarage,” and with
shell sticks. Her brother had given her an ordinary-looking bracelet.
Then followed a collection of jewel-cases, albums, useless
articles,--the thousand and one trifles, as ordinary as they are
worthless, which are only bought and sold on the pretext of giving a
present on the occasion of a wedding or birthday. Behind them all, in
one corner, as though ashamed of itself, was a most singular object--an
enormous rat-trap.
“Why, who gave you that?” I asked, without being able to restrain my
laughter.
“Who else could it be but Serafín,” she replied, joining in my mirth.
“Is it possible!”
“Yes; and he felt so proud of it. I wish you could have seen him holding
his rat-trap on high, exclaiming:
“‘This, at least, will be useful!’”
“But about that Serafín,--is he crazy, foolish, or what is he?”
“In my opinion, he has not got over being a child. He has not a bad
heart, and sometimes makes bright remarks. But a moment afterward he’ll
fly off on a tangent, and say all sorts of silly things. Sometimes, for
example, he will make a sound observation regarding some point of
theology or morality,--I know it is so because Father Moreno says
so,--and again he is exceedingly stupid about the simplest facts. Once
we gave him some candle snuffers, telling him to snuff a candle, and he
took them, looked at them attentively, wet his fingers in his mouth,
snuffed the candle with his fingers, and then, opening the snuffers, put
the bit of wick inside, saying proudly: ‘I can see very well how you
work, little box!’”
We were still laughing at this anecdote when we went out into the
garden. My prospective aunt showed me the outbuildings, the hen house,
the stables, and the orchard, inviting me to taste the fruit of the
sweet cherry, to pick some flowers, and to try the swing and the
trapeze.
Father Moreno made his appearance in the garden, calm, communicative,
and even jocose. He questioned me about certain people who preferred to
take a dip rather than attend mass celebrated by a friar; about Serafín,
who could not be found to do service as acolyte; about our triumphal
excursion through San Andrés. Señor Aldao also was not long in
presenting himself. He was brushed and waxed, his mustaches dyed, and
his cranium glistening like a billiard-ball; but he looked to me like a
wreck, under the green shade of his opened umbrella. He asked me if I
“had seen it all,” with the air of a Medici inquiring whether a
foreigner has visited his palaces and galleries. Then he added:
“What do you think of the yew--the famous yew-tree?”
“Ah, it is magnificent, wonderful!”
“An English naval officer was here last year who admired it
enthusiastically and wanted to photograph it. He carried away more than
ten different views. Don Vicente Sotopeña assures me that Castelar, in
his speech at the Literary Contest, praised the yew very highly when
speaking of the marvelous beauties of Galicia. Castelar is a great
orator, hey? Flowery,--above all things flowery.”
Señor Aldao appeared to me like one of those men who carry their vanity
(somewhat concealed in other men) outside and entirely visible to
everybody. I afterward found out that he had always been vain, and
founded his vanity on the most hollow and superficial things. When a
young man he prided himself on his dandyfied appearance, his waxed
mustaches, and eyebrows drawn out straight. Afterward he was seized with
the nobility fever, and on all occasions wore his uniform as an officer
in the militia, dreaming about the marquisate of Tejo. He made a sort of
platonic love to the said marquisate, attaching himself closely to the
civil governors when he desired a title from Castile, and to the bishops
when he wanted it to be palatine. However, his desire for vulgar display
was never gratified. An old man now, the extraordinary power Don Vicente
wielded, and his absolute control over the province and a great part of
Galicia, had made Señor Aldao comprehend that social rank, in our times,
is not founded on parchments, more or less musty. “Nowadays politics
absorb everything,” he used to say. “The man who can give away
sugar-plums with one hand, while he wields the lash with the other, is
the real celebrity.” That was one reason why he had received my uncle’s
matrimonial proposals with so much favor. He saw in them the handle
whereby he might fasten on to the great Galician boss’s coat-tails, and
thus gratify a multitude of miserable ambitions he had preserved for
years, and which were getting sour, viz., that about the cross; the
rousing up of a bill for a carriage-road, which was sleeping the sleep
of the just; and I don’t know what other trifles in connection with the
Provincial Legislature and contracts.
No matter how much we may search the depths of the human heart, we never
succeed in disentangling the cause of certain hidden feelings. Envy,
competition, and emulation demand, it would seem, something like
equality, and one cannot understand how those bad passions are developed
when not the slightest equality exists between the envious one and the
man he envies. Can a soprano who sings in comic opera envy Patti, or a
simple lady of the middle class, the queen? Well, they do, without any
doubt, and from the obscurity wherein they dwell they try to cast a
feeble ray of light which will compete with that of the star.
In the same way, Don Román Aldao, a small, provincial gentleman, who
enjoyed only a moderate income, indulged himself at times in impulses to
compete with Don Vicente Sotopeña, the renowned politician, the shining
light of the law, the famous chief, the great boss of Galicia, the
lawyer overrun with succulent cases, the millionaire, the man of great
and universal influence.
And in what particular did he want to eclipse Sotopeña? Why, in the
matter of their respective country seats. Don Vicente owned a sort of
royal estate near Pontevedra, where he could rest from his labors and
enjoy his leisure hours; and whenever Señor Aldao heard any one speak of
his magnificent villa, of his orange orchard, of his grove of eucalyptus
trees, of his marble statues, and of the other beauties which were
displayed at _Naranjal_, his face would wear a scowl, his lips would be
compressed in mortified pride, and he would ask the people with whom he
was speaking:
“What do you think of the tree, my yew? An English naval officer praised
it most enthusiastically and wanted to take views of it,” etc.
It was a fancy of Don Román’s, never to be realized, that he could
beautify his estate in imitation of _Naranjal_. Nature was an accomplice
in his dream, however, for, besides the gigantic yew-tree which she had
created, she spread around it all the charms which she is accustomed to
display in that corner of paradise which is called _Rías_ _Bajas_. The
sun, the ocean, the sky, the climate, the beach, the vegetation of a
district so luxuriant, formed an oasis of Tejo, though it could not
compete with _Naranjal_ in what depended on the work of man. Art may
make a great show in the country, but the highest charm of a country
seat depends on Nature. But our Don Román did not understand this. He
did not appreciate the ineffable sweetness and repose of the country,
which causes a man to forget the pleasures of social life. On the
contrary, he longed for the bustle, the style, the glories and pomps of
a proprietor and local magnate, and felt, above all, the urgings of his
vanity, which was so absurd, because so impotent. Of course, Aldao did
not attempt to copy splendors like those of the famous chapel of
stalactites, so highly praised by newspaper writers and tourists. But
if, for example, they set up at _Naranjal_ a spacious breakfast room, in
an arbor covered with jasmine-vines, immediately Don Román would fall to
planning a rickety place, covered with honeysuckle, wherein they might
take their chocolate. Was there fine statuary at _Naranjal_? Out Don
Román Aldao would come with his plaster busts, his “Four Seasons,” or
his group of “Cupids,” and would place them in the middle of a meadow or
an espalier. If they introduced a conservatory at _Naranjal_, with a
fine collection of ferns and orchids, immediately after Don Román would
repair to Pontevedra, and purchase all the worn-out window-frames he
could find, in order to fit up a cheap hot-house, filled with stiff and
insufferable begonias. Did they have rustic tables and seats brought
from Switzerland at _Naranjal_? Señor Aldao would show the village
carpenter how to saw pine cones in two, and with the trunks of the pine
trees would make rustic seats and all kinds of furniture. And, to crown
all, there was the yew-tree!
On the first day of my stay at Tejo some people came from Pontevedra to
dine: Señor Aldao’s oldest son, Luciano, with his child, a boy about
four years old, and a provincial deputy named Castro Mera, who was my
uncle’s greatest friend at that time, and head of the clique which
represented his political views in the bosom of the Pontevedra Assembly.
Everything is relative, and in Pontevedra there were not only my uncle’s
henchmen but his own public policy, directed by the strict principles
which the reader will imagine.
The editor of _El Teucrense_ was also there. That petty sheet was a
devoted supporter of my uncle at that time, although it used to abuse
him soundly six months before; but there are magical sops to throw to
such Cerberuses. They talked a great deal about local politics, which
were so small that they were fairly microscopic.
We took our coffee in the Tejo and I gazed attentively at that
respectable patriarch of the vegetable world which was destined to play
a certain part in my life. The enormous, rugged trunk fantastically
covered with moss, with its bark alive and sound in spite of age, easily
supported the majestic branches of the giant of the _Ria_, as it was
styled in poetic parlance by the writers and correspondents of the
Madrid journals when they came to pass the summer there. The manner in
which it grew and spread its foliage of an intensely dark green had
something of biblical impressiveness. It was impossible to look at the
yew tree without profound veneration, as a symbol of exuberant and
maternal nature which had brought forth such a sovereign organism.
The ocean, enamored of the beauty of Galicia, embraces her lovingly with
its waves, kisses and fondles her with its spray, surrounds her,
caresses her, and extends toward her a blue hand eager to press the soft
roundness of the coast. The spreading fingers of this hand are the
_Rías_. There the air is purer, softer, and more fragrant, while the
vegetation is more southern and luxuriant. That Tejo, king of all other
trees, only on the border of a _Ria_, and on land enriched by its
waters, could spread itself with such lordly pride. It was the real
monument of that region. It gave a name to the country seat; it served
as a landmark to the boatmen and fishermen when in doubt how to find
their way back to San Andrés. From its lofty summit one could overlook
the surrounding country, and see not only the hamlets on the seashore,
but also the group of islands, the famous _Casitérides_ of the ancient
geographers, and the boundless extent of a sea almost Grecian in its
quiet beauty.
In order to build the three balconies, one above another, which adorned
it, neither great architectural science nor unusual skill were needed.
All they had to do was to take advantage of the splendid horizontal
position of its branches, and build on that strong foundation some
circular platforms, guarded by a light balustrade, running around them.
The winding staircase found a natural support in the very trunk of the
giant. Its foliage was so dense that no one, from the ground, could see
those who were taking coffee or refreshments in the second story, nor
those who were dancing in the first, while the person who climbed to the
third had to come to the front of the balcony in order to be seen.
Each story had its name. The first was the ball-room, the second the
supper-room, and the third, “Bellavista.”
At Aldao’s you would often hear some one say: “Did you go up to
Bellavista this morning?” “No, I went no further than the ball-room.”
To tell the truth, even if Señor Aldao should be displeased by it, the
ball-room was not very spacious. However, it was large enough to enable
them to dance a contra-dance there very comfortably, to the sound of the
piano, which was brought out into the garden on such festive occasions.
And it was quite charming to dance under its green awning, between its
green walls, which hardly allowed the sunlight to flicker through. The
platform used to shake a great deal, and so the exercise was dancing and
swinging at the same time.