THE REGIMENT OF SAN ANTONIO.
You must know, Señora patrona, and señores, my friends, that Saint
Anthony, the patron of Portugal and patriarch of monks, though born
at Heraclea in Upper Egypt, on the borders of Acadia, so long ago as
the third century, is now a member of the battalion in which I have
the honour to hold the commission of major; and that he has been many
times visible in its ranks, mounting guard, and always when under
fire, or engaged with the French or Spaniards. Under Wellington in
the last war he was frequently seen among our men, clad in a cloak of
white wool, and wearing an inner garment of hair-cloth, with a bell
tied to his neck, and a pig trotting beside him, for it was his
favourite animal when he was hermit near the village of Coma. When
our esteemed regiment was first embodied about a century and a half
ago at the city of Lagos, in the ancient kingdom of Algarve, the
blessed St. Anthony was enrolled in the muster-book thereof, as a
private soldier, that he might be its especial patron and protector,
even as he is the patron of the whole Portuguese nation.
He conducted himself with such fidelity, valour, and distinction,
that he soon passed through the ranks of corporal and sergeant, and
having restored, no one exactly knows how, the colours of the
regiment, after they were lost at the battle of Almanza in 1706, he
was appointed captain, and his pay, together with four marevedis from
each soldier, were devoted to buy masses for the souls of our
comrades who die on service--a very pretty perquisite, padre José,
for mother church.
It would be a vain task in me to attempt enumerating the miracles
performed by St. Anthony during the one hundred and eighty seven
years he has belonged to the valiant regiment of Lagos in the kingdom
of Algarve; for in danger, doubt, difficulty, or death, his comrades
have never sought his aid in vain.
Our colours have been thrice lost in battle, after prodigious
slaughter you may be sure--being Portugese colours; and were thrice
restored to us, being found quietly in the colonel's tent the next
morning, with the naked footmarks of a man and a pig--the blessed pig
of course--impressed upon the turf! At the passage of the
Guadalquiver, our drum-major was swept away and would have been
drowned beyond a doubt, had he not called upon St. Anthony; and lo!
an old man of most venerable aspect, clad in skins like this shepherd
beside us, but with a long beard and leathern water-bottle hanging at
his girdle, suddenly appeared among the reeds by the river side, and
stretching out his crook, fished up the ponderous Anibale Pintado
lightly as a straw, though he was at that moment in heavy marching
order, with knapsack, blanket, great-coat, sword and his canteen,
which was full of brandy. Then to think of the wounds that have been
closed, the bullets that have been extracted, the bones that have
been set, the sick made whole and fit for service, by our soldiers
merely thinking on, or praying to, the glorious St. Anthony, would
occupy all the paper in the kingdom of Algarve; but his crowning
miracle was the birth of a child of the regiment, for one of our
soldiers' wives being in labour, during the siege of Roses, and
calling upon the saint in her pain, to the astonishment of the whole
allied armies was delivered of a little drummer boy in the uniform of
the battalion of Lagos! I hope I have now said enough to convince
you that the regiment, and every member of it, are under the peculiar
protection of the saint, and this, as I am about to have the honour
of telling you, I experienced myself, although not a Portugese, but a
native of the fair city of Seville; and as a further proof of what I
have adduced, I will take the liberty of reading to you from my
pocket-book, the following certificate of the military service
performed by the saint--which certificate I copied fairly from the
books of the noble regiment of Lagos in the kingdom of Algarve, being
the document which was forwarded by one of my predecessors, then in
command of the battalion, when recommending the blessed saint to
further promotion from the rank of captain which he had held since
the year 1706. (With this long and pompous flourish, the Spaniard
opened his pocket-book, and read a translation from the Portugese,
which ran as follows.)*
* See notes at end
"Don Herculeo Antonio Carlos Luiz, José Maria de Albuquerque e Arajo
de Magalhaens Homem, noble of Her Majesty's household, cavalier of
the sacred order of St. John of Jerusalem, and of the most
illustrious the military order of Christ, lord of the towns and
partidos of Moncarapacho and Terragudo, hereditary alcalde-mayor of
the ancient city of Faro by the sea, and Major of the Regiment of
Infantry of the noble city of Lagos in the kingdom of Algarve, for
her most faithful majesty, Donna Maria, Francesco Isabella the first;
whom God and the Blessed Virgin long preserve, &c., &c., &c.
"I hereby attest and certify to all who shall see these presents,
signed at the bottom with my sign-manual, and the broad seal of my
family arms a little to the left thereof, that the Lord St. Anthony
of Lisbon (commonly and most falsely called of Padua) has been
enlisted, and has borne a place in this regiment since the 24th of
January, ever since the year of our Blessed Lord Jesus Christ 1668.
"I do further certify, upon my word of honour, as a noble, a knight,
and a good Catholic, what hereunder followeth.
"That on the said 24th of January, 1668, by order of His Majesty Don
Pedro II. (whom God hath in glory), then Regent of the valiant
kingdoms of Portugal and Algarve for Don Alphonso VI.,--St. Anthony
was duly enlisted as a private soldier in this Infantry Regiment of
Lagos, when it was first formed by command of the same illustrious
prince; and of that holy enlistment there is a register extant in
vol. i. of the records of the said regiment, page 143, wherein he
gave as security or caution for his good conduct, the queen of
angels, who became answerable to the colonel that he would never
desert his colours, but always behave as became a good Portugese
grenadier. Hence did the saint continue to serve and do duty as a
private until the 12th of March, 1683, on which day the same Prince
Regent became King of Portugal by the death of his brother Don
Alphonso VI., when he was graciously pleased to promote St. Anthony
to the rank of Lieutenant of Grenadiers in the said regiment, for
having, a short time before, valiantly put himself at the head, of a
detachment of the regiment which was marching from Jurumenha to the
garrison of Olivença, both in the province of Alentizo, and beat off
four times their number of Castilians who had been lying in ambush
for them, with the intention of carrying them all prisoners to the
castle of Badajoz, the enemy having obtained information by spies, of
the march of the said detachment, every soldier of which saw our
blessed patron, visibly, and to all appearance in the body, and
attended by his pig.
"I do further certify, that in all the above-cited registers, there
is not any note of St. Anthony being guilty of bad conduct, disorder,
or drunkenness; frequenting taverns, or other improper places; nor of
his ever having been flogged or sent to the guard-house when a
private: Thus during the whole time he has been an officer, now about
one hundred and nine years, he has constantly done his duty with the
greatest alacrity, at the head of the grenadiers, upon all occasions,
in peace or war, conducting himself like an officer and a gentleman
of good breeding; on all these accounts I hold him most worthy of
being promoted to the rank of aggregate-major to our noble regiment
of Lagos, with every other favour Her Majesty may be graciously
pleased to bestow upon him. In testimony whereof, I have hereto
affixed my name, at the Castle of Belem, this 25th day of March, in
the year of our redemption, 1777.
"MAGALHAENS HOMEM."
(Thus ended this wonderful certificate, the contents of which,
together with the pompous gravity of the reader, made Jack and I
almost choke with suppressed laughter. The major then continued)--
Hereupon Her Most Faithful Majesty, who reigned at that time--now
seventy-eight years ago--was pleased to promote the saint to the rank
prayed for, and he is now our lieutenant-colonel by brevet. Once in
each year it is the custom to send an officer to Lisbon to receive
the pay and perquisites of St. Anthony from the royal treasury, and
in the course of last year this most honourable duty devolved upon me.
We were then quartered at Barbacena in the jurisdiction of Elvas; and
to this place I travelled alone from Lisbon, with the pay of the
saint, which was to be given to the care of our chaplain. Being in
moidores, it was not very bulky, but its value was great--its
sanctity greater; and after traversing in safety the whole province
of Alentijo, it was with some anxiety I saw the mountain Sierra,
which lay between me and my destination, rising in my front, about
sunset. The hope of being able to get across those rocky hills
before the approaching night set fairly in never occurred to me. I
found myself in a solitary spot, without shelter near, or any place
where information of the right way could be gathered, and my horse
was growing weary.
The sunlight died away behind me, and shed its last rays on the white
walls, the square campanile and tall cypresses of a convent which
crowned a height on my left; and on the red round towers of an old
castle that topped a rock on my right; but both were in ruins and
desolate, as the wars of the infidel Moors, ages ago, had left the
first, and the desolating retreat of Marshal Massena had left the
second. The older fragments of a Roman aqueduct lay between, and
half hidden among wild shrubs. The pathway was rugged; untamed goats
scrambled about; snakes hissed in the long grass, and eagles screamed
in mid air. Ave Maria! it was impossible to conceive a place more
dreary and desolate; but the way became still wilder, and as I
progressed into the gorge of the Sierra, even the ruined works of man
and the traces of his feet disappeared. I was in a desert, and, save
the faint crescent moon, without a light or guide.
As I rode slowly on, thinking of the bright golden moidores of our
Lord St. Anthony, with which my pouch was blessed, and reflecting on
the prize they would be for any sacrilegious picaros who might be
hovering in this dark wilderness, ever and anon humming a song,
muttering an ave, and feeling the percussion caps on my pistols, I
suddenly met a strange figure in the dim moonlight--a goat-herd, as
he seemed to me.
He was clad in a zamarra of sheepskin, which he wore with the wool
outwards; his white hair hung in tangled masses upon his shoulders; a
bota was slung at his girdle, and he carried a stout Portuguese
cajado, with a little cross stick nailed thereon, to give it more the
aspect of a pastoral staff, than a weapon of defence.
"Vaya usted con Dios, Señor Major," said he.
"God be with you," I reiterated, a little scared on finding that this
stranger knew my name; "you have the advantage of me, Señor Pastor."
"Hombre, do you think so? but do not be alarmed, for I am an old
Christian, without stain of Moor or Jew in my veins. I am no
enchanter----"
"Ave Maria, I should hope not!"
"Yet I know that you have in your pouch the pay of St. Anthony of
Lisbon, whom rogues and fools style of Padua--what the devil should
he have to do with Padua?--in your left breast pocket, all in fair
round moidores of gold--eh, señor?"
"Very true, pastor," said I, slipping a finger into my near holster,
and keeping my horse well in hand and beyond the reach of his cajado;
"but how came you to know me?"
"I know every officer and soldier in the regiment of Lagos as well as
if I had made them--and you especially, Señor Major."
"Well--and about the moidores," said I, uneasily; "you know of them,
and what then?"
"Merely this, Señor Don Joaquim; that if you would arrive at
Barbacena to-morrow with the pay of the patron of the regiment of
Lagos----"
"In the kingdom of Algarve," suggested Jack Slingsby.
"Si, señor; and would hand it over safe and sound to the reverend
chaplain," continued the old man, in a manner so impressive that a
chill came over me, the more so as I saw his sunken eyes shining in
the dim moonlight like two bits of green glass; "you will beware, my
son and comrade, how you taste the wine of Xeres to-night."
"The wine of Xeres, father pastor," said I, with a loud laugh;
"Heaven forgive you for the tempting thought; I am not likely to
taste aught to-night but the chilling dew; yet if a good cup of Xeres
did come my way----"
"Avoid it as you would poison, or by the soul of St. Anthony you will
repent it."
At that name I raised my hand to my cap in salute, like a good
soldier of the regiment of Lagos; while waving his hand
authoritatively, the old man hobbled up the slope of the mountain
pass and disappeared. As he did so I heard the tinkle of a bell, and
for the first time perceived a little pig trotting by his side as he
vanished in the shadow of the mountain and its moonlit rocks.
The scales fell from my eyes; por el Santo de los Santos, he was no
other than our Lord Saint Anthony, whom I had seen. Who but he would
have termed me "son and comrade?" sinner and fool that I was. The
hair of my flesh stood up, as the Scripture says, and with a prayer
on my lips I gored my poor nag with the spurs and dashed along the
pass of the Sierra for two leagues more until the poor animal almost
sank beneath me; but perceiving rest necessary for him, I reined up
at the door of a lonely wayside inn, in a part of the country which
was entirely unknown to me, and which seemed to be overshadowed by
mountain peaks and masses of rock, the features and outlines of which
were strange, and to me gloomy and fantastic. In my excitement, and
the holy terror under which I laboured, I had evidently lost the
path, and thus mistaking my way, had ridden, Heaven and St. Anthony
alone knew whither.
Solitary, dark, and desolate as this posada seemed,--and it was just
the kind of place we so often read of in romances as being a
rendezvous for robbers, and for having a landlord in their interest,
with trap-doors under the beds, stains of blood upon the floors, old
skeletons in the cellars, and a terrible reputation for mysterious
appearances and unaccountable disappearances--it was a welcome
halting-place for one so weary, so thirsty, and anxious as I was
then, and so full of supernatural fear, as I never, for an instant,
doubted having seen the blessed patron of our regiment, and to me at
that time the human countenance even of a robber had been thrice
welcome.
Though the hour was late the hostalero had not gone to bed. He
seemed a civil and respectable man, and smiled with good-humour when
he saw me, with all the care of an old traveller and the suspicion of
a true Spaniard, transfer my pistols from their holsters to my
girdle, a movement which seemed to fill with alarm the miserable and
drabbish-looking Maritornes, who seemed to be the sole assistant of
the patrona. Vague fancies and a sense of alarm were floating
uppermost in the current of my thoughts; and being most anxious to
start betimes when day broke, I left the saddle on my horse, as I
stabled him in the lower apartment of the posada, for you may know,
señores, that the Portuguese inns are constructed exactly like those
among us here in Spain, the lower story being entirely one vast and
clay-floored chamber, appropriated to the cattle and baggage of
travellers. I merely relaxed the saddle-girth and curb-chain, but
left my Andalusian jennet all ready for marching, when the morning
came, and then ascended by a wooden trap-stair to the upper story,
where the patrona had a steaming supper of ham and eggs, just such as
we have had, well seasoned with pepper and garlic, spread for me,
with a bunch of raisins and a choice flask of--ah, demonio! my heart
leaped when I saw it--the wine of Xeres de la Frontierra.
A prayer rose to my lips, I thought of St. Anthony, but felt strong
and composed, believing that I was under the peculiar care of that
blessed patron of the regiment of Lagos. I would have left the
little venta and betaken myself once more to the road, but, if any
snare was really laid for me, such a movement might only render me
more liable to an open and deliberate attack.
"I will be wary," thought I; "let me watch well, even as our holy
patron watches me. Xeres! ouf, I would rather drink the salt lake of
Fuente de la Piedra than touch a drop of it."
I felt morally certain that it was poisoned or drugged for some fatal
purpose, and that in the tasting of it lay the main part of my
danger. I finished the rasher of ham and the fragrant huevos; and to
lull all suspicion asked my host to join me in discussing the bottle
of Xeres as he uncorked it.
"The señor would, perhaps, excuse him. Xeres always made him ill,
maldito--yes, and there was no doctor nearer than Elvas or Abrantes;
but he would take a glass of aguadiente to my health and successful
journey."
"Rascally picaro!" thought I; "you have other reasons for declining
the Xeres, but I shall mar them yet."
I might have forced him with my sword at his throat to drink a
cupful; but I dissembled, and filling out a bumper from the leathern
beta, raised it to my lips, pretending to taste. I saw, then, the
slow stealthy eyes of the hostalero watching me keenly.
"It has a peculiar flavour," said I.
"Flavour, señor?" he asked, anxiously.
"But not unpleasant."
"It is from the grapes of Puerto de Santa Maria, like those of
Tribujena, as the Señor Caballero will perceive; they have a peculiar
flavour--sharp, is it not?"
"Yes, but as I said before, not unpleasant," continued I, placing my
pistols on the table, and availing myself of an opportunity to pour
the whole of my bumper back into the bota, and this I achieved
unseen. Some grounds which remained at the bottom of the crystal
glass assured me that the wine was drugged.
"I have a pigskin full of wine from the grapes of Don Carlos, or
rather I should say of my Lord the Marquis de Santa Cruz, who now
owns the vineyard; and if your grace----"
"Many thanks," said I, pouring out a second bumper, so that the wine
frothed in the glass; "but be assured I shall content myself with
this most excellent bottle of Xeres," and taking another opportunity,
while the patrona was telling her beads near the fire, and the worthy
patron was below pretending to groom my horse--but no doubt to
appraise its furniture which he expected to possess before morning--I
repeated the manoeuvre, and poured the wine back into its leathern
receptacle; thus my deluded entertainers were led to believe that I
had taken enough to drug a regiment of Asturians.
I scrutinised my hostess; she was a swarthy and dark-skinned
Portuguese; her hair, which was coarse and thick as the mane of a
steed, she had knotted in a coronet round her head, and over this she
wore a yellow shawl. Her features were square, massive, and
repulsive; and her arms and legs, which her scanty garments fully
displayed, were disgustingly powerful and muscular.
"Are you not somewhat lonely here, señora?" I asked, when her orisons
were over.
"Yes; but then we are never disturbed. Once, indeed, some drunken
contrabandistas, riding to Gibraltar, made a noise at our door; but
my husband shot one with his escopeta, the rest fled, and we have
never been molested since. But erelong the new railway from Lisbon
to Abrantes will change everything--for so the priests predict."
"You talk of this little shooting affair with delightful coolness,"
said I, "and just as if that devil of a contrabandista had been a
crow. Ah, and so he was shot?"
"Yes, and buried about a mile beyond this," replied the woman, over
whose dark eyes there passed a savage gleam; "perhaps, caballero, you
observed the cross as you came along?"
"You forget that I came this morning from Montemor o Novo, where I
wish I had stayed with all my heart."
"Ah, our caza is a very poor one, señor," growled the host, with a
glance at my glass and another at the bota: "but none ever complain
of it after they leave us."
"I believe you, my lad," said I, with a glance at the cuchillo in his
sash; madre mia! it was at least twelve inches long in the blade. He
detected my expression and said,--
"I am always well armed, Señor Caballero, for my little wife, our
niece, and I, are the only inhabitants here. They are apt to be
timid at times; thus I always keep my escopeta loaded, and six
junkets of lead in that old brass-mouthed trabujo over the
mantel-piece; so with my knife and strong bolts, bars and shutters,
we could stand a very good siege, even if Don Fabrique de Urquija and
all his band were assailing us. One glass more of the Xeres before
you retire, señor--no?--well, how such a sober Caballero belongs to
the regiment of Lagos surpasses my--a thousand pardons, señor; I
meant no offence; but a poor man must have his little joke as well as
a rich one, and I am sure a noble Caballero will excuse it. So you
won't take one glass more of the Xeres before retiring, well,
well--this way, señor, up this stair--take care of the step, and now,
señor, Bueno noches, and may all good attend you."
I was alone. I was in my sleeping apartment, a miserable loft, to
which I had ascended by means of a trap-door and trap-stair. The bed
was poor and shabby; a thousand discolorations, the combined result
of damp and dirt covered the ill-plastered walls and bare wooden
floor. A small and ill-glazed window opened to the dark mountains,
behind which the moon, a pale crescent, was just sinking, and to the
deep black gorge which yawned between their peaks like some vast
Titan's grave. There was not a sound upon those solemn hills, or in
that savage pass through which the roadway wound; there was no sound
in the posada below me, and as I set down the candle and listened, I
heard only its sputtering and the beating of my own heart.
I knelt down, and drawing forth my beads and crucifix, said my
prayers like a good Catholic, and solemnly invoked the protection of
St. Anthony. After this, apprehension almost vanished.
If any attempt was made upon me in the night, I had but one man to
oppose--the hostalero, and surely I was a match for him. But then
there was his wife, a powerful Asturian termagant, who had doubtless
the cunning of a fox with the strength of a bull. I looked about for
something wherewith to secure the trapdoor, but found nothing; my
bedstead was the only piece of furniture, and it was too weighty for
removal. I might have lain down and slept above the trap; but the
idea did not then occur to me; and at times, as my candle burned low,
such is the weakness of the human heart, that I began to mistrust
even the protection of my Lord St. Anthony, and think I was unwise in
not quitting this unblessed posada, instead of retiring to a
bed-chamber, as the hostalero might be joined by others more
ruffianly than himself, and thus overpower me.
"No, no," thought I; "no others will come; the rascal trusts in his
Xeres, and I shall soon see the sequel."
I drew off my boots and flung them heavily on the floor, as one might
do who was undressing; and having thus, as I supposed, deceived any
one who was listening, drew them carefully on again; tightened the
buckle of my waist-belt, and loosened my good Toledo sabre in its
sheath. I then examined my pistols; ay de mi! what were my emotions
on finding the percussion caps removed, and that my pouch, with the
remainder, was in my holsters below!
My heart stood still on beholding this, and an emotion of rage shook
my heart, for I now remembered having laid them on the table beside
me in case of accident, for I once had a friend who was killed by a
pistol exploding in his belt. The patrona, while laying the supper
table, or bustling about me, had adroitly--but the saints alone know
how--removed the caps.
Twenty times I searched every pocket, in the faint and desperate hope
of finding a stray one. Not one--they were all below with my
holsters.
"Ass that I am!" thought I, replacing them with a sigh in my belt;
"this will be a lesson of prudence that may cost me dear."
At that moment the candle-end sank down in the iron holder; it shot
one red flush upwards on the cobwebbed ceiling and damp, discoloured
walls; on the ill-jointed trap-door which led to the lower story, and
expired. I was in darkness at last, with no companions but my Toledo
and my own thoughts. The first was silent--the second sufficiently
uncomfortable.
Sleepless and watchful, I lay on the miserable pallet for more than
an hour, till the silence began to oppress me, and in spite of
myself, my eyes were closing. Could it be the drug--could it be the
wine that slowly was sealing them up? Nonsense; I had but put it to
my lips, and I struggled to shake off the coming sleep. Yet, I must
have closed my eyes for a moment, for I started suddenly, like one
who dreams he is on the brink of a precipice. A strange shivering--a
minute, pricking sensation ran all over me from head to foot, and
from a state of drowsiness, I sprang all at once to the sharpest
wakefulness, and grasped the hilt of my drawn sabre.
A dim light was now ascending from the floor of the apartment, and I
perceived the trap-door was lifted up, and the round bullet-head of
the hostalero appeared, with his deep-set stealthy eyes, scanning the
bed and its occupant, myself, who affected to be sound asleep. Up,
up he came, step by step, until he stood by my side, with one hand
grasping his long cuchillo, and a finger on his coarse, blubber-like
lips, as if he would impose silence on himself, and still his very
breathing.
Mueran del Demonio, what a moment it was! I would not endure it
again for a million of reals. He came close to the bed; he stooped
over me, the knife was lifted up, and I saw its baleful gleam; but at
the same instant there was an upward flash, as I swept my sabre round
me, and one stroke cut off three of the robber's fingers, and cleft a
fair slice off his right temple--a stroke which stretched him without
a cry at my feet. Desperate and furious as a wild beast--half
blinded with his own blood, he sprang upon me and we grappled in the
dark; but as his wife, that diabolical Asturian, rushed up the
trap-stair, armed with a ponderous cajado, to his aid, I flung him on
the bed, for he was weak as a child now. Seeing a figure struggling
on the miserable pallet, the woman, who was as furious as an enraged
tigress, and who, in the uncertain light, believed that figure to be
mine, whirled round her head the cajado--which is the favourite staff
of the Portuguese, and is usually seven feet long, with a leaden knob
at one end of it--and by one blow dashed out her husband's brains as
completely as a cannon-ball would have done.
Madre mia, some of that frightful mess flew over me, and that blow
ended the matter, for I uttered a cry of horror, and plunging down
the trap-stair, threw myself on my horse, and galloped away. On, on
I rode, with no wish but to leave that scene of crime behind me, and
at the very place where I was met by that venerable shepherd, whom,
until my dying hour, I will maintain to be no other than our blessed
St. Anthony, but for whose warning I had drunk that poisoned Xeres,
and perished--I overtook a troop of the Carbineros of Alentejo, to
whom I told my late adventure.
A party was sent to the little inn, where they found the hostalero
brained, as I have said, in that miserable loft, and the hostess
almost bereft of her senses, such as they were. But the dragoons
placed her on a troop horse, and brought her before the Alcalde of
Vimiero, which is the nearest town, and before the next day's noon,
she had been garotted and buried by the wayside; and you may still
see her grave, one mile beyond the gates, on the side of the way that
leads towards Estremoz and the mountains.
Two days after, I reached Barbacena, our headquarters, in safety, and
paid over to our Father Chaplain, the purse of moidores, containing
the pay of our extra Lieutenant-Colonel, the blessed St. Anthony.
Only a month ago, we marched through the pass of the Sierra, and I
found the old posada roofless by the roadside, for it is shunned like
that place of horror, the Rio de Muerte; the grass has grown on its
floor, and the wild vine overtops its chimney; the merriest muleteer
becomes silent as he passes the place, and whips his lagging team
down the mountain side, without looking once behind him.
----------
The major of the noble Regiment of Lagos now paused, and looked round
with the air of a man who thinks his story has rather made an
impression; for he had told it well, and with much gesture and
spirit, and completely succeeded in arresting the attention of all in
the venta; but of none more than my matter-of-fact friend Jack
Slingsby, who had listened to the narrative with a degree of
attention which I thought unusual in one so volatile and heedless.
"Your story, major, has had a peculiar interest for me by its
striking and close resemblance to an adventure of my own," said Jack,
"an adventure to which I can never recur without an emotion of
horror."
"Is this the Spanish story you so often refer to, Jack?" said I.
"The story our mess could never get out of me?--yes."
"And shall we hear it now?"
"With pleasure; because it will interest all here, whereas among our
own bantering fellows at Gibraltar it would only have subjected me,
perhaps, to jibes and jokes, and all that sort of thing, from those
who were, perhaps, more thoughtless than myself. Señora patrona,
please to have the wine replenished; give us more cigars, and stir up
the fire, Ramble, while I prepare to tell you a story--aye, a marvel
of a story, in which I had the misfortune to be a principal actor not
very long ago."
"Bravo!" muttered every one.
All were provided with a fresh supply of wine, new cigars were
lighted, and Jack found himself the centre of a circle of dark,
gleaming, and intelligent eyes, while every ear was waiting for the
promised narrative; for among the romantic, adventurous, and
marvel-loving Spaniards, as among the wandering Arabs, a story-teller
is at all times the principal person in company.
It would be scarcely possible to find a scene more remarkable, or a
group more picturesque, than the great apartment presented, in which
we were all congregated.
A large fire blazed on its broad hearth, and shed a ruddy glow upon
the rough architecture and ill-squared beams of the chamber, from the
roof of which hung innumerable bunches of raisins, strings of the
garlic onion, pigskins of wine, hams, baskets, and other etcetera.
The flood of steady red light that gushed from the hearth glared on
the striking forms and foreign faces of the listening group, among
whom were the well-conditioned potters and soap-boilers of Seville in
their black velvet jackets and gaudy sashes; our patrona, a plump and
pretty paisana of Valverde, in her provincial costume, a dark blue
skirt, the scantiness of which displayed her well-turned legs and
handsome feet encased in little shoes of untanned leather, while the
gathered masses of her smooth black hair shone in the glow of light;
there, too, sat the old padre José of Medina in his sable cape and
long cassock, and a grisly goatherd of the Honda clad from neck to
knee in sheepskins, with a weatherbeaten sombrero slouched over his
sallow visage; a knife and bota, castanets and flute, at his girdle,
to which descended his snow-white beard, giving him the aspect of St.
Anthony in the major's story; then there was the major himself in his
light green frock-coat, scarlet cap and trowsers, with a cigar
glowing like a hot coal in the centre of his heavy thick mustache;
then there was an old unhoused Franciscan, begging for that
subsistence of which the new Government had deprived his order; a
charming young Gitana, tall and beautiful in form, with a clear olive
complexion and magnificent eyes; and by her side sat a free, jolly
Catalan reaper, whom in defiance of all gypsy rule and immemorial
custom she had taken as her spouse; so it must be acknowledged that
if Jack's audience was not select, it had at least the merit of being
so remarkable in costume and character, that a painter or novelist
would have been delighted with the whole group, its background, and
accessories.
"In many of its features," said Slingsby, "my story is so similar to
the one just related by the major, that I am assured you cannot fail
to be struck with the resemblance. The adventure made a deep
impression upon me; and though several months have passed since it
occurred, the whole affair is as fresh in my mind as if it had
happened only yesterday. On leaving the 6th Regiment," continued
Jack, turning to me, "I went for a few months into the Highlanders,
but, being an Englishman, I never felt at home in the kilt, so I
exchanged into our present corps, which will account for my being in
the Mediterranean at the time referred to.--So now for the story."
"Bravo, señor!" said the major of the regiment of Lagos; "you speak
Spanish like a good Christian. We are all attention."
Jack bowed, stuck his glass in his eye, tipped the ashes off his
cigar with the nail of his forefinger, and began the following story,
which deserves an entire chapter devoted to itself.