José María de Pereda

“ What evident happiness! Aunt Simona, grasping the handle of the frying-pan in one hand and a wooden spoon in the other, and crouching down upon the bare floor, feels more important than the emperor of China, and regards her task as more difficult and critical than that of an ambassador of peace between two powerful nations engaged in desperate fighting. A great pity it was that the student had not arrived, in order fittingly to celebrate Christmas Eve. ”

“ And in proof that they do not say so for the mere pleasure of opening their mouths, no sooner is the corn harvested, and the fall grass cut, and the wheat threshed, and no sooner do the thatched roofs begin to weep down drop by drop in the morning the dew that has fallen in the night, than you find them inviting to their kitchen every neighbor who may choose to favor it with his presence. ”

“ When he learns that they have come and gone, he fills the kitchen with his howls. His father begins to cuff him, but his mother and the student interpose. The fire goes out, the light of the candle flickers, the girl nods, the cat lazily mews, Jeromo's pipe falls from his mouth more than once, the Seminarist talks stupidly about the phenomena of light; and when the neighing of the marzantes is heard far away, with slow and reluctant steps the family of Uncle Jeromo go to seek in repose the end of the lively and pleasant evening.
Aunt Simona is the last to go. ”

“ I am accustomed to do with little; and picking out the very best I've had in my life, it has never been anything but pain and trouble. Seeing here, about you, something so entirely different, you know what a value I set on it—and whose fault it is that I do. There's a man needed in this house. Are you taking in what I am telling you, Sotileza?"
Sotileza was giving heed to it only too well. For that very reason she replied with a certain curtness:—
"Yes, I am; but what of it?"
"Again? Confound it! you make me that answer again," cried Cleto angrily. ”

“ You are a pretty little mischief-maker, Theresa! I shall take that as a warning. Well, then, I was saying to my friend that you were all so much prettier when you went out with nothing on your head, with your hair so beautifully done up, and those fetching little kerchiefs round your necks, like the one you have on now, than when you wear a mantilla and shawl, which hide the graceful outlines. ”

“ Tuerto no sooner hears these words than he fells his culprit spouse to the floor with a resounding whack, rushes to the bed, rummages amid the contents of the poor mattress, pulls out from it a small bottle which contains the remainder of the contraband liquor, and returning with it towards his wife, hurls it at her head at the moment when she is just getting up from the floor. It knocks her down anew, and the children are sprinkled with the flying spirits. The wretched woman, sorely hurt, laments and groans; the frightened children weep ”

“ A gentleman who came back to the place loaded with money-bags,—who has made ladies and gentlemen of all his relations,—who no sooner learns his neighbor's need than he goes to help him,—who single-handed bears almost all the taxes of the village, and who puts an end to all lawsuits, that Justice may not absorb the rights of the one who wins nor the property of the other side, and in return for all this bounty asks only the blessing of honest men. What greater satisfaction could one ask than to see our son some day as highly esteemed as Don Damian? ”

“ And one day the girl says to the king, 'Father, I am in love with the one who has cured me, and if you please, I would like to marry him.' And the king says to her, for he was very good and thought the world of her, that he has no objection to it; only, the marriage must not take place till she is as sound as a bell, and if, supposing a case, she should die from a relapse, the shepherd was to be hung. ”

“ Over there in our tenement there was nothing of the kind, by a long chalk: filth and brutishness, the good name of every person they spoke of pitched head first out of the balcony, not a scrap of decency about anything they did. By thunder! it's enough to give a fellow a bad temper, even if he was born with one like sugar. That's the way I came to give you that slap, Sotileza; if it wasn't, I would tell you so, honestly. Why, if any one was to say to me, right here and how, 'Cleto, you go and jump off the ramparts for Sotileza,' I would do it. ”

“ A West Indian of this stamp will pass the best years of his youth meeting with one disappointment after another, and still will not despair. No work is so difficult as to frighten him, no opposition can lessen his faith. Fortune is there, smiling behind his bad luck, as real to his vision and his touch as in his boyhood, when, dreaming of her rich gifts, he swung to and fro in the high branches of the walnut tree which shaded the hut where he was born. ”

“ I'm in my ball-dress I had on Sunday when you met us near the gas factory."
"And nothing would induce you to look at me, Theresa! You were having such fun!"
"There were eight or nine of us!"
"Oh, surely nine, Theresa. You seemed to me the nine Muses, all in one graceful band together!"
"Oh, get along with you! You are always laughing at people and calling them names!" ”

“ The feeble, flickering flame seizes upon the dry thorns, and quickly a column of fire goes crackling up to the very flooring of the garret, lighting up the faces of the company against the dark, gleaming background of the smoky, walls, in a way that would delight Rembrandt, if he could come back from the dead to look upon the scene. ”

“ They raise the cover, and there on the bottom, between heaps of flour, bran, and half of a ham, are seen two large jars filled with milk. The boy of the house looks at his friend with an air of triumph. Both of them fasten their eager eyes upon the jars. Both of them stretch out their right hand, and both moisten their forefinger in the milk, each in his own jar. Continuing to move as if by a common impulse, they draw their arms out of the chest, and stand face to face, sucking their fingers. ”

“ I can live on just nothing at all, Sotileza; for as sure as God is in heaven, what makes me fatter than anything is to have a little order, a grain of human kindness, a scrap or two of jolly good-nature, in the house. By the powers, how I should enjoy that kind of thing! ”

“ One and all, like Andrew, were going to America to seek their fortunes, and all were going practically at the mercy of chance, like himself. And to tell the exact truth, many of them had not even a letter, such as Don Damian had written for Andrew. Of all those who are setting forth with our hero, perhaps not one will find what he goes in search of; all perhaps are gazing for the last time on the land of their birth.
Now Aunt Nisca has found the berth her son is to occupy during the voyage. ”

“ I hope I find you well," began Don Simon, uncovering his head with a grandly sweeping bow, and tendering his right hand to him of the new-plowed land.
"Me? ye-up, I'm well," replied the "Squire," without sign of a movement to take the proffered hand.
"Do you smoke?" the candidate now inquired, feeling for his cigar-case.
"Once in a while, if the tobacco is good for anything." ”

“ A bow of ribbon in Sabel's hair, a new gather in the sleeves of Clavellina's waist, which immediately catch Aunt Cimiana's attention, are enough and more than enough to excite the artistic enthusiasm of the rustic modiste.
"Well, if you girls nowadays don't beat all! After one has worn one's self out in cutting a dress, there you come out at the end with, this is lacking and the other is wrong, that isn't the style, this must be turned, and the other twisted. ”

“ To write a volume about the habits and customs of these mountain people without dedicating some pages to the seamstress, would be depriving Santander of one of its chief features. So important and conspicuous is this part of the population that the weaker sex there, after making some necessary exceptions, might be divided in equal parts between women who are seamstresses and those who are not. ”

“ For you see, Sotileza, it's one thing for a man to be chock full of feelings like this, and another thing for him to speak up and tell his girl about them, if he's tongue-tied like me and can't put two words together. It knocks me all out when I think what you are, and then what I am,—the very mud of the gutter, in comparison. Well, I just couldn't hold it all in any longer, and I went to some folks that understand how to talk about this kind of thing, to get them to come and see you for me. ”

“ Uncle Tremontorio, who arrived from the sea at the same time with his mates Bolina [Billy Bowline] and Tuerto, had been in his balcony knitting away at his fishing-nets (his customary occupation when at home) from the beginning of the dispute between his neighbors. From time to time he would take a bite out of a hunk of bread, and another of dried codfish, the provision that constituted his usual dinner. Though he is perfectly well posted about what has just taken place [across the narrow street] , it is not his way to mix himself up in what does not concern him. ”

“ As the ship is lost to view the poor peasant woman did not fall fainting on the paving-stones of the Mole, for God has given these poor souls a force and a faith as great as are their misfortunes.
That same afternoon, when the sun was setting, Uncle Nardo and his wife crossed the wide plain on the way to their village. Sadly they walked, and crestfallen, one behind the other. They were both thinking of Andrew, but Aunt Nisca, with the livelier imagination, thought over the whole extent of her sorrows, and found ample reason for the full bitterness of grief she was enduring. ”

“ From time to time is heard the melancholy and monotonous cry of the laborer calling his cattle; occasionally the scurrying of wooden shoes over the stones in the alley is perceived, and you need listen no longer, for no other sound indicates that there is any life in that pale and somber landscape. ”

“ Then afterwards a tumble here and a stumble there—a heavy surf, as it were, rolling round inside of me; little sleep of nights, and a lump in my throat all the time. Look you, Sotileza, I used to think there were no more troubles than those I had at home; but now I can see that I slept better, twice over, than since all this trouble began about you. I—I—don't offend anybody, do I, in talking this way, Sotileza? And then—er, while all that was going on that I was telling you just now, I got to getting fonder and fonder of you every day, and I got to having more and more respect for you ”

“ He was a lean, dark man, with a large nose, a penetrating eye, his face almost beardless, although he was by no means young; he spoke little, but that to the point; and as to confidence in men, he would have been distrustful even of his own shadow. ”

“ As God is my witness she's the worst villain unhung. What is going to become of those poor brats of mine when I am taken away from them? for the devil will never take that woman: he has no place to put her. ”

“ The unhappy mother feels that even her voice fails her for the last "adios!" Andrew realizes for the first time what it is to lose sight of his home and his native land, to go forth, little and alone, through the desert places of the earth, and weeps for the first time, perhaps regretting his undertaking. Uncle Nardo looks toward the Mole, and avoids speaking, that they may not see the tears that at last have come to his eyes, and lest his voice betray the pain in his heart. ”

“ With all this high living, the shepherd, who was good-looking anyway, got to be a fearfully handsome fellow, and as he used to go so often into the room of the king's daughter, she fell desperately in love with him. ”

“ In the broad porch of one of the houses that adorn it are two little chaps stretched out upon a heap of dried rushes. They are lying on their stomachs, their faces rest upon their hands, and they are looking into each other's eyes. ”

“ I turned around, and, man, what do you think I saw? she was just swallowing down the last drops of the spirits from the saucepan, almost ablaze as it was. Man, man, was there ever a worse curse of God?"
"Well, friend—in regard to that—ahem! what can I say to you? When a woman chooses to take the crooked path, like yours, give her the stick, and plenty of it. If with that she doesn't mend her ways and float off in good style, then either sink her to the bottom, once for all, or string yourself up to a yard-arm." ”